VBS-Being Fat

It was 3 years ago that I took my first trip with YWAM to the Dominican Republic. A main theme that they taught us on the trip was the ability to be F.A.T. Flexible, Adaptable, Teachable. It was an important lesson for that trip, and something that I've always reminded myself of in the 3 years since. I thought I had really learned how to apply it to my life. 

Then VBS happened. 

We had an opportunity to run a VBS in a small Moldovan village this week. Before the camp even started, the plan changed 3 times. I was the "Leader of the Week" this week (we have a different one every week), and it was a massive stretching experience for me. We ended up starting a day later than planned, and we had to completely change our plan for the week a day before it actually started. 

I was teaching the Bible study portion of the VBS along with a fellow team member. I was really excited about this opportunity. This has been a big area of growth on DTS for me. Leading up to and even during lecture phase, I was very nervous talking in front of people. But on outreach, I have been forced out of my comfort zone, and officially been broken of this fear. I have come to really enjoy teaching people and was really excited. 

There are only 800 people in the village, so we were mostly expecting younger kids. We weren't really expecting more than 20. "How many people in this small, poor village are gonna come out for this?" I thought. I prepared a lesson for younger kids and went in excited.

So we get there and are waiting to start the camp. A few younger kids come in. Plan intact. Then one 16 year old girl comes in. Followed by two more teenage girls....followed by 3 teenage boys.....

We end up with 40 kids, and half of them are teenagers. I'm freaking out. I have a lesson prepared for younger kids and I now we are splitting the older and younger kids, and I have to come up for something with the older kids on the spot. 

The phrase F.A.T. has really been impacting me this week, and I wouldn't have made it through that first day without it. As I walked outside to collect myself, freaking out slightly (in a not so slightly way), I finally decided that I just needed to relax. I gave a grin, looked at a couple team members and said "Well, time to be fat. Here we go." 

I was still struggling with what to say. We get through our intro part. Time for classes. At least I figured that I could get the younger kids first. As we're splitting groups, one of our Russian speakers says something, and all the younger kids walk out to English class. Older kids are with us first. There goes that plan. 

So, as I stand there, I'm racking my brain, and all of the sudden I just feel this complete peace come over me. All of the sudden, God starts giving me the exact words to say. It was one of the most clear times that I've heard Him speak. One of our team members looks at me and says something about changing the plan, and I just said really without thinking, "Oh, we're fine. I know exactly what to say now." After I said it, all I could think was, "Uh....why am I calm right now?"

Long story short, I ended up sharing the story of the bible with the students. Thank God for Bible Overview week. I split the Bible up into the 9 parts that our teachers had for us (Creation, The Fall, Promise of Redemption, Call of Abraham, The Law, Eternal Kingdom, Jesus, Holy Spirit, and The Second Coming) and taught the kids about the story of the Bible. I shared personal stories from my own life, got the kids involved with some of the interactive stuff from our Bible Overview week in DTS, and I am still a little shocked to say that I actually ended up having to cut short what I was saying because I ran out of time!

The whole week was filled with examples of F.A.T, as well as God using our team to reach the kids. A small lesson that God taught me was found in a stuffed animal.

The guys in our DTS like to have fun, and back in Kyiv, I had purchased a stuffed snake as a joke to put on our door. I figured I'd take it on outreach as a joke and threw it in there. As we were getting ready for Bible study for VBS, I figured I'd bring it to use as an object lesson. From the second we got there, the kids loved it. They were playing with it, and passing it around to everyone. The rest of the team used it, and I know it was extremely useful in bible. Every time I pulled out the snake, the kids were immediately interested in what I had to say. 

So on the last day, as I was looking at the snake, I felt challenged. "If God can use a stuffed snake that looks ridiculous to reach some kids in Moldova, then why do I ever doubt that he can use me, who He formed in His own image, and gave specific talents to reach people?"

This is something that I struggled with at times on the DTS, and I have finally received revelation and growth with on outreach. It is easy to feel sometimes that you're not good enough to do ministry. Not qualified or talented enough sometimes. But the reality is, there's only one attribute you need for ministry. You just have to be willing. You don't have to be good enough, or talented enough, you just have to be willing to do it, and love people, and you'll have an impact.

