Yesterday we got to do something that we have not done on the race yet. We were invited to speak live on 92.2 Timisoara for the 9am program. We would most likely have an audience of a few thousand. The team was thrilled. We had a blast playing on the equipment and planning our debut prior to the program.
Caitalin, our contact here in Romania, Pastor of the Rock Church and Grace International Church, where we will be working, set up the time on the air for us. He said that no one in the area had ever heard of the World Race and he wanted people to be informed about who we are, what we do, and why we are in Timisoara.
So since there were seven of us and we had collectively been in seven countries, Romania being our eighth, we decided we would each talk about one country and then our leader would touch on our time in Romania near the end. We put the countries in order and then each chose one, crazy thing happened, we ended up speaking in alphabetical order, which was kind of funny to us how that worked out. But God knew what He was up to because when each person got behind the mic they did so well!
Everyone was on top of their toes for the questions the DJ asked and God received a lot of glory through the stories we were able to share. I shared about Zimbabwe, my first country, my first month. The DJ had us each assign a number to the openness to the gospel in the country we were talking about. In the end he averaged them all together and said, “The overall openness in the places you have been is a seven, do you think it was worth it for God to do all he did for us for his people to be open to him at a seven?” In unity we all replied with an overwhelming yes. God would have died for one.
We travel to reach anyone who is open to the gospel. And now we are in Romania hoping that God will show Himself to the people that we will be ministering to. We promoted an activity that will be taking place next Friday called Remember India. Since we just came from India, and there are several Indian foreign exchange students studying in the area, Caitalin thought this would be a great event.
We ended our time with the song How Great is Our God
Pray for us as we promote this event in the evenings on campus this next week. We will be passing out flyers and having conversations with the university students. There has been a lot of opposition that has tried to make this event seem too difficult, but that just shows me that God is up to something and darkness doesn’t like it. So pray for a great turnout next Friday, for the love of God to be displayed, and for the Indian students to enjoy remembering home with us.
The people of Romania have been wonderful to us. They have showed us amazing hospitality and gone out of their way to attend to our needs and even our wants. We spent time with an amazing family, got to know another couple from the states who fed us breakfast each morning and taught us how important studying God’s word is, and had several opportunities to reach out to the community, share testimony, and love others. Our social life was fun too! The people we were serving alongside were around our age so we were able to get to know each other well and became good friends, we ate pizza together, chatted over dinners, watched movies, went bowling with the orphans they serve, and enjoyed each other’s company while driving place to place. Our first week in Romania we were in Brasov for debrief, then the following two weeks, where all the fun that I just mentioned happened, we were in Lugoj and Mondeal. This week we are in Timisoara and will be doing events with the children, youth, and university students. Keep Dry Bones and the people of Timisoara in your prayers!
