Getting To Know Our New Missionary (Part 6)

Massimo Mollica. That’s his name. I posed many different questions to Massimo and he has been so kind to answer them so that you can get to know him a little better.

REMINDER: Massimo will be with us this Sunday, September 5 for worship (along with his wife, Susanna and 2 children – Alessandro and Elianna). We haven’t asked him to spend much time during the service answering questions like these in the blog series. Over the years I’ve benefited greatly from his understanding of God’s heart to save sinners in Scripture and so we’ve asked Massimo to preach to us on exactly that.

Again – please make sure everyone in your smallgroup visits this blog so they can learn become familiar with Massimo before Sunday.

Question: What place has evangelism held in your personal life and ministry in LA?

Answer: Ever since I can remember, the Lord has given me a burden to share the gospel with people. God has simply worked in my life to have a heart of compassion upon those without Christ, a heart that is so unnatural to me if left to myself. God has faithfully opened doors for evangelism through all sorts of venues to this point in my life, relationship evangelism (especially in the workplace), drug rehab ministry, cold evangelism, hospital evangelism, campus evangelism, and simple opportunities with those unbelievers I come into contact. At the end of my life, I want to stand before the Lord, having been faithful to bring the gospel to those unbelievers around me, which means often I must get out of my comfort zone and be intentional about interacting with unbelievers.

Question: Why is your heart burdened specifically for the Italian people?

Answer: I initially began to consider serving among the Italian people in 2004 or 2005 when I was reading some statistics about the state of the gospel in Italy. Italy’s 60 million people are spread throughout more than 33,000 cities, towns, and villages. Less than 3,000 have an evangelical church or missionary. Less than 1% of the population professes to be evangelical. The Protestant Reformation never made an impact on Italy. Considering these statistics, I felt hopeless, but also knew first hand the need, having a father who was born and raised in Italy. It took my dad coming out of Italy to hear the gospel. Given some basic knowledge of Italian language and culture that I have and a growing heart for the nations of the world, I felt a responsibility to pursue the possibility of serving in Italy. In God’s providence, He has opened the door.