VBS was amazing. We taught the kids about Friendship, Creation, Who God is, and The Story of Christmas. We had English and Bible lessons, as well as crafts and games. We got a chance to present the gospel to the kids, and love them and form relationships. At the end of the camp, the pastor told us that he had done other VBS's before, but didn't think he had ever seen one have such an impact with drawing kids closer to God than ours. 

On the last day, as I was teaching the kids about Christmas, I had another moment where I realized that I am really living Christmas this year. At the end of the teaching, I felt God prompt me to share the gospel with the kids again, (I had shared it the day before as well), and I ended up presenting the gospel to the kids. What better way to spend the Christmas season than drawing people closer to Him? As we were in the middle of planning for the end of the day, I got a tap on the shoulder from one of our team members. "They want you in the crafts room!" I run back there, nervous that there's been yet another change to the plan. "The students want you," our crafts leader says. As I get to the back of the room, one of the students hands me their craft they made for the day and tells me it's a Christmas present for me. I was already impacted and then he motions to the people sitting around him and I notice that there looking very shyly at me. Suddenly, I realize what he's trying to say. "From all of you???" I asked. "Da!" (Yes in Russian) they say excitedly! This is one of my favorite presents ever, and I will be keeping it.

 At the end of the day, we passed out presents to every single kid there (remember the hundreds of presents that we moved? This was some of them, the rest got taken to other locations). It was life changing. This was their Christmas. It was such a big deal to them. Seeing the huge smiles on the kids faces.....I will never be the same after that experience. 

Circumstances change in life. Plans change. It can be hard for us as humans to accept sometimes. This week, with the teaching on Christmas, I shared on Joseph. Even though his circumstances changed greatly, he still had to trust in God's plan for his life and follow him. In the end, Joseph had to be F.A.T. We serve a God that demands that we be flexible. Circumstances change sometimes. If we can't be able to change at times, then we won't be able to serve people. Situations change at times. We may not like teachings. But are we going to pout, or are we going to adapt and move forward with God? And the most important of the 3, teachable. If we cannot be humble enough to learn from every experience, we will not grow, and our ministry will become stale. All three of these are very important to ministry.

Tomorrow, we celebrate New Years with a local church. To give you a perspective on how Eastern Europe celebrates New Years, the party starts at 9 PM, and goes till 6 AM. It's going to be wild! Supposedly they go absolutely crazy, so it's going to be a fun night. 

God is doing incredible things with me personally, as well as our team. Keep us in prayer, it makes a difference!

Redefining Christmas

For the past 18 years, I've done the same thing every December. Make a Christmas list, get other people's Christmas list, hang out with friends, wait for Christmas impatiently, wake up December 25th and have a party. 

This year is a little different. 

I looked at the date yesterday and was in shock that Christmas is in 5 days because we honestly haven't really had time to think about it. I mean, there's been the occasional mention from a team member, there is a loose plan for a gift exchange, and I'm sure we will have a celebration at some point, but we haven't had a chance to really think about it.

The Protestants celebrate Christmas on January 7th. The Orthodox Christan's, along with the Catholics celebrate Christmas on December 25th. So a couple weeks ago, we were informed that we would be running a Vacation Bible School on the 25th of December with a Protestant church. I'm going to be honest, my first reaction (along with the rest of the team) was to be pretty disappointed. But as time went on, and our ministry has continued to take shape, God has started to challenge me with how I view Christmas. I'm having one of the best Christmases ever. It's just outside of my box, which is a common theme in DTS. 

On Tuesday and Wednesday, we go to a kids program with children who come from troubled homes. We are able to form relationships with the kids, and really have a positive impact on them. Last Tuesday, I was dubbed by our team to play Santa Claus for the kids. As the kids went crazy and started running up to me to poke my "stomach" (a teddy bear), I told them that I wanted to give them a gift. Our team had gotten each child a little orange as their Christmas present (we're a YWAM team, there's not much room for expensive presents). I honestly did not expect it to be a big deal to them. But as I started pulling out oranges, the kids faces lit up. Someone had actually gotten them something! Later, I found out that one of the girls had her orange eaten by someone else accidentally, and she was so crushed that she went to another room to cry. When we came the next day, we were met with extreme joy from the little kids. Everyone ran up to greet "Santa Claus," and poke my stomach (there was no teddy bear this time, so it was slightly uncomfortable).

