Thursday, July 28, 2011

"You are real"


Every Wednesday Cameron, I and others go to the Roma community to do discipleship with the adults and life skills training and scripture memorization with the kids. Last Wednesday the community was being forced to move from the area of the field they had been squatting in and were unsure where they would move next. We were happy to find them in the same field this Wednesday when we visited. They were allowed to stay in the same field but had to move to a different location within it.
We walked through and talked to familiar faces and were shown the new area they're living. The children and I were about to leave the area to play when a woman called me to come over her tent. The woman's mother was sitting next to her with a pot of vegetables and some bread. When I approached the woman told me to sit and eat with them. I sat down and took some bread from her hand and dipped it into the vegetables and began to eat. Immediately the older woman began crying. I was completely taken off guard and asked my friend to translate for me and see if she was okay. She began talking and said "I see you all come here and you play with the kids and you smile at us but I wanted to know if you were real. And you are real! You are willing to eat from my dirty hands and eat my dirty food! God bless you sweet girl! I know you are real now. You don't look down on me!" I am crying as I type this out and relive this moment. Praise God! We had a very sweet conversation and I was able to share with her my story and how God loves us without hesitation. When Jesus sat at the tables of men, he looked past the hands that served Him and whether they were clean or dirty but rather looked at the heart of man. It's the stain of dirt from sin that Christ looked at and came to clean. Praise God for last night!

Friday, July 15, 2011

More pics of our last day!





More Pics of our last day of VBS







VBS!!!











I want to apologize because though I know many of you prayed and want to see everything, you will see only pictures from our last day. From our first month after arriving in Bulgaria we have been confronted with presumption that we will only stay here long enough to snap pictures to send home and then will be back in America in a blink of an eye. We know our heart and our dedication to be obedient to God, but others do not know us in this fashion and so for the sake of image we almost always leave our camera at home. The issue of taking a picture is not worth jeopardizing ministry opportunities, so please be patient with us as we know you desire to see what God is doing. We will always try to find a way to meet both needs; the needs of supporting churches back home and the needs of people here wanting to see someone who is genuine and not someone with a camera.

VBS was amazing! The first day was spent organizing groups and expectations before enjoying the activities that were planned. We managed to find an area of the field that had very little broken glass but the trade off was stinging bull-nettle plants! =) God answered our prayers for wonderful weather and the benefit of the field provided us the opportunity to share the stories with those who didn't come to church. God also answered our prayers for workers! There were 4 couples who helped man the group activities, pass out snacks, and help with worship time and crafts. God is faithful!
We saw two salvations during our week. One was a 14 year old boy who is an "adult" in their culture and the other was a 68 year old man who always seemed stand offish but was drawn in by a merciful Savior.
On Saturday we will have a family movie night to watch the Jesus film. At this time we will have adults ready with translators to help those desiring to follow Christ understand their commitment. We approach salvation slowly because we are very committed to giving the clear Gospel message and in seeing real transformations come from authentic relationships with Jesus Christ. Those who decided to follow Christ will be involved in discipleship training on Wednesdays at 6:30. Please pray for Saturday, we feel it will be a great time of harvest after much work!