Romania

Our Romania team arrived back at school safely EARLY this morning at 12:30am.

Everyone made it safely (but sleepily!) and we are excited to connect with family and loved ones to share stories and photos with everyone as soon as we are over the jet-lag!

Thank you again for following along with our journey, praying over our ministry and loving us well as we served overseas! If you want to hear more about our experience, please reach out to us and we would be happy to meet up with you. We also hope you will continue following the other teams as they update us on their time overseas and what the Lord is doing in and through them.

Thank you and we hope to see you soon!

Hello everyone! Chris and Genna here to give you an update on the last
few days of our trip!

We left Bazna on Monday and had a long drive
back to Oradea. Along the way we stopped in several different cities
and were able to take in some Romanian culture and history. We
explored an old fort and explored Sighisoara which is a walled city in
Romania where people are still living. The views of the architecture
and landscape of the country were exquisite. Sighisoara is also the
birthplace of “Dracula”, so a few of us took a quick tour of the house
he was born in. We got back to Oradea Monday evening and spent that
night in our driver, Ionels, home. We woke up Tuesday and had another
day of driving ahead of us to Satu Mare. There we had the privilege of
working with different churches and orphanages. We were able to spend
multiple days at House Of Hope. This is a Christian run home that has
such a great love for God. We all had such an amazing time bonding
with the children and getting to know their stories. We played with
the House of Hope children for hours and hours and had so much fun
doing so. They all have a joy in their hearts that comes from being
apart of a wonderful family that loves like Jesus loves.

The three days we spent in Satu Mare were impactful, inspiring, and
hard at times. We had the ability to spend some time in Herezu, a
state orphanage. There we shared the gospel and spent some time just
loving on the kids. We also got to spend some time at an orphanage for
handicapped girls. Both of these orphanages contrasted with House of
Hope in many ways. It was hard to see the difference between
orphanages run with Jesus as their foundation and orphanages that did
not share Jesus with their children. It was a blessing to be able to
love on these orphans and I know that every person on our team was
deeply impacted by the time we got to spend with the children of
Romania.

Seeing how the lives of the children are so greatly impacted by the
parents that run House of Hope brought me such joy. These kids lives
were changed and they receive so much love from the people there. I
had such a great time playing with all the kids and getting to know
what they like. It is amazing how much a smile can communicate and
even though there was a language barrier, it didn’t stop us from
having fun. But it was not only at House of Hope that we got to share
God’s love. We also visited a transit center and got to do a lesson
and many games with them. The kids here were so open to hear what we
were speaking about and loved the message and the the skit some of us
put on. We then got to play many different games. These kids were
constantly smiling and had the best time playing with all of us.

Thursday was our last day with the kids, and it was tough to say
goodbye but we know that God has his hand in their lives and will
continue to cover them. For the next few days we will be in Budapest.
We will take time to discuss everything we experienced while here.
Processing everything we learned and spending time in reflection while
learning about the city.

See y’all soon! Can’t wait to see you family! Love and miss you guys – Genna

Miss you Mom, Dad, Marlea, Casey, and Carson. I love you and cant wait
to see you all and tell you all about the last two weeks. – Chris

See you all soon!

Buna (hello) friends and family,

Kacey and Emily here! Sorry we took so long to post an update, we just got out of our food comas. After our flight, we spent the night in Budapest. No one could figure out how to work the showers, so we failed our first cultural test. It was so nice to sleep in a bed after our long flight!

The next morning, we enjoyed our first European breakfast and Katie lead a devotional for the team. After, Andy (our fieldworker) and Ionel (pronounced Yo-nell- our wonderful bus driver) came to pick us up for the drive to Oradea, Romania. When we got to our new living space called Noble House, we dropped our stuff off and headed to Mama’s (Ionel’s mother in law) house!! She fed us a wonderful meal and served us three trays of donuts. We ate them all and she was very happy about that. When we had finished dinner, we thanked mama and left to go to a lookout of the city of Oradea. It was so beautiful and we got to watch the sun set over the city. Andy shared the history of Romania and Communism with some of the team members which was super helpful and interesting. Then we went to downtown and walked around the city for a bit and saw the Moon church (rumor is that it’s one of the wonders of the world) which was beautiful, especially at night!

On Thursday, we began the day with devotionals led by me (Kacey). We then headed back to downtown Oradea. The team explored, purchased souvenirs, and went to a coffee shop called Café Frei. We also visited a Hungarian church and were able to walk around and also pray if we wanted to. After adventuring, we had our first day of ministry! We went to a Christian orphanage called Ineu. Right when we pulled up, the kiddos looked so excited to see us and we jumped right into playing with them. After we played for a bit, we sat them down for a lesson, crafts and a game lead by Grace, Cooper, and Caleb. For the craft, the kids colored on paper crowns that they could wear to remind them that they are princes and princesses of the Lord. We then played soccer and tag and many other activities with the kids! Before we left, we passed out bracelets that our team made for the kids! The bracelets also had a verse on them with the name of them team member who made it! They were such a hit! We said our goodbyes which was hard knowing that we would not see these kids again. It was bittersweet, but the time we spent with them was priceless.

On Friday, Cooper led devotions and then we took a road trip to Bazna, Romania. Fun fact: Bazna means “a better place” which we all agree is an accurate portrayal of the city. The drive was a total of 7 hours of laughs, and sleeps, and Ionel’s mixtape. The drive took up most of the day, however, that did not stop us from doing more ministry. That night, we played volleyball with some young adults in the community. They were really good at volleyball and we enjoyed spending some time with them!

The past few days in Romania have been absolutely amazing, and all of our hearts are so full. It has been such a blessing to create new relationships with the Romanian children and adults. The Lord is moving in this nation and we are so happy that we are a part of what He is doing. As a team, we are quickly adapting to the new cultural experiences, and we are creating so many new memories together. The laughs are nonstop, and our bond is continuing to strengthen day by day. We are so excited for what is in store for the rest of our time in this breathtaking country.

Quick shout outs:

“Love you all and hope you’re doing well. I’m eating enough protein, don’t worry!” –Emily

“Hi everyone, I love you all so much! It’s beautiful here, and I wish you could try Mama’s donuts.” –Kacey 

We have arrived!

Hello from Romania, everyone! After a long day of travel (and an hour delay…) we have made it to Romania! Thank you so much for your prayers that our travels would be smooth and without any (major) issues. He is so faithful, even in the seemingly little things.

We are checked into our hotel and are getting some much needed sleep before we hit the ground running tomorrow. Our first day here will include some cultural acquisition, introduction to the ministry and hearing how we can best partner with them during our time here. Please pray for a quick adjustment to the time change so that we can get right to work, and for an openness to the Gospel when we are finally able to go connect with the people of Romania!

We will send another update in a few more days! Miss you all!

-Steph & the team