Romania

It's been about a week or so since I've been back from Bistrita, Romania. I got to lead a team of 6 others on an outreach to the church out there. I'm so grateful to have gotten that opportunity, to have had such a wonderful team, and to be around a wonderful church yet again.
If you remember, I went to Bistrita exactly a year ago, but as a student and not an intern. It was a whole different ballgame this time, in my opinion.

To be completely honest it's really hard for me to get detailed about outreaches because I want to be very careful about exploiting the people we meet along the way...but I will attach some pictures and briefly explain what we did....

The train ride there was about 8 hours to Cluj and then the pastor was so gracious as to drive so late at night to pick us up and take us to Bistrita. We got into our apartment at about 12:30am. It felt so great to be back in that apartment (and the new central heating system definitely was a bonus since I'm terrible at making a fire!)

Our first day was spent doing practical ministry for the pastor and church. I got to stack wood and rake a massive amount of leaves for the first time. It was really great to be able to help out and save the missionaries time by doing this. 

We met a girl named Bianca that was so sweet and she came over and cooked us a real Romanian meal. It was a sweet time with her and we got to share our lives with each other and encourage each other. I think meeting her and making that new friendship was so divine :)

My favorite part of the outreach I unfortunately can't post pictures of: the orphanage. Every morning we got to go to the orphanage and bring the babies out into the sun. One of the missionaries, Natalie, has done so much in that orphanage (Praise God). Before she started volunteering there, the workers didn't care for the children at all; babies left in cribs all day to sit in their dirty diapers, no loving looks into their eyes, and no going the extra mile to love them. No wonder attachment disorder is so rampant in Romania. But to be able to bring them out into the sun and give them some real life experiences was so amazing. You can see how it has affected the babies. I fell in love with a little baby named Valentine. There was a moment where we were invited to an old woman's house where we sat in her beautiful courtyard, drinking her Turkish coffee, and eating her grapes of the vine while she shared about WWII. And I had the baby on my lap and it just felt so purely lovely. It was really hard to leave him once the week was over. But I'm so thrilled Natalie remains there to continue the work. And speaking of the old woman, she is not a Christian, yet we got to pray for her and talk to her and it was really another divine and lovely moment. 

Everyday we also got to hang out at the after school space for the Roma kids. Some days we just helped them with homework and hung out, building relationship, and some days we got to share a bible study with them. It was really cool to see them again. 

I remember last year one of my favorite things about the outreach was getting to share with the teen girl bible study. Last year I shared my testimony, and this year I shared about the woman caught in adultery in John 8 and about God's grace. It was so cool to be remembered by these girls and to get to hug and love them all over again. 

It was really fun to be able to teach a song about Jesus to a young English class :) They were so sweet and we had a blast. 

We also got to visit a Roma village and see some hunger for the word of God. 

All in all it was an amazing trip that further fanned the flame of my heart for missions.
God is showing me so much about the future and I am oh so excited for it!