Meet Our Partners In Spain – Daniel and Liliana Palma

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August 31, 2012

People

While we were in Spain in 1999 we had the privilege of working with Pastors Dani and Lili Palma. I have often mentioned that they helped to form our missions philosophy and our approach to ministry in general.

When we first met, Dani and Lili were missionaries to Spain from Argentina and are the pastors of Centro Familiar Cristiano they tought us some powerful principles for ministry that we have continued to implement to this day.

Ask God To Show Himself To People Through Powerful Prayer

Their main method for evangelism was to introduce people to the power of God in their lives through prayer. Not too many people, no matter how antichristian they are, will deny you if you ask to pray for their needs. And as time goes on and God faithfully works in their lives it becomes harder and harder to write these blessings off as simple coincidence. You don’t have to argue with them, you don’t have to convince them you just have to care enough for them to pray for them and let them know you are praying for them. And that leads to principle 2…

Love The People You Serve

We learned early on that you have to truly love the people who you serve. You have to identify with them, you have to know them and spend time with them and you have to invest in them. Loving people also means to tell them hard truths and live an honest open life in front of them. That had practical implications in where their children went to school (public school) to where you bought your bread (maybe paying more to see that person you have been praying for rather than getting the cheap stuff from the super market).

Seek To Please God And Not People

We can often be tempted to be people pleasers and seek to do what makes people happy, but to truly be a disciple of Christ we have to be concerned with His opinion of us and obey his call in our lives. Sometimes that means doing things that are out of the ordinary, breaking with traditions or even stepping outside of what is considered safe and taking great risks.

Prepare The Next Generation Of Leaders To Take Your Place

Discipleship is the cornerstone of spiritual growth, both as an individual and in a ministry. We have to be concerned with making sure that the message we have been entrusted with is passed on to a new generation of leaders who will carry that message into new places and to new generations. This was reflected in their multi-site philosophy of ministry and the fact that they were pastoring 7 congregations when we arrived. They raised up pastors for those churches and continued to disciple them and minister to their people, and teach them to raise up new leaders as well

Since we left Spain Dani and Lili continued to pray with us and minister to us. Their ministry expanded and their network of churches and leadership teams continued to grow expanding all the way into Sierra Leon Africa. They raised their daughters to love the Lord and serve him and they continue to minister together as a family.

Check out a gallery of Dani and Lili and their work around the world ↓

They eventually obtained permanent residency (and perhaps citizenship, I’m not sure) in Spain and have committed themselves to serving southern Spain for the long-haul. They recently opened a family bakery called Delisüss in Spain where their oldest daughter is the head chef and proudly uses her mother’s recipes to sell Artisanal Cakes and Pastries to help support their family and their ministry.

When they invited us to return to Spain and partner with them in ministry we were thrilled to think of working with our old friends and pastors again. As the days to our departure are counting down we are eagerly looking forward to picking up where we left off and work with Dani and Lili to help encourage and train new leaders and to help reflect the glory of Christ to a country that long ago walked away from him.

2 responses to “Meet Our Partners In Spain – Daniel and Liliana Palma”

  1. […] is an encouraging email we got from Liliana in […]

  2. […] is an excerpt from Pastor Dani, standing up against hypocrisy in the government and calling the people of the church to stand up […]

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