On Saturday the 13th I traveled with a few other Racers to Caracal, a town about 25 minutes away from Draganesti. We were on our way to do street evangelism with a few translators from Hope Church, and I was just excited to get out of the Mission House and see more of the country. The drive was beautiful; the land in this part of Romania is mostly flat so you can see for kilometers (I’m trying to transition….). As we cruised along in the Swagger Wagon, er minivan, with the wind blowing in the windows, we passed fields upon fields of giant sunflowers. Cows were swimming in the river. Men were selling watermelons on the side of the road. Women were driving donkey carts into town for the market. I got that feeling like, “This is Romania.”
We all gathered in the parking lot of the Penny Market to divide into groups. The plan was to walk around the nearby apartment complexes and ask people if they were interested in participating in a Bible study in their area. Kara and I teamed up with Marcel and headed out with tracks in hand. While we walked my attention was focused more on people watching and dodging street dogs than conversation, so it took me by surprise when Marcel began speaking to me intently.
“I want to invest in you while you are here. I have no money to give to your trip, but I will pray for you or drive you and your friends if you need a ride. Just let me know. I may not have a lot of money, but I work in Heaven’s Currency- prayers.”
Have you ever been instantaneously humbled? I definitely was. It was a total shift in my perspective. Hadn’t I come to Romania in order to invest in the lives of the people and missionaries here? Wasn’t I the one supposed to be offering prayers for them? I was supposed to be the blessing in their life. And here comes this offer to invest in me and support me; the fact that he would even consider supporting me monetarily blew my mind. It took me a little while to respond because I was trying to keep my emotions in check. I didn’t know how to adequately express my gratefulness to Marcel for his offer.
When we finished the evangelism, I made my reply. “Marcel, I will take you up on your offer for Heaven’s Currency. Please pray for me that God will continue to grow my faith and that I will hear His voice speaking to me.” He said simply, “I will.”
It’s always a beautiful thing, receiving blessings in unexpected places. And I’ve already been able to pay back Marcel in more of Heaven’s Currency. I am so grateful to the Lord that He gave me this lesson in Month 1. Going into these next 10 months, I will now be looking forward to receiving just as many blessings from ministry as I will hopefully be giving.
