THINK AGAIN ~ KECY Slovakia

This years theme was THINK AGAIN. Each day there was a theme for the day...Reality, Self, Wonder, Hope, Awakening; and with these themes we had English classes, sports, games, crafts and evening programs. It was great!

The city I worked with was Lucenec and we had camp in the city of Kremnica (I posted about it in a blog previously).
Even though are camp was small it seemed to be just right. Our camp was in the middle of the mountains in a tiny village.

This year my role was a bit different from last year so I was not able to build quite as many relationships. This year I was the camp leader and was responsible for the American team as well as the Slovak team to make sure everything ran smoothly.

Here are some pictures from camp...

the morning camp dance....

English classes (Adam and Morgan's)

team building activities

American team resting

The whole camp!

God revealed himself huge one night....Adam was speaking on 'wonder' and had a powerpoint all ready to go with all kinds of pictures of the universe, stars and so on. We could not get it to work...so Adam just began his evening speach. At the end we all went outside for a campfire. Well God showed himself because before the evening program it was really cloudy and we did not think that we would be able to see any stars after the program...when we went outside that night it was unbelievable. The stars were all over the place and the sky was cloud free, the weather was gorgeous and God was bigger than ever. I love when God does things like that and what a perfect night to do it!

By the end of camp many great relationships were built. When the students were leaving one of the students asked an American, "How long have you been a Christian?" And he replied, "5 years" (I think that is the number he gave....) then he turned to the student and said, "what about you?" and his reply was.... "10 hours." WOW!!!! God is on the move in these students hearts.


Please continue to pray for the students in Slovakia and that they will be responsive to the Gospel.

Happy 4th of JULY!!!!!!!!

Okay so I am writing this late....but I was thinking of you all while I was at camp in Slovakia for the 2nd summer in a row.


HAPPY 4TH OF JULY!!!!!!!!!!

Old German church 1931-1945

While we were at camp, our campsite was neslted in the valley of rolling green hills in a small village. It was beautiful. Across the street from us was the village church, Catholic and behind that, almost hidden was an old German Luthern church. This church was built in 1931. Then in 1945 when all the Germans were chased out of Slovakia the church shut down and has never been reopened.




We walked over to get a closer look and some people (we won't mention names ;) ) climbed inside the widow to an even closer look (some pictures below are the view from the top). It was really small and looked as if there used to be some sort of wall around the church. There was nothing left of that. There was also some tomb stones and even some more recent ones to the right of the church.



This sign below was still on the front of the church adn written in German...it is Mt. 11:28
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest."

Kremnica, Slovakia

When we were preparing for camp I had to run into the city for a few last minute things and my friend Miska went with me. She is so full of knowledge, I love walking around with her because I always learn something new about some kind of history here in Slovakia.

We had our English camp in a city called Kremnica. It is a beautiful.

Funny thing about small towns is that the people are so kind. When Miska and I were looking for last minute items...pencils, sharpeners, sticky notes, erasers, crayons, etc. We could not find anything open. It was a Saturday and everything closed early. So we went into one shop and asked the lady if she knew where we could get anything of the sorts...she grinned, "no, nothing is open around here..." so, before we left she asked us to wait and went to the back of the store (keep in mind this was a little store that could probably hold 6-8 people at a time in it). She came back with most of the supplies we needed...they were here own personal supplies. She was willing to give them to us. WOW, Miska and I grinned, we love small villages. So we kindly paid her for her items and proceeded to find more of what we needed. It is amazing to me how kind the people are in such small towns/villages. Miska and I laughed about that all day.

I did not forget...here is a bit of history that I learned about Kremnica...

Kremnica is most famous for its mint. It has been producing coins since the 14th century and still produces coins for the surrounding nations today.
It is said that the hills in Kremnica are full of gold and silver.

There is also an old gate entrance that is still there and a castle. We climbed to the top and you can see over the entire city. While I was looking out I kept trying to imagine what it must have been like when the castle was all in one piece and you could look over the walls at people coming your way, like the guards did years ago.
There was also an old church in the castle that is still used today for services on Sunday. The church was beautiful and had a ton of HUGE pipe organs in there as well. I would have loved to hear those play.





Also, this past May in the local paper here, there was an article about a man from Kremnica who was making coins for Iraq last year and he has signed some papers/contracts for this. Well, when he went to delvier the coins, he was killed and then the truck with the coins was then stollen by the Iraq's. Sad how it happened last year but just came out in the paper this year....