Children from Moldova

Here are two little girls who are enjoying the church directory from Oakmont Church. They loved it when they recognized photos of Steve, Kim, Linda, or others from our team. They also tried very hard to say the names of the Americans in the photos. What a treasure this is. We will never forget these wonderful children. They are in our hearts and prayers from now on. There is also a photo of one of our interpreters. Stella was wonderful to work with. The children loved her and she is an expert in interpreting Bible thoughts and scripture.

There is no I in Team

On the long-long-long flight back, I had time to think about what God was teaching me during this short mission trip. I sure hope I was able to bring His good word to a few people. There is no doubt, we worked hard and provided a lot of fun and games. We "taught our hearts out" trying to help children to understand God's love.

But we also learned a lot about ourselves. I think each of us, in our secret hearts, learned something new about ourselves and our relationship with the Father. We learned a little about self-sacrifice. Certainly, not anything near those who are life-long career missionaries, but a little maybe.

Pam, as our leader, kept us safe, on time, and led us all the way through to complete the task. I am so thankful for this. Steve never waived, not once, as the humble minister that he is to us all. I can learn from this. Tracie's beautiful flute that played "As the Deer Pants" squeezed my heart in remembrance of another time hearing that beautiful psalm. Kim's vibrant personality kept us laughing and added pure joy to the trip. She wrote the book for "fun-loving". Mary's gift for giving provided so many gifts to help us remember, in a tangible way, this life-changing trip. I'll treasure the silver cross, always. I've never met a better and more talented middle school teacher than Mary. Beka 's enthusiasm was very contagious. What a wonderful testimony for one so young. I really appreciated Linda's love for everyone on the trip. She demonstrated this in tangible ways by making sure we had all the supplies needed and taking special care that as many people as possible were comfortable. The children responded beautifully to Bridgette's gentle spirit. I loved the high finance goldfish. Scott was a friend and a teacher to those young boys. I think they loved him for his honest presentation of the gospel. And, Ruth was in my heart, remembering her desire to give to this team.

All these together, spell team. Our devotional book for the team asked that we reflect on what we learned. As I was reading and praying I thought about all our precautions for cleanliness, safe food and water. I came across this verse in Matthew:

Do you not yet understand that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and is elminated? But those things which proceed out of the mouth come from the heart, and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceeds evil....to eat with unwashed hands does not defile a man.

I pray that I might have a clean heart so that whatever comes out of my mouth will edify and uplift. There may not be an I in Team, I pray I am in Him.

Full Day on Saturday

There were three major events for this Saturday after the end of camp. First we visited a preschool orphanage. We distributed bananas and chocolate cookies. I have a new respect for bananas after this experience. They sure loved the fruit even more than the cookies. Playing games with three year olds is easier than 6-16 year old children but being able to teach a child how to find passages in the Bible is much more rewarding, and not possible with the preschoolers. Next we visited the Abbey in a nearby villiage. In the afternoon we finally shopped in the city. It was a good chance to buy very unusual Christmas gifts.

Reflection for the week

The theme for today was God's love. The children easily received this good news. The teachers had many questions about how to love the unlovely---but they questioned how to love troublesome peers, not the children. They have no problems loving these children. This is grace.

We saw God's love in so many places this week: the patience of the interpreters, the kindness of one child to another, the goodness of the mission team, the perseverance of the SERI team. There are so many gifts, talents, and skills offered to this trip. Tracie had her beautiful flute absolutely mesmerized the children. Steve H. and Bryan was able to clearly communicate the foundational lesson for the day. Pam was a kind and thoughtful leader, day after day afer day. Kim and Linda are the Craft Queens! Our devotions and lesson prepared by Ruth Ann blessed our souls and spirits.

I feel like I've been preparing, all my life to work with these orhpanage teachers this week. It was like a dream but clearly reality with colors and sounds I'll never forget.

Time is up, others are waiting for the computer....I am thankful.

A Motley Group

Today was t-shirt day. No good VBS is complete without hand-painted t-shirts. Our Moldovan children loved writing their names, painting flowers, and hearts on their shirts. Again, I must say, children are the same the world over when it comes to personal pride in their creative activities. They want things to be pretty...and they want to do it for themselves.

A few of the older boys were pretty creative in their pilfering of about two dozen of the shirts out the back door. ...thus causing a lot of stress for the team. There was a lot of talk about forgiveness and an effort at understanding what real poverty is really like. We also talked about how theft is wrong no matter the circumstances. All this caused quite a lot of discussion in our nightly planning meeting.

A highlight for me, was the continued attendance by the camp teachers, at the adult Bible studies. I used the ABC method for explanation the gospel. They listened attentively and began asking questions. One of many unbelievable events of this week.

Steve mentioned tonight that we are a very motley team, so many different personalities, skills, and gifts, are brought together in a way that only God could accomplish.


I think 135+ children were in the presence of Christ this week, and I also think a team Americans, our interpreters, and Steve with SERI all enjoyed the hand of God on our efforts here.

Worship at the camp

Each day begins with some of my favorite praise songs...all sung in Moldovian (Romanian) language. The children know these by heart. It is beautiful!

Steve and Brian the puppet have brought several excellent sermons for the children. I learned some new lessons too! The children were very attentive and really absorbed these important words.

Each team member has told the children a short personal testimony/message. Each has been unique and very appropriate for the lessons of the day.

Bible study has gone very well. We can thank our wonderful interpreters for this. We are all amazed at how much the children already know.

At all the worship services we close in prayer and I can hear the children praying aloud the Lord's prayer (in Moldovan language). It is wonderful that they pray but we are hopeful they will also learn that pray is personal conversation with God.

Ruth Ann's devotion on the topic of "don't worry" will be presented tomorrow to both the children and the adult teachers.

A huge victory today was the request by the teachers for ideas for teaching Bible lessons to their students.

A visit to the University

My translator was able to negotiate a visit to her university this afternoon. You can see their website at http://www.ase.md/cartea/en/

Much of the campus is deteriorating and the buildings need a lot of repair, but Stella tells me this is one of the best in the city. The professors and staff were very gracious. I was able to speak to the director of the libray who was thrilled that ECU had arrived. It seems we have some sort of a partnership with the library at this institution and even though I'm not connected they were pleased to see me. I learned a lot about the economic downfall at the end of Soviet Union. This was catastrophic for Moldova. The problems are extremely severe.


More later.