Saturday, June 30, 2007

In Bistrita for Wedding

I am up in Bistrita to go to my friends Luci and Mona's wedding on Sunday. It is nice and cool here which is a nice relief from the hot temperatures we had in Bucuresti. The day before I left the temperature got to 104F/40C in the shade and 122F/50C out in the open. Now that is hot!!!

This weekend here in Bistrita they are having a medieval festival with groups performing music on stage, dances, and displays of clothes and weapons. After the weekend I will put some photos I've taken here in Bistrita on my Flickr account.

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Prayer Request - Support and Place to Live


I would really appreciate prayer in regards to my support as it is not adequate for living in Bucuresti. Earlier in the day, when I got my first report from my home church on the level of my support after having come back to Romania, Shane and Randie asked me to wait to find an apartment so that I could watch their place when they left to go back to the States for a few months. Later that day when I got my report I saw that the monthly support was low so I decided it would be best to wait to get an apartment and save up some money for awhile.

For the first four months I stayed at the ministry building in one of the rooms set up for teams when they come here. Now I am watching Shane and Randie's apartment till the end of August. Before then I will need to find my own place so please pray that everything will work out.

Ideally (maybe not realistic), it would be best to be able to buy an apartment as real estate and rent in Bucuresti is very expensive compared to the rest of the country and is expected to keep going up for the next 10 years. That way I would not have to worry about rent increases and would get some equity in a place. Considering I do not have a retirement fund that would be great. I have no idea how to go about making this happen but I can pray and see what the Lord does.

Prayer Requests
  • That my support would increase and be adequate for living in Bucuresti
  • To find a place to live in August in a good location at a good price
  • To be able to get a loan or some other means to purchase an apartment
  • If I have to rent to have a good landlord that won't try to take advantage of me

Friday, June 22, 2007

Andreea's Graduation from University

On June 8th Andreea Oprea graduated from the University of Transilvania in Brasov in the faculty of Modern Applied Languages. Though they have had the graduation ceremony she still needs to finish her final exams then she will officially be done.

Andreea was the first person who started coming to the church when we began meeting on Sundays. Before that she had been regularly coming to the Bible study I had been doing.

Please pray for her as she begins a new chapter in her life. That God will show her what His calling and will is for her at this time.

You can check out a photo album of her graduation here.


Prayer Request - School of Ministry

The planning and preparation for the School of Ministry continues as school will begin the first full week of September. So far we have developed the classes and the schedule for the four semesters of the two year program, finished all the forms related to the application process, and have written out a vision, purpose and mission statement which includes a list of the classes that you can view here.

We are still working on the course descriptions and the student handbook. After these are done each teacher will begin working on their syllabi and curriculum for the fall semester. The teachers for the fall semester are Adi Caciula, Florin Enescu, Shane Herman and myself. At this point it looks like we will have between 5 and 10 students the first semester.

Prayer Requests
  • Please pray for wisdom, direction and resources for everything related to the School of Ministry
  • For those teaching the classes and for me as I oversee the administration of the school
  • For the students coming the first semester, that God would call those He desires to be equipped through the School of Ministry
  • For the financial provision for each student so they will be able to come to school full-time
Class List for First Semester

OT310 Genesis
NT353 Luke
NT407 Galatians & Ephesians
OT300 Through the Word Part 1
OT301 Old Testament Survey Part 1
TH101 Lectures in Ministry & Theology
TH417 Inductive Bible Study/Hermeneutics
CL101 Morning Chapel
CL105 Community Worship
CL351 Growing in Christ (The Gospel In-depth)
CM199 Practical Christian Ministry

Total credits: 20.5


Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Storming the Gates of Hell

During our conference Ken, one of the speakers, asked if our churches were storming the gates of Hell. As you can see, Calvary Chapel Brasov is. See larger photo here.


Church of Angels

After the Calvary Chapel Romania Conference I went to Brasov with Florin who is from there. On the way we stopped in Miercurea-Ciuc to find a church I saw briefly a few years ago with angels on it. It took awhile but we finally found it. I find the architecture very interesting. Below is a link to an album I made on my Flickr account of photos of this church. Not sure but think it may be a Catholic church.

Church of Angels Photo Album

If you want to download any of the photos you need to click on the photos you want and after you click on them to click on the button "all sizes" above the photo. Then you can choose what size you want to download.

Calvary Chapel Romania Conference 2007

We had our seventh annual Calvary Chapel Romania Conference May 22-25. The theme was "Who is Jesus" and our guest speakers were Bob Caldwell from Boise, Idaho and Ken Sutton from Costa Mesa, California.

The conference was a great blessing to the 80 or so who attended with the worship, the teaching on Jesus, the fellowship and the great weather. We had lots of positive feedback saying this conference really ministered to people.

Below are some links to the photos and the MP3's of the main sessions and the workshops. I have uploaded all but one of the videos of the conference to Google video but there are problems with the audio on some of the sessions. Will try to fix them if possible.

Photos on Flickr

Download MP3's

Google Video in the search box put- calvary chapel romania 2007


To download the photos in Flickr click on them individually in the album then click on the "all sizes" box above the photo then choose what size you want to download.