This month in Romania has been one of the busiest months for me, and also one of my favorites so far! If you look up Romania online, you’ll see information about Dracula’s Castle, Ottoman battles, and gypsies. But when I arrived to our ministry location, it seemed like so many of the Eastern European towns I’ve visited so far. A bonus this month, however, is that teams Bellator and Akal-Esh were together!
Both teams noticed a spiritual heaviness in the town and we later found out that witchcraft, human trafficking and spiritual oppression plague a lot of the people here. As we settled into our new town and walked to the grocery store that first day, we had no idea what would await us here in Romania.
We were quickly excited to find out that Hope Church in Draganesti-Olt is a thriving body of believers, quietly and fiercely battling daily for this town, this county, and beyond. We started each morning with group prayer and worship. After lunch, I was paired with Kristin to help Anna, the pastor’s wife, as she ministered to the women of this town. We walked up and down streets looking for women to talk to, prayed with those women, visited their homes, and even helped with some cleaning or canning peppers. I’ve had tea, “cake” and pastries with strangers who quickly became friends and I’ve felt welcomed into the wonderful church family here. I even got to sit in on the weekly Friday night women’s Bible Study!
Canning Peppers!
Something I discovered this month, is the religion of Christianity from the Middle Ages that I learned about in History classes still exists. I thought it died out long ago, but in the Orthodox church, members still pay for prayers, pay to ensure their deceased loved ones go to heaven, worship the dead, and are discouraged from reading a Bible. Most of the times when I offered to pray for someone, they were surprised to find that I would pray for them for free, give them a free Bible, or just simply listen and show them Christ’s love. It broke my heart to see so many people deceived by those claiming to work for God.
Handing out Bibles and sharing the Gospel (Photo by: Kristin Brewster)
In the middle of the month, we surveyed some people from a nearby city that Hope Church will be expanding to next summer, Craiova. We wanted to get an idea of what the people thought of church, of God, of life in that city. The answers were shockingly similar to those I’ve heard while doing similar surveys in the States. They don’t trust pastors, church people are hypocrites (Orthodox), and God is mean. However, despite their views, they know what they see isn’t right, and there is still a hunger to know the truth. They see something in the Christians here that they don’t see anywhere else.
Here’s a quick video Kirsten Reilly made about our time there and the vision for the future of Hope Church.
Craiova from Hope Church on Vimeo.
Stay tuned for more Romania updates in Part 2!!
