Arriving in Rejika

We departed at 7pm on Thursday night from Phoenix, AZ and arrived in Rejika at 5:30am on Saturday morning! While it was quite an exhausting trip, on the bright side we were able to watch an amazing sunrise from our hostel on Saturday.

And praise God that everyone and everything (like our luggage) arrived safe and in one piece! Other than a really long delay in London, our travel to Croatia went smoothly. And it’s hard to believe that there is a hostel that has the view we do- it literally overlooks the Adriatic Sea!

As you can see, the view is quite amazing and we have our window open every night to let the mild, fresh summer air in. We finally met Stevo and his wife, who are both amazing, godly individuals. They are the missionaries supported by Scottsdale Bible Church and they organized and oversee the English camp we are taking a part in. They have 3 beautiful children and their love and trust in God is so evident and inspiring.

We walked through the downtown Rejika area at night and it was quite interesting to see evidence of the old communist regime in some of the stark architecture and how it differs from the newer, more elaborate and ornate architecture that was developed after the fall of communism.



One of our team member interns (Peter from AZ) started to talk with a group of teens who were just hanging out in the downtown area, and they knew exactly who Stevo was! They talked with Peter for over an hour about their spiritual beliefs. It’s amazing to watch how the group went from being very skeptical to wanting to discuss with him why they had their beliefs, their questions, and the spiritual concepts they were wrestling with. The majority of the population there is Catholic although most are passive, agnostic, or atheist. To put this in perspective, here’s a great analogy that Stevo gave us: There are 3.5 million Croatians in Rejika, about the size of Phoenix, AZ. However only 8,000, or the size of Scottsdale Bible Church, are Christians…! Imagine if Scottsdale Bible Church was the only place in the entire city of Phoenix to interact with other Christians…and that is Rejika. It puts in perspective why it is so important for us to be here and reach out to the youth of Croatia now, and I hope we can help them find what they may be searching for spiritually.