Every Thursday night, we go to a youth ministry. I LOVE this ministry. I have formed a lot of great friendships there, and that is a real connection for us to be able to reach out to Cahul. So I was shopping with a few team members, when another team member came rushing in to tell me that we had to go now. The pastor of the church with the youth ministry had called our leader and informed him that he needed two guys to run an errand with him outside of the city. He didn't tell us what it was, just that it could take an hour and we could be back in time for youth, or it could take 3 hours, and we could miss most of youth. It was much closer to the second one. 

That pretty much defines what DTS outreach looks like.

So we're in a car with 6 or 7 other guys. Not a single one of them speak English. Through the TINY bit of Russian that some of us have picked up, we understood (or thought at least) that they were saying something about presents. So we get to this church. They tell us to go inside, then they tell us to sit down and relax. Then they tell us to go outside. As we go outside, there's a truck the size of the length of my house trying to back in on snow and ice. So we tried to push the truck in. Nope. Had to push it back out. Nope for a couple minutes, then got it to work. Then they finally realized that the truck would have to go straight in. Problem is that there were some trees blocking the entrance, and this was a HUGE truck. So, we had guys climbing the trees to cut off the branches to make room for the truck, and we still have NO idea what's going on. 

So finally the truck gets in. Then a couple smaller trucks and some cars pull in right behind it. So they pull off the tarp for the first section of the truck. Hundreds of presents. "Wow," I said quietly to myself. They pull off the second tarp. Hundreds more. "Woah....." Third tarp comes off. Hundreds and hundreds of presents. "My gosh!" I said (which the Moldavians thought was hilarious). So we spent the next while pulling presents out and loading trucks and cars. Then a man comes up to us and says "YWAM team for Emmanuel, we have to go!" (Emmanuel is the church with the youth ministry). So, I think we're done. We head back. As I start to go in the doors, my team member calls me back. I turn around and realize that one of the smaller trucks had followed us, and realized that we were unloading some of the presents at Emmanuel. So we spent the next 30 to 45 minutes unloading that truck into a back room of the church. You can not walk in that room at this point, and you can barely open and close the door. It is packed with presents everywhere. 

As I walked into the youth group, I looked around the room and had a moment where I realized "Not only do I know these people, but I really love these people." Several of my friends turned around to greet me and one of them energetically pointed to the seat next to him for me to come sit there. As I sat down, I realized that this is Christmas. 

I miss my family and home a lot. But if we're not using Christmas as an opportunity to reach out and touch other people, then what's the point? The point of Christmas is celebrating that Jesus came so that people could come into relationship with him. So what are we doing if we're not working towards saving people? The goal of Christmas should be to give it away. To love other people. Sure, part of the fun of Christmas is the atmosphere, the family time, the late nights, but what is the focus of our Christmas? 

For me the question it came down to me for me was, am I going to sulk about the fact that I'll be missing my own interpretation of what Christmas should be, or am I going to give out oranges to kids with a grin on my face, and work as hard as possible to make sure some kids get presents that they wouldn't otherwise?

God is moving through our outreach team big time. One thing that I already felt before the trip, but God has been speaking to me a lot is that relationships are the key to reaching people. I do believe God can use programs. But I believe he uses programs as tool to form relationships. Everywhere we go now, we have friends around the city. The other day I was greeted with a hug from a little boy I have only met a few times. On Saturday, we had a sledding outing with some of the youth in Cahul (and we do consider that ministry), and left with 4 people joining us at our house for dinner (actually I invited 5 or 6, and had to be told by a couple people that I needed to stop because we couldn't host half the city). We went to a school yesterday to do a presentation on human trafficking and I was greeted by several students that I have formed friendships with. This is how we are reaching Cahul. This is how I think we need to reach the world. 

But we also have a call to preach the gospel. And I got an awesome opportunity last Sunday to go into a village church (the poverty in the villages is pretty shocking) with a mostly older congregation and preach my first sermon on the "Heart of Missions." I was really nervous when I was first told that I would be preaching, but as it got closer I got a real peace about it and made it out alive with the thumbs up from my team. 

