Try to imagine your own country telling you that you are not wanted? Try to picture in your head how you would raise your family and provide for their basic needs when your own neighbors won’t even give you the time of day?! Try to visualize trying to put your faith and trust in God but not knowing if you will be kicked out of your home because the government wants to use the land you eat and sleep on for a cemetery!? Try to think of a way of how you would tell your kids that they are beautiful and can reach any dreams that have when you have lost all hope!?
Try to imagine looking into the eyes of the very people who wonder these questions every second of the day!?
In Romania there is a people group who are not wanted! They are pushed to the side and people try to forget all about them. Most of them were born right here in Romania. They may have never been out of the country; maybe their great-great grandparents came over from India or a nearby country looking for a better life. They are scattered over all the country! Some have running water and some have never heard of the idea of washing their hands. Some have a roof over their head and some sleep outside! Some have one meal a day and some go days without food. Some have jobs and some beg on the streets! Some still have hope and some have hardened hearts for their own protection.
People call them scum, dirty, lazy, robbers, drifters, and Nomads!
But what you may know them as our Gypsies!
In Bucharest, Romania I entered into this unknown world with my eyes closed tight and my heart full of fear. I had no idea what I was about to enter into! A gypsy to me was a person that wore long skirts with lots of jewelry and danced a lot. I had this idea that they always partied and that they chose this lifestyle! The picture in my head was a combination of Esmeralda from the Disney Movie: The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Johnny Depps’ character from the movie Chocolate! (I know movies are not real life…but that is what I had pictured.)
I didn’t know what I was expecting when God brought us to a friend who wanted to take us to a nearby gypsy village so we could minister to them. She took us to 4 different homes where she had built relationships with the families. Some days she would bring them food and clothes, some days she would check in on them and just see how they were doing. Some of the families she was helping to grow gardens and give them some sort of hope. BUT every time she went out, she let them know that Jesus loves them so much!
Driving up to the first home, my heart was beating so fast! It was a family with 4 kids and 2 dogs. They lived in an open field and their home was a cement looking tower that was patched up by whatever they could find. Each of them was filthy and was wearing clothes that we would have thrown away years ago. As we drove up, the smiles on their faces showed that they didn’t care about any of that.
They knew our friend but they didn’t know us at all. They spoke Romania and we spoke English! Things that would have stopped us…didn’t stop them at all! They welcomed us with warmth and love! They were excited to meet us and to laugh with us. The kids started warming up to us and a tickle fest started happening with some of the girls on the team. The parents shared with us about their house and the garden.
We stood in a circle and we sang songs like “This Is the Day,” ‘My God is so BIG,” and “The wise man built His House upon a Rock” in Romania and in English! As we were singing; ‘He’s Got the WHOLE World in His hands,” the dad started crying! He didn’t stop…he sang through tears of joy that this was a promise from God. A grown man singing a child’s song knew that even though they were poor and had very little…that God still was holding him and his family in His arms.
My heart was at a standstill! This family didn’t ask for this life! This family works hard but no one will give them a chance. This family knows how to love each other but to the outside world they are dirty people with torn and outdated clothes! They welcomed us into their home, but would anyone ever invite them into their home?
I didn’t know what to do! I didn’t know how to help them! I smiled a lot and enjoyed being with them, but as I got back into the car to head towards the next home…I still didn’t know what God wanted me to do.
Each house we went into, the response was the same. They welcomed us with open arms. They enjoyed all the singing and the children were eager to learn the hand motions and smile for pictures. They listen to the message about how God loves them and they enjoyed the different stories from the bible! They enjoyed the apples and candy that we passed out. We prayed over the kids and the mothers. We prayed for healing and provision. At one of the houses, we even passed out New Testament Bibles to some of the kids.
After a few minutes of being at each house, more and more people (usually the kids) came to hear what we had to say! We fell in love with the kids and we each tried to figure out how we were going to take them home with us!
But I still had this gut feeling that I wasn’t doing enough! I was getting back into the car, heading for home where I have AC and a comfortable place to lay my head. I knew that I was getting dinner that night and that when I woke up there would be food for me the next day! I knew I was protected from people trying to hurt me or steal from me!
Was I just supposed to take the last 2 days as ‘an experience’ that I would never forget? I could tell people “oh yah, I went to the gypsy village that one time!” But what is that going to do or how is that going to help?
It wasn’t until the next morning when I started to understand. Maybe I wasn’t supposed to do anything Maybe all God was asking me to do was to smile at them! Maybe the reason why we got to visit these people was to show them that they do matter. Not a lot of people give them the time of day but for a few hours, they could feel a little more normal and welcomed! They got to be acknowledged by strangers without wanting or needing anything in return. The parents got to see their children being loved on and accepted. The neighborhood got to come together and hear about the Love of Jesus!
I think why I was there for God to teach me a lesson!
He was trying telling me that when doing ministry the outcomes are not always going to be tangible and pretty! There may not be a clear answer as to why you are there or not. You might never understand the full reason but that isn’t the point. You aren’t doing ministry for yourself. You do ministry to glorify God and to build His Kingdom. A lot of the time ministry is simply obeying to what God calls us to do…no matter how out of the box it may seem.
This is not an easy lesson to learn… but I have a feeling it is a lesson that a lot of us NEED to learn! I like when I can see fruit from my labor but sometimes our job is to plant the seed or pull out the weeds. Maybe our job is to simply smile at a face that no one else would ever look at!
