Rev. Martin Rolfs Massaglia and grandson Julian

Posted: June 30, 2010

On the time-line of a ministry that spans four decades I can only speak personally about the four years since coming to First Baptist Church.  Still, in those four years I’ve been honored to become friends with Gustavo and Joan Parajon and their family, and I’ve had a firsthand look at a ministry that reaches across the United States, throughout Nicaragua and really around the world. Gustavo A. Parajon will retire this month as the pastor of Primera Iglesia Bautista de Managua (The First Baptist Church of Managua).  Gus wants time to write the story of his ministry of hope, peace and reconciliation, a ministry in which The First Baptist Church of Greater Cleveland was privileged to be a partner from the very beginning.

Gustavo Parajon graduated from Denison University and married Joan Morgan on the same day in 1959. They immediately moved to Cleveland where Gus entered medical school and the Parajons became members of First Baptist Church of Greater Cleveland.

The plan, all along, was that following medical training Gus and Joan would become American Baptist Missionaries in Nicaragua.   And as the training advanced and friendships at First Baptist developed, it was inevitable that a partnership would develop.  While Gus was doing his internship at Cleveland Metropolitan General Hospital, the congregation developed a desire to involve the youth of the church in an annual mission project.  This was LONG before short term mission projects were in vogue.  So Gus traveled to Nicaragua and discussed a plan with the Minister of Health, and the group was invited to come to Nicaragua.

The program was known as “Pistolas de la Paz” or “Guns of Peace.”  The group used 27 jet inoculators offered by Dr. Robert A. Hingson, whose son was a member of the team.  The guns, which Dr. Hingson was instrumental in developing at Western Reserve University, were capable of giving more than 400 injections per hour.  The medical goal achieved by the mission was the immunization of 130,000 people in the vicinity of Managua, with approximately 300,000 doses against small pox, pohomyelitis, tuberculosis and leprosy.

This mission trip was the inaugural brigade under the leadership of Gustavo and Dr. Bill Cumming. Though the mission and the make-up of the groups have changed many times over the years, the church has been sending a brigade every year since, with Bill Cuming at the helm until a year before his death in 2010.

Once on the field in Nicaragua, Gus founded PROVADENIC (Nicaragua Vaccination and Community Development Program) in 1967, in partnership with the First Baptist Church of Greater Cleveland, The First Baptist Church of Managua, and the Nicaraguan Baptist Convention. The ministry addressed the fact that rural villages in Nicaragua had virtually no access to health care without traveling long distances.  PROVADENIC served rural communities in Nicaragua by training local health promoters to treat and prevent common illnesses which still are the most common causes of deaths in the country.

Then, following an earthquake in 1972 that devastated the country and claimed 10,000 lives,  Gus formed CEPAD (Nicaraguan Council of Evangelical Churches) as an interdenominational relief organization to aid victims of the earthquake.  Eventually, the mission of CEPAD expanded to serve congregations of approximately 45 different member denominations and the population at large with emergency relief, development and reconciliation programs.

During the Sandinista Revolution and the war in the 1980's CEPAD was the intermediary between the Evangelical Churches and the government, and won the admiration of Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega who appointed Gustavo as a member of the National Reconciliation Commission, together with Cardinal Miguel Obando y Bravo, former Catholic Archbishop of Managua.  This led to misrepresentation in some conservative circles that CEPAD was a communist organization working in tandem with the Soviet-backed government.  As a result, CEPAD’s clinics became targets for attacks from Contra rebels, who sought to overthrow the government, placing doctors, nurses and the villagers at risk.  Gustavo especially wants to write about his work in the area of reconciliation.

Somewhere along the way, I’m uncertain of the date, Gustavo added to his myriad responsibilities serving as the pastor of the First Baptist Church of Managua — a congregation ministering not only to spiritual needs, but one that also has a vast ministry of outreach to people in need throughout Managua, a congregation with a gift, for singing God’s praises under the remarkable direction of Joan through the church choirs, the musical congregation, and a choir of men prisoners in a Managua prison.

When I read through the summary of his ministry, it isn’t the list of Gus’ accomplishments that causes my spirit to soar, rather it is the incalculable number of people that have been blessed, healed, helped; the number of people whose lives have been saved or transformed; the number of people who have experienced the love of Jesus through Gus and those who partnered with him in all those ministries through all those years.  And of course, this includes not only Nicaraguans, but people in the United States and around the world as well.

Someone calculated that over the 45 years since the first brigade in 1966, First Baptist has taken over 500 people to Nicaragua to be part of Gus’ transformational ministry.  Jessica Chapman was 16 when she went on her first brigade.  She was so moved by the experience that she returned as a volunteer for a year as part of her undergraduate curriculum; and now she is back for two more years as an employee of AMOS Health and Hope, the newest expression of the ministry to rural Nicaraguans.

Last year Christopher Murphy celebrated his 18h birthday in the village of Nacascolo while serving as part of a First Baptist Brigade.  In that experience we helped to complete a medical clinic and build a latrine for the village.  We also spent a week nurturing relationships with the children and adults of Nacascolo.  Christopher was so inspired by what he observed that he went home and “tweaked” his course work at Kenyon College, added Spanish to his curriculum, and is returning to spend 8 weeks in Nicaragua this summer.

A ministry spanning four decades; demonstrating tireless commitment to the cause of Jesus Christ as pastor, missionary, peace maker, advocate for the poor and the oppressed.  When I think of all the lives that have been transformed by Gus’ ministry it inspires me to work harder, to persevere in the challenging times.  Observing all that has happened through the ministries under Gus’ care in a context of poverty, injustice and powerlessness, I am reminded that the God to which Gustavo Parajon has devoted his life in service, is a great and powerful and faithful God.

At this milestone in his ministry we give thanks to God for the life of Gustavo Parajon, and also for the privilege of serving in ministry with him through all those years.  “Well done you good and faithful servant….” (Luke 19:17).

 

 

The Peace of God

Martin

Rev. Martin Rolfs Massaglia

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