Last time in my blog I mentioned it was snowing here in Moldova. Funny story, it hasn't stopped. There is snow and ice everywhere all the time. I have taken quite a few tumbles on the ice, and my definition of cold has changed very much.


Also, I have some extremely exciting news! The two students that had passport issues and could not come with our team originally to Moldova have solved their issues and will be here on Saturday! I am so excited! These are two of my best friends and I know they are going to have a big impact here in Cahul.

Lecture phase was a life changing experience. But I have to say I am experiencing pretty explosive life change on outreach. Me and my team have big opportunities to change Cahul. Not just a short term change. But by forming relationships, and challenging the Moldovan people into a deeper relationship with Christ and presenting the gospel to people who just simply don't know about Jesus, we are pushing hard for permanent change. We are not a relief team. So what if we make people feel good for a couple months? It accomplishes nothing. But we want to leave Moldova with stronger leaders, ministries, and Christians than when we came here. We are well on our way to accomplishing this goal, and we're just getting started.

7 weeks left, a lot of big things happening. Merry Christmas from Moldova!

Setting Captives Free

Outreach is underway and we have completed our first week. A lot of this first week was getting in contact with the people we are going to be working with and setting up opportunities. We have some really exciting stuff ahead of us.

We will have a heavy emphasis on working with the youth here in Cahul. They are really searching for answers and need Jesus, and we are excited about having an opportunity to work with them. We want to be hospitable and be able to develop relationships so we are renting out an apartment for the girls on our team to stay in and to function as a place for fellowship, while the guys are staying in an apartment provided by YWAM Cahul.

This week, we had an opportunity to go to one of the churches we will be working with and work with some kids that come from difficult family situations. Specifically, I was part of a team that worked to help the kids with learning English (that's going to be a common theme for our outreach, it opens up a lot of doors). I am extremely excited to have a chance to develop relationships with these kids.

We also had a chance to go to a youth group that we are going to be working with just to meet the group and get to know some of the people we will be working with. The youth pastor is a really cool guy, and really has a handle on the situation in Cahul. I am excited to get to work with him more.

On Friday, we did an observation/prayer walk through Cahul. The dynamic is really interesting here. The older generation is definitely larger than the younger, and you can always find the younger generation in small groups. It also took quite a few days to get our passports stamped....seeing how the passport and visa situation works in other countries has been really eye opening. It is extremely difficult and there is so much corruption.

Saturday was practical work for half of the team. It was extremely difficult. We had to shovel iced dirt to help plan trees...on a hillside. With cold wind blowing in our faces. With ice. I am from Florida. Quite the experience.

While we were working, it was extremely difficult, but to see how appreciative the workers were of our hard work made it all worth it. The guy working with us was just clearly blown away by how much we helped....it was super awesome! Afterwards, we ate lunch in a small trailer with him (the food was actually pretty amazing) and I just couldn't stop thinking about how cool it was. I love people, and getting to minister to the people of Cahul is awesome!

Sunday, we split into two teams and at one church, we had someone preach a 20 minute message, and at the other church (my group) we were able to lead worship for a few minutes. Actually, only the men will be able to preach, which means that I will most likely be preaching at some point. Please pray for me!

There isn't much to do in Cahul, which means there is a heavy emphasis on relationships. Even on the first day, we had a couple youth who live in our apartment complex come up and start talking to us. Real fun guys, I am excited to develop that relationship. Pray for us as we develop relationships.

Also, huge prayer request. We had a couple team members who had passport issues and got sent back at the border. They are working to get these issues fixed and one of them should be here soon. Please pray, this has had a huge effect on me personally, as these are two of my best friends. Please pray guys!



And PLEASE continue to pray for us! Thanks guys!

Lecture Phase

Character and Nature of God

Father Heart Of God

Identity In Christ

Cross Cultural  Communication

Creating With God

Worldview

Relationships

Evangelism 

Holy Spirit And Spiritual Warfare

Spiritual Wholeness

Discipleship

Jewish Culture

Bible Overview

 

FireBegins

WithSparks