Hey everybody!
First off I wanted to thank you all for your prayers this past week. The kids programs went really well, as did the house visits and the ladies' meetings.
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Back row (left to right): Emily, Keitra, Karina, Laura, Tina, Alexandra, Muriel, Joyce
Front row: Fosca, Carrie, Essi, me. |
In case you didn't know, our Transform Albania team was a group of 12 women from 7 different countries, and our ages ranged from over 60 to 18 (me being the youngest). It was a great group to be a part of, with strong unity.
The theme for the week was "Loving the Unloved". The Roma people are a heavily discriminated people group. Many of them have turned to Islam and have started going to the Mosque because they get money there. This creates a pretty strong opposition. Due to their poverty levels the parents don't always understand the importance of education and they would rather have their kids on the streets begging than in school learning. 50% of the adults don't know how to read, but their kids are learning to read more and more. Another part of the Roma culture is the need for marriage. They have arranged marriages and more often than not, the girl will be engaged by the age of 15 and married only a few years later. A lot of the time if the daughter is not engaged by the age of 19, it means there is something wrong with her.
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| I know what you're thinking, no it wasn't always that chaotic. |
But as for our week with the Roma people, our group saw the God working in awesome ways. Every morning from 10:00-12 we went to the Emmanuel Centre where different programs are held. In the morning we worked with kids and about 15 children would show up. We had a time of singing, a Bible story, a memory verse, a science lesson about butterflies (led by me), and craft time. If we had time at the end we would go out for games.
Each day the story talked about God's love for His children. The kids learned about His power and His love for them and at the end of the week Carrie (one of the team members) gave them the clear gospel after telling the story of Saul (Paul). We also taught them "Who is the King of the Jungle?" in English, and they performed it on our Cultural Night on Sunday.
We also had them memorize this:
Jeremiah 31:3 Which says: "The Lord appeared to him from far away. 'I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.'"
The only catch was that we had to memorize it in Albanian too. It's harder than you think, and if you think it's hard you're getting the picture.
Anyway, I pray that this would stick in their mind and sink in their hearts until they truely find God's love.
After singing, the story, and the Bible verse I would come up and start talking about the 4 stages of the butterfly. It was a simple 2 minute science lesson for them.
Stage one: The Egg. The eggs are laid on leaves in groups of about 20 or 30 in hopes that one of them survives. some of the eggs can be as small as the tip of a pin.
Stage two: The Larva/Caterpillar. When the egg hatches out comes a caterpillar. The caterpillar begins eating the leaf that it's on. then it eats another, and another, and so on. As it grows it has to shed it's skin and can do it up to 5 times!.
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| Me in my cocoon. |
Stage three: The Cocoon. When the caterpillar is ready, it will begin to built itself a comfortable home that it can live in for up to 7 weeks. While in there it begins to transform into a butterfly.
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| Breaking out of my cocoon. |
Stage four: The Butterfly. After several weeks, the insect is ready to break out. It is no longer an ugly caterpillar, rather it is a beautiful butterfly.
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| Showing off my wings =). |
I went through one stage each day. On the last day, I reviewed each stage, then went on to tie it in as a Biblical illustration of the heart before and after Christ transforms us. Then they got the joy of decorating butterfly masks to represent the transformed life.
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Just like the butterfly transforms into something beautiful, so do we when Christ works in our hearts.
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Our team also had the privilege of visiting homes. There we simply talked to the Roma people and shared our testimonies. One home we visited was a strong Muslim home, though they really didn't know what they believed. Because 12 people couldn't fit in one home we broke up in 4 groups and visited different homes 3 nights in a row. One night 2 groups were able to bring a 13 year old boy to Christ and (in a different home) and lady also accepted Christ. It was amazing to see these faces shining when we came back home and talked about our evening.
On the last three nights of the week we also held a ladies' meeting. For that, we also broke up into 3 different groups and set out a program. My group decided to tell a small story about an African village, do a skit on the Samaritan woman at the well, then our team leader told her testimony, and I had the privilege of tying it all together and sharing the Gospel. Although we did not see any one come to Christ that night, the Holy Spirit's work was evident because the next night 3 of the 7 women that showed up dedicated their lives to Him!
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| A few of the women at our meeting. |
Lastly, (sorry this is so long) we had a Cultural Night on Sunday. That night each of us on the Transform team shared a little bit about our country and it's culture to not only the kids or the women but the whole family was invited. Some of us taught a dance, others held competitions, one had a quiz, and some simply had a power point on their country.
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| Keitra (Bahamas) getting ready to teach a dance. |
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| Watermelon eating competition (America). |
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| Joyce (UK) and two hyper boys |
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| Alexandra (Austria) with some typical Austrian candy. |
It was a fun night, and the pastor of the church there then gave a clear, short gospel message. We also had a surprise guest from South Africa who was on the Transform Kosovo team sing for us. After the program they went out and tried some typical food and candy from our countries and they were also given a plate of some Albanian dish for their super. The night turned out to be a pretty good one, and the week was well spent.
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| Me with one of my favorites =). |
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| Essi (Finland) with one of the boys. |
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| Me with two beautiful girls <3 |
Thank you all so much for your prayers for the week. I know God heard you. Please don't stop praying for them, they need God just as much as we do, and He is their only hope for satisfaction in life.
In Christ,
