A Month In Romania
I can not believe that this month is already over. It has not been what I expected or what was planned, yet was exactly what God had planned for us.
We stayed with our hosts Raul and Ana who are incredible people of God. They live their lives as a sacrifice to God and I can not even begin to explain their kindness, generosity, and amazing love for the Lord. Raul always treated us with his big grin saying, “Hello people of God!” and then would proceed to ask who needed some coffee, and then he would give them the coffee he bought for himself that day. They were genuinely the best hosts I could ask for, they constantly poured into us as a squad and looked for ways to amplify the talents that we brought to the table so that we were serving God with our passions.
After 2 and a half weeks in quarantine it left us with only two weeks of ministry in the field. I can definitely say that this month did not go how I thought it would, but it was so much sweeter than I could ever imagine. Despite every obstacle, I still got to live on mission in the city of Craiova! I got to paint a mural, evangelize on the streets, intercede in prayer, pass out over 1500 bibles, host events for women, young adults and muslims, and overall pour out love onto this city. It was an incredible month and I have met so many amazing people. We saw God come through in ways I never imagined.
I personally saw God move a lot in the young adults event. We only had two weeks to plan and organize as well as hand out flyers and build relationships with the people of the city. In all we only expected 15, maybe 20 people to come to the event. I had spent a fair bit of time talking to young adults around the city, meeting them and their friends, building relationships and getting to know them.
The day the event came and as people started to trickle in and I couldn’t believe my eyes. We had 45 people show up from all walks of life. It was incredible. And what blew me away even more was how willing they were to talk about their faith and who God is and open up conversation.
I think my biggest take away was not to shy away from the sensitive subjects that we have been trained by culture to avoid. The only way to impact people and to build relationships is to be willing to go deeper consistently. I am reminded of how offensive Jesus was. He spoke the truth, and some people accepted it and some people rejected it, and he spoke it all the same.
And who am I to say that someone isn’t ready to hear the work of God in my life. How inflated have I allowed my self image to become that I allow my comfort to guide whether someone can hear the truth of life. I hold the keys to life and life abundantly, where is my urgency to share them!
All in all, I am very excited to go into this next month in Albania! I can’t wait to apply the skills and knowledge that I acquired in Romania to this next season. Especially since we will be doing ATL ministry. For those who don’t know, that means “Ask The Lord” ministry which is what happens when we don’t have an established Host that we will be living with. That means it’s up to our team to find a place to stay, develop relationships and do short term ministry in the place that we end up. I don’t know what it’s going to look like but just be praying that we have faith and courage to follow where He is leading us this coming month!
Photos!! (In no specific order)
This is a sweet little park in Croatia with painted trees all through it.
This is me eating a sandwich, which is basically what I have eaten once a day every day since I left America.
This is the view out of the room that I was staying in during our Quarantine in Raul’s house!
This is a quarantine hallway chill time when we were let out of our rooms! This was by far the coolest place in the house so we loved the tile floor when it was super hot outside.
JEAN DAY!!! This was jean day, the first day it was under 80 degrees and we all got out our jeans and had a jean party in the hallway.
This is a picture of downtown Craiova during a rally car race that happened while we were there. They shut down the whole street and it was a town festival all weekend! Such a cool experience.
This I’d some architecture in Craiova as well!
And there are so many more but I’ll leave it at that for now!!
