Why we started building coffee shops in Europe

My husband and I used to pastor in the USA. Our churches ran anywhere between three and five hundred people. We had staff people who worked with children and music and teens. We had a big house and two cars, a good salary, credit card debt and a life that often seemed overwhelming. Life was full of meetings and retreats and services and events. We started out believing that we could help people find Jesus only to find that the bigger the church the bigger the machine, and fewer people actually came to know Christ.

At some point we both heard God telling us that He had something for us to do. Something bigger and far away. We sold our house, our cars and our stuff. We quit our jobs. We paid off our debt and left our families. We moved to Europe and we started listening to people talk about what was important to them, all over Europe. Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Albania, Italy, Kosovo, Poland, Norway,Denmark and Germany. We met new friends and we asked many questions. We tried to figure out why so many young people did not go to church anymore. We prayed about how we could bring them back to a place of worship once again, a place where they really felt loved.

When we moved to Poland we started building our first coffee shops. We have never run coffee shops, but we felt God compelling us that this could be a really different type of place. We could welcome ANYONE. It didnt matter where the came from, we could offer a place to be real and safe. A place to find and discover FAITH.

It is hard to describe how it all happened and what it is like. But I think it was worth it all. This is what Helka thinks: