It’s been five weeks since I’ve been to mass. Now let me tell you that five weeks has been a long five weeks. In that time my soul has been tested. Pushed to what felt like the edge, but then again when tested the soul always feels pushed to the brink of destruction. The last five weeks have been a time for me to begin a process that God warned me of days before I left for my race. “I will break you” He told me.
The week before I left for the race I committed myself to going to adoration for a couple of hour each night. The time was excellent for me. I started a devotional one of my sponsors gave me and I felt myself actually getting prepared for the quest to come. The last night of adoration I felt a faint thought start its way toward my full consciousness. The words weren’t my own. If they were then I have a rather depressing outlook on how this race will go.
He was going to break me. The words sacred me so like any other regular American I put them off to the side to deal with later. FYI poor way of doing thing, but something tells me I wasn’t ever going to be set for the challenges to come.
If your wondering if I’m ever going to get into what happened this month then wonder no longer and know that you will not be learning about it in this blog. I know that now is not the time to talk about it and I am confident in that. What I can tell you about last month is this: spiritually… I’m exhausted… emotionally… I’m exhausted…and physically… I’m exhausted.
I must say I’m glad that my first month on ministry is over. At the same time I will dearly miss a lot about it. The perfect temperature of the morning that were warm enough to keep me from shivering (most of the time) and cold enough to make it feel like home. I will miss the park, it may have been abandoned and spooky, but the view from the edge of the tree line made it my favorite place in all of Dragonesti. I will miss the people, the people of Hope church in Dragonesti and Coteana (where my team did ministry for our month in Romania), they were so joyful and truly lived for God. The thing I will miss the most though is the squad.
This last month was all squad month.That means that my entire squad, all 40 of us, lived in the same house for the last month. We utilized our four burner stove, two toilet bathroom and numerous bunk beds to their very limits. We laughed, cooked, sang, and cried together. I made new friendships and strengthened others.
I may only be leaving them for a month but I will miss everyone of them. They showed me who they were and in that I learned more about myself. I may have only spent a grand total of 5 weeks with these people, but they truly feel like family to me.
Now I realize that I haven’t been posting much of anything these days and I apologize for that. Truth is every time I started writing something I found myself talking about what God broke in me this last month. It’s a great story and one I do plan on sharing eventually, but as I said before now is not the right time.
So in remembrance of the good things that happened this month let me show you my first month in Romania (in a nutshell)…
I border hoped twice…
Drove through Bulgaria…
Stayed In Greece…
Cliff jumped into the mediterranean…
Drove back to through Bulgaria…
Started a 40 day fast…
Did street evangelism…
Did several house visits…
Talked about boxing and God in the same conversation…
Built a shelf…
Played soccer with a bunch of Romanians…
Lost at soccer to a bunch of romanians…
Was hit in the face by soccer ball…
Made a chimney to start charcoal with…
Baked a cake over charcoal (5 times)…
Failed at grilling american cheese burgers over charcoal…
Succeeded at grilling american cheese burgers over charcoal…
Cook calzones over hot charcoal…
We used charcoal a lot…
Deep fried chicken..
Deep Fried donuts…
Deep Fried fries…
We deep fried a lot too…
Cooked an entire meal for the whole squad consisting of deep fried chicken, delicious potatoes, and green beans… (we were in the kitchen for 5 hours straight that night)
I kinda learned how to cook…
We watched the movie Se7en outside, in the cold, In Dragonesti (kinda sketchy late at night)…
Was scared half to death by cats several times…
Yelled back at several Dogs who were getting a bit to aggressive…
Walked to an abandoned Campground…
Stumbled upon what looked like a drug deal at said park…
Found a place to hang hammocks at the park…
And napped in peace at the super sketchy park…
Met missionaries from around the world…
Drank tea with a british man…
Had a british man talk to me about conspiracy…
Painted a house…
Dug a hole…
Filled in a hole…
Played more soccer with romanian kids… (they cheat a lot)
Arm wrestled with the cockyest kid you’ll ever meet…
And received the nickname Conor McGregor…
Loved every moment of this month…
Left for debrief…
Got to debrief in Brasov…
Saw the sights…
Had lots of gelato…
Climbed a mountain, in the rain, at 6am…
Played a game of hide the phone for 2 hours…
Whent to Dracula’s Castle…
Was left in Transilvania…
Made it back to Brasov…
Went out on an ATL (Ask The Lord)…
On said ATL tried to get free food…
Did not get food…
Got to hang out with my team…
Paid a street performer who played the violin…
Watched Joel teach swing dancing in the middle of the Brosov to the tune of the violin…
When to a catholic mass…
Now I want to talk about what it was like going to mass a bit. It had been 5 weeks since I last went to a mass. 5 week that I hadn’t been able to receive the Eucharist. For me that means a lot. It was through the Eucharist that I had my first close encounter with God. So for me to go so long without it, made me feel like I was missing something. When I found out I had the opportunity to go to a service I made sure I was there. I went in to the church anxious. I don’t know why. Maybe I was nervous, maybe I was excited. To be honest I was really happy. Inexplicably happy. I was nervous that listening to a catholic mass in a Romanian might be so boring that I’d regret going. Then I found myself knowing exactly what was going on. Initially I was very confused. Then I noticed everyone bring their fist to chest and hit their chest three times. It was the “I confess to you”. From there on I knew where I was and was able to say the prayers in english as the rest of the congregation said in romanian. I felt a part of the mass. Then it came time for communion. They did it a bit weird, but essentially they just said stand up and walk toward the front. It was chaos for a second but then everyone formed into two lines and continued forward. Receiving communion for the first time in five weeks was huge for me. I felt truly full. To be one with Christ in that way means so much to me. Its unexplainable and I am so thankful.
This is a bit of a long blog post so I’m going to finish it up here with my last update: I’m in Ukraine. I got here two days ago and I feel pretty sick. I ask that you pray for me in that and my team (some of them are under the weather too).
I want to assure you all that there will be more posted this month, but in case you still aren’t satisfied I would like for you all to think about checking out my Instagram page. I have been posting a bit of my journey there. I do want to bring each of you along with me on this stupendous adventure I apologize for failing to do that last month, but that is something I’m looking to change this month.
Thank you all so much and may God bless you.
