This past week our teams, along with Pastor Zsombor and his family, worked with a church putting on two Christian concerts in different city squares on Wednesday and Saturday nights. Before the concerts we would go on the streets and spread the word with flyers inviting people, but also start up conversations with people about faith. The concerts went well and had a great response in the cities but the most memorable moments were the conversations that took place.
The first day out the Lord led me to stand on a street and hold a sign that said “Free Hugs” in Hungarian. However crazy it may seem, below I had three others that said Faith, Hope, and Peace in their language. Faith in the Son of God, Hope in a country filled with conflict in its past, and Peace where insecurity is high. I didn’t know if I would get a hug or fifty of them on this random street corner, but the point was the three words, not the hugs because that was the real message. After three hours of standing on the street and people giving me stares I received two hugs from an elderly lady and a young boy; the woman said she recently lost her husband. None would have been ok too; Jeremiah preached to a nation his whole life that God told him would never listen. Successful ministry isn’t about the product of what you do when it comes to numbers, but about the faithfulness and obedience in what God calls you to do no matter what.
Back on Friday I met young man named Majesh; a student in University studying Infomatics and wants to work on computers. Sitting on a bench in the square eating a sandwich where the concert would take place the following night, I came up to him to say “Jonaport” (Hello!). For the next half hour Majesh and I talked about life, education, and then about what’s important to him in his life. To him health was important, money was next, but he truly believes in science. In our conversation the Lord really spoke to him in our conversation as I talked about science and it’s relation to the real existence and work of God in our lives. Throughout he would talk about the incredible realization about how things of this world work because of a perfect Mathematician. Unfortunately he had to go, but I had the opportunity to share with Him the gospel and he said that we wanted to change his faith and believe.
Friday night a group of five of us took a two hour trip to a small town where I was to speak to a new church and we also did some music. The church actually met in a restaurant where one room of tables with dinnerware was pushed all to the sides as they set up a small sound system and instruments. For the first forty minutes was all in Hungarian and then they had us come up to do songs and there was more passionate worship in a restaurant room of a small congregation than the largest building with 300 people; church is really the people and not the building. I led in guitar and the mic as the four others also joined in and the Romanian congregation knows even the newer songs; and so as we sung in English they would sing in Hungarian. There is just something awesome about a congregation singing passionately to God in their language while you’re leading the same song in your own language and knowing that God hears both. That from two sides of the world these groups would come together and know that God doesn’t favor or determine us by country lines, politics, tribes, etc. He sees us as Christ who is All and in us according to Colossians 3. The worship was exciting and passionate as the presence of God was so heavy and even this past Sunday at another church where it was the same order and new Racers gave testimonies and Rachael, Charity, and I did music; it was so encouraging to hear both languages in passion. Testimonies by Danny, Jonathan, Tash, and Kristi were awesome.
Saturday, I met a man named George whose English was the best of anyone I met on the street. Our conversation went from politics, movies, Romanian history, the States; and religion as he was a history teacher. George told me he became a Christian two years ago but has not really been going to church because all the churches are just dead and aren’t alive. I told him that I understood completely how he felt, but that even if you go to a church that seems completely dead, if he went with a passion and fire in his personal worship the Lord will still honor that and may encourage others. The stronghold pastor Zsombor had told us about the stagnancy in churches here in Romania is showing its effects to me on the street. Our conversation ended when his little boy started crying without signs of ending and he needed to go; but he allowed me to pray for him and encourage him to find a church that’s alive and told him about the one we were working with.
At the concert that night I noticed that a few gypsies came; the kids don’t hesitate to say hi to you if you’re a stranger. Then I saw three women dressed in their scarves as a lot of the gypsies wear those even the small children; then a shorter man with a cool mustache was there. I came up to them and said hello as they were really nice and happy to talk. Later I found out that the man was actually a missionary pastor to the gypsy people of Romania and the three ladies were new believers. So for the next few minutes God ordained this awesome time for us to meet and encourage each other.
After many years of Communism which eventually fell in the 1989 Revolution; there’s still a sense of fear for persecution. Only traditional religion was allowed and anything remotely passionate about worship like the services we had been at in the last couple of days would have been illegal to the government. Religious freedom was restricted and oppression was very bad; that even today as we go out to minister the pastor prays in case there is persecution to us.
Affection is huge here in the most sincere ways. A drummer for a band I helped set up his drum set came up to me with his wife to say thanks for my help. She translated for him saying, “He says he loves you! And thank you!” Women in the country kiss the friend on both sides of the cheek in a formal greeting to men and woman.
Unfortunately it can be too much sometimes. Our team is now in a village just outside of Tirgu-Mures where once we got here a man on the street tried to kiss one of our girls, and a guy Racer was offered sex with money; all this was done in a public place like it was OK. He stood up and said boldly, “This is not right!” Our ministry in the next three weeks will be various types of things; street evangelism, preaching, crusades, working with the gypsies on the streets and we’re all excited for it. But also at the same time we need your prayers for protection physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally. We need your prayers in how we talk to the people and having the compassion of Christ. It’s easy to look at people that did weird things to our group today and judge, but instead we are to show Truth in love and care. Some places in Africa, drunkards were treated as “losers”, but we are here to show that God loves even the people society doesn’t care for and that we have no right to judge, but called to love and lead to hope.
