I’ve been in Tirana, Albania, for about 5 weeks now. So that means this is the halfway mark until I leave for the Philippines. Let me just tell you, I am not handling it very well. I’m so in love with this city and the people. I think they might have to drag me out of here kicking and screaming.
Our hosts are THE BEST. Especially because we’re a lot to handle, and we break everything we touch. Yall, they had to tear up the plumbing and install a new toilet (no one told us we can’t flush toilet paper)! We even brought back a week old kitten, and they drove us an hour out of town to take it to an animal hospital. They really, really, really rock.
For ministry, we’ve been doing everything around the church, like painting, cleaning, organizing. We even did some renovating and built shelves. In the afternoons, we do coffee ministry where we invite people to go get coffee with us in the church’s coffee shop. The main goal with this is opening up the coffee shop to the community.
We have also been going to the roma camp. This is a community of people that, back in the States, would be referred to as gypsies. Their full time jobs are to beg for money. We have been going once a week to bring them food, play with the kids, pray over them, sing songs, and ultimately showing them God’s love.
We have also been meeting with a few teenagers that are living in a safe house. They have either been sex trafficked, or are at risk for sex trafficking. We’re also in charge of planning lessons for youth group on Fridays and children’s ministry on Sundays. It’s been so sweet, there is no place I would rather be.
God has really been revealing to me that I’m lacking depth in my emotions. I tend to keep my emotions to myself and I would rather talk about how others are feelings. He has been showing me that it’s not only affecting my relationship with the people around me, but also my relationship with Him. For so long I have been living my life at surface level. He’s been showing me what it looks like to go deeper with Him and other people.
If you want to see more of what we have been doing, you can watch this video or go to my youtube channel
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCkeAawAUvKzhfESmQVlQMAg
Love ya deep,
Mal
