Called
for These Times
.
A brief history
of the People of God community in
Beirut
.
updated May 2016
When the People of God
community first began in Lebanon, its
members did not know they were about to
be plunged into a civil war that would
decimate their country and threaten
their lives. The encouragement they
received from other Christian
communities made it possible for the
members of this community to stay in
Lebanon and survive the 15-year war,
helping to maintain hope and vision for
the future. Now the community is playing
an important role in revitalization of
the local Catholic and Orthodox
churches.
A founding member and
former senior leader of the People of
God, recounts the early history of the
community.
Beginnings
The People of God community in Lebanon traces
its beginnings to August of 1969 when a young
Lebanese university instructor encountered the
Catholic charismatic renewal movement in Ann
Arbor, Michigan, USA. As a result of his
experience, a prayer group of university faculty
and students started up in Beirut in
mid-September of that year, when he returned
home.
In 1974, the local parish run by Capuchin
priests invited a French priest to preach during
the Lenten season. He had recently experienced
the Catholic charismatic renewal, and his
preaching led to our expansion into parish life
in Lebanon.
Life in the Spirit Seminars followed, and by the
summer of 1975 the charismatic renewal movement
was thriving in the Beirut area with many people
attending the weekly prayer meetings that we
hosted.
The war years in Lebanon
The wars in Lebanon erupted in April of 1975.
The Lord had prepared us initially for this
major upheaval and for the challenging years
that were to follow. But the final preparation
came when a group of us felt called by the Lord
to leave Lebanon for a period beginning in
October of 1975. Eighteen of us went to Ann
Arbor, Michigan, USA, for a crucial period of
bonding among ourselves and with The Word of God
community located there. By April of 1976 we had
firmly committed ourselves to God’s call to live
a shared life as a community in taking a name,
People of God. Our commitment together was
formalized with a community covenant.
In the spring of 1976, we responded to the
Lord’s invitation to return to Lebanon at what
was perhaps the worst period of the wars in our
land. For five months we continued to live
together in a set of apartments in Beirut. The
process of growing together as a people that had
been in place for us during our stay in Ann
Arbor went on to further maturity as we deepened
our relationships, while ministering hope to
people in the limited area we could reach
because of the war.
September 1976 witnessed the next step in God’s
careful plan to equip us for the years to come.
We felt his call to come out of the enclosed
area around the universities and into the
broader area that had become the “Christian”
heartland in Lebanon.
Public meetings and Life in the Spirit Seminars
resumed at the parish church of the same
Capuchin priest who had hosted us in 1974. With
the shifting areas of political influence, the
parish by 1976 was on the border of the
Christian area. The number of people coming to
our weekly prayer meetings increased rapidly,
and in one year’s time we felt called to move
more deeply into the heartland. This proved once
again God’s careful shepherding, for soon after
our peaceful move the border area became the
scene of constant warfare. This new location has
been the center of our activities ever since. A
Maronite bishop was happy to let us take over
his vacated family home, and in the recent past
we purchased it from him, and now have with
God’s grace built a permanent center for the
charismatic renewal movement on that site.
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The People of God is a
multi-cultural, ecumenical
community of some 800 adult members
and their children. Members belong
to Catholic, Orthodox, and
Protestant churches in Lebanon,
including Greek Orthodox, Syriac
Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox,
Maronites (Catholics), Greek
Catholics, Syriac Catholics,
Chaldean Catholics, and Catholic
Copts.
The community celebrated its 40th
anniversary in April 2016. |
Two main periods of community
development
Two main periods are recognizable in God’s
ongoing faithful providence for us.
1. Foundation building period -
1976-1989
The years between 1976 and 1989 were a period of
establishing the People of God as a stable,
growing community, along with building solid
relations with local church authorities, and a
period of expansion through prayer meetings
(reaching 1200 attendance at one point in the
war) and Life in the Spirit Seminars (attracting
up to 600 for a single annual Life in the Spirit
Seminar).
During this period, we also built some solid
structures to serve the growing numbers of
people who wanted to participate in the
charismatic renewal movement. In 1986 we
developed a “Movement of renewal in the Holy
Spirit” (with the important help of the Ligaya
ng Paginoon community from Manila, Philippines)
to cater to the swelling numbers that could not
be incorporated in the People of God
community. All of this activity and
expansion took place in the midst of constant
and severe wartime circumstances. Indispensable
to all this was our being a Christian community
and not just a spiritual movement or prayer
group.
2. Institutional
structure-building period from 1989 to the
present
The second crucial phase – and vital to our
survival long-term and transgenerationally – saw
a further development to put in place the
necessary structures that would ensure our
ability to go on beyond our early growth. The
focus is on clearer structures and the fostering
of strong personal relationships to support our
ongoing expansion, both internally as a covenant
community and externally in outreach movements.
Our contacts have continued with leaders of the
various churches our community members belong to
and are bearing good fruit (our work has been
solidly ecumenical from the outset, reaching out
to the eight or more Christian churches in
Lebanon). We have been asked by bishops and
groups to help with building communities in
neighboring Arab countries such as Syria,
Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, as well
as in other countries such as the Holy Land,
Turkey and Armenia, and in other parts of
Lebanon. Our main leaders have also been called
to serve internationally in building up the
international Sword of the Spirit.
Our community outreach ministries include a
family-based renewal movement (called "Living
Hope"), three evangelistic outreach programs to
university students (called "UCO"), a youth
outreach program (called YOut), an outreach to
young professionals (called “YPO”), a “Scouts”
association, public prayer meetings in different
regions of the country, and other ministries as
well. Taken together they involve more than
3,000 people.
Current situation
“It is for these times that I have called you.”
We have heard this word throughout our life in
community, but have been hearing it with greater
urgency more recently. Thus every time there is
are new war threats, we are not surprised.
Rather we ask the Lord to continue to shepherd
us and protect us from sin, faithlessness, and
division, and that we might be an instrument in
his hands that he wishes to use for these times.
The current situation has been particularly
malicious, as the spiritual war rages beneath
the external strife. A special pressure now is
put on all young people to emigrate – this
perhaps is the ugliest face of the current
battle. Vying with it is the ever-present enemy
of civil hatred and strife.
We invite you to join with us in praying that we
play our part in remembering that our enemy in
not “flesh and blood”(Ephesians 6:12) and that a
deep love for and witness to our non-Christian
fellow citizens be nurtured and maintained.
Otherwise we lose our “saltiness” (Mark 9:50)
and our clear call to be a “message” as a
nation. The late Pope John Paul II, after he had
visited Lebanon, said, “Lebanon is more
than a nation – it is a message for the world.”
That message entails Christians and Muslims
living together as children of Abraham. I
believe that this is possible only if Christians
live out their true witness and avoid
resentment, hatred, and prejudice.
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