After 25 years of paperwork, appointments, and prayer, Sofia West Seventh-day Adventist Church in Bulgaria is under construction, after obtaining a building permit for the construction of a permanent church building.

To build any kind of building in Bulgaria, a city issued building permit is required. Because the new building would be located in the country's capital, the Church needed a permit signed by the city's chief architect.

To get the signature, an in-person appointment with the chief architect needed to be made by phone. Complicating matters, the chief architect was only available to sign permits one afternoon per month.

Iva, the office secretary of the Church in Bulgaria, was charged with making the appointment. The first month she called to scheduled, the phone line was constantly busy. The second month, the line was free, but no one answered. The third and fourth months, the line was constantly busy again.

After four months of failed attempts to schedule an appointment, Dr. Milen Georgiev, president of the Bulgarian Union of Churches, went to the chief architect’s office to explain the situation in person.

“You can’t arrange an appointment by coming here,” the secretary said. “You need to call.”

In response, Georgiev called Iva from the chief architect’s office and said, “I’m in the office. Please call his secretary now.”

Iva called and called, but, again, no one answered. Despite Georgiev being in the office and hearing the phone ring, the secretary did not answer.

Frustrated, Iva called Georgiev back and said, “Please call her yourself.”

So, he did. Standing in front of the secretary, he called her office line, but she didn’t answer.

It was then that church members began to suspect someone else might want to buy their land. The property they had purchased for the Sofia West Seventh-day Adventist Church was prime real estate—right next to the underground entrance of a subway station. On one side of the future church was a large shopping center. On the other side was a main tram line. They believed it was likely someone hoped they would give up and sell the land at a low price.

Church members began to pray earnestly for their church building. And they continued praying for 25 years. Finally, a new chief architect took office in Sofia, and he signed the long-awaited building permit. Construction of the church began in October 2024 with the help of a Thirteenth Sabbath Offering.

“We are glad that our prayers for 25 years have come true,” said Marian, head elder of the church.

The Sofia West Seventh-day Adventist Church is under construction, thanks to the support of generous donors from around the world who contributed to the first quarter 2020 offering. The Sofia West Seventh-day Adventist Church continues to need financial and prayerful support. Part of this quarter's offering will support a Seventh-day Adventist kindergarten called Colorful Hope (Tzventna Nadezhda) as it moves from rented facilities into its own building in Sofia.

The original article was published on the Adventist Mission news site.