Miracle Behind Thirteenth Sabbath Offering for Bulgaria

Praying pastor is surprised to learn his church will receive part of the offering.

By Andrew McChesney

Pastor Stoyan Petkov prayed for two years for a new church building in Sofia, Bulgaria.

As he prayed, world church leaders in the far-off United States approved a plan to earmark part of a Thirteenth Sabbath Offering to build a new church for his congregation.

Stoyan didn’t know that God had answered his prayers until after the Thirteenth Sabbath Offering was already approved. When he found out, he was thrilled!

This is what happened.

Stoyan became the pastor of the Sofia West Seventh-day Adventist Church in 2015. The congregation didn’t have a church of its own and met on the premises of an evangelical church.

The location of the church was excellent, but Stoyan noticed a problem with his congregation. Other than meeting for four hours for Sabbath School and divine worship services on Sabbath, the church was dead. No cooking classes or children’s programs were held during the week. There were no prayer meetings. Church members didn’t have any meetings to which to invite friends.

The evangelical church’s owners refused to allow the Adventist congregation to gather in the building for any meeting other than Sabbath worship. The pastor suspected that they were worried because several of their members had started attending the Sabbath services.

The last straw came when several people stopped attending Stoyan’s baptismal class. He needed more time than only a few hours every Sabbath morning to meet with the class, but he couldn’t secure more time in the building. He thought about inviting the class members to meet at the Adventist Church’s Bulgarian headquarters, but the distance was too far for many.

Stoyan combed the neighborhood in search of a new building for the congregation. He walked up and down streets, but found nothing. He led a prayer group in raising up the matter to God.

Months passed.

In late March 2017, Stoyan stopped looking for a church building. Instead, he announced that the church would hold an Easter concert. The church didn’t have a choir, nor did it have a place for the concert. But Stoyan wanted to do something to encourage the young people, who were largely inactive, to do something to share the gospel. He told them to organize the concert and to sing.

As soon as Stoyan changed his focus, big things began to happen.

The young people formed a choir, and Stoyan found a small hall with 50 seats to rent for the Easter concert. The day before the concert, however, the landlord broke the agreement.

“I’m sorry, but the hall has been leased by someone else,” he said.

Stoyan didn’t know what to do. He walked on the streets and prayed. Passing a nearly vacant shopping center, he contemplated speaking with the owner. He knew the owner but doubted that the man would agree to a rent a space. The owner earlier had vowed never to rent space to any religious organization. In addition, Stoyan only had a small amount of money.

Nevertheless, the pastor called him. To his surprise, the owner agreed to his proposal.

The second-floor hall, however, had no seats.

Stoyan spoke with a pastor who happened to be driving an ADRA van.

“No problem,” the pastor said. “I can bring 50 chairs from the church’s headquarters.”

The concert was a big success.

The owner stopped by as church members cleaned up the hall afterward.

“You are interesting people,” he said. “I like how you think. I expected lots of noise and shouting, but you are very well-mannered people.”

He and Stoyan had a nice talk, and the pastor explained how he couldn’t find a hall for the church. The next day, the owner called.

“I spoke with my wife, and I have a proposal,” he said. “I’ll demolish the wall dividing two retail spaces in the shopping center and you can have a bigger hall for your meetings.”

As they negotiated the price, the terms got even better. The owner offered use of the large hall and a retail space on the ground floor where the church could provide children’s programs for the community. The rent for the downtown space was less than leasing a church building in the countryside.

After the West Sofia church moved into the shopping center, church attendance rapidly grew and church outreach programs mushroomed. The shopping center also saw changes. New tenants moved in, and the once-empty center began to bustle. This was not lost on the owner.

“You have brought me luck, and many people are renting now,” he said.

He kept the rent low because he didn’t want to lose the church.

Stoyan was able to hold baptismal classes in the new facilities, and five people were baptized in the first year. Church members are engaged in health classes, cooking school, and children’s programs.

“Two years ago, this was unthinkable,” Stoyan said. “Before I went to church, preached, and returned home. But God has opened the doors.”

But the West Sofia church needed its own building. The rent would not always remain low and, in any case, the church already had 120 members packing the hall.

Then, out of the blue, Stoyan learned from Bulgarian church leaders that his church had been chosen to receive part of the Thirteenth Sabbath Offering in first quarter 2020.

Stoyan said good things started when he stopped worrying about how to construct a new church building and focused only on spreading the gospel and encouraging church members to share their faith.

“When we planned the Easter concert because we wanted to do something for the Lord and for the young church members, the Lord provided us with a new space to rent,” he said. “Then I knew that the Lord would provide us with our very own church building one day. It’s important to press ahead in spreading the gospel.”

Thank you for planning a generous offering to help construct a new building for Sofia West Seventh-day Adventist Church in Bulgaria’s capital.