STRBSKE PLESO

This past weekend Amy, Paige, Stani (three of my dearest friends in Slovakia) and I went for a weekend away to the Tatry mountains. We stayed at the highest settlement in Vysoke Tatry (the High Tatras). It was gorgeous. We all wanted some time together to relax and nothing says relax to me like sitting in the middle of God's creation at 4,380 ft above sea level. I was speechless everytime I looked at the hands of God all around me.

We took a relaxing hike on Saturday almost to the top of the mountain. We were less then 2 hours from the peak. INCREDIBLE! There was a lake at the top that was the second highest lake in the Tatry's. We sat around the lake for a bit to take it all in and then we hiked back down. In the eveninings the sunset was stunning. The colors went from pink to an incredibly bright orange.

CAMPFEST

This year I had the opportunity to go to Campfest again. For those of you who are not familiar with Campfest, it is the "Passion" of Slovakia. It is a huge Christian worship festival and over 3000 people show up for this 3 day event and camp out.
/>

http://campfest.sk/en/

Only this time I was really only planning on going for Thursday afternoon to have a meeting with Danny Jones about mine and Bryan's future with Josiah Venture. So i hopped on a trian and headed up to the Tatry Mountains. Then some students asked me to stay for one night, so I figured why not (keep in mind I had nothing with me, I was not prepared to stay the night). I slept in Mike's car and was going to head out the next day. So I got to hang out all day Friday then headed to the train station Friday night to catch the LAST train to Presov...last train was right, I missed the train and the bus station was closed and taxies are too expensive, so I called Mike, he came to get me and I stayed another night at Campfest, still not prepared. (Same clothes, no toothbrush/deoderant, and a train ticket that is now no good). I found out that our friend from Presov was going to be at Campfest on Saturday afternoon. I asked Marcel if I could ride back to Presov with him that evening, thankfully he said yes. I finally left on Saturday evening and was less then 12 hours shy of staying for the entire Campfest. Everyone left on Sunday morning.

While I was in the train station I found some kids and asked if they could help me find another train or someway home...unfortuanatly they had a train to catch and I ended up calling Mike. The next day at Campfest, I saw the two boys (picture below) who were so kind to help me. I should have just jumped on the train with them to go to Campfest but I had no idea that is where they were going.

Ministry bus...

While I was in Cz saying goodbye to some folks I had the opportunity to talk to Mark Krupa. He lives in Czech Republic and is part of the JV team. Mark was sharing with me about his ministry and what is going on with students around him. …



This may look like some gang bangers got a hold of this bus but actually this is Mark’s ministry. M: “It’s not about finding the place but finding the people.” (Those were not his exact words but close to it)
Mark mentioned how this bus was an old junker and the entire inside was wiped out and all the seats were gone. So they put pillows on the floors and use it as a meeting place for students. It has been broken into many times but there is nothing in it to steal. And in the winter time there is a generator hooked up to it for heat and lights. How cool is this bus?!

Every night during the month of August, Krupa is there at 8pm whether students show up or not. If not, then he sits there in prayer and if they do then he has a study prepared for them. Well this particular night that I was there it had been raining and a group of kids were out in the park across from the bus. Most of the rough kids in the neighborhood hang out there. Well, Krupa invited them in to get out of the rain and they read a chapter in Genesis together. He said the room (bus) was silent. They all listened as he read. I love seeing how God moves.

Could you please be praying for Mark and his team in Cz as they reach out to the youth there. Pray that God will use this cool bus as a place for the students to come and hear about Him.

Zakopane, Poland

This week Mike, Ryan, Anka and I went to Zakopane, Poland for one day to debrief part of the summer. It was gorgeous. It reminded me a little bit of Helen, Georgia (for those of you who know where that is). I enjoyed the quietness there and time to relax after camp.
We spent the afternoon walking around the center and having some dinner and coffee. The summer is quickly coming to an end…right now the weather has been so cool that we feel like Fall is here. I think we might have left the summer heat in Serbia. We had to pull out our fleeces and long sleeve shirts in Poland.

Then the next morning we headed to Czech Republic for some meetings….

Novi Sad after camp

After camp we stayed with Serbian families in Novi Sad to do some follow up with students. It was a great time to get to know the Serbian culture a bit more closely and spend some time with students outside of camp.

We had a couple days planned to do things with students. Usually at a follow up a few will come and that is about it. Well we had the entire camp of students at follow up except 3. Go God!
The first evening was a chat club. All the kids came and we talked about camp and looked at pictures and movies from camp. Did the camp dance AGAIN along with the Cha-Cha slide.



The next day we took them to the beach in Novi Sad. They swam in the Danube…I took pictures and the guys played a game of soccer. It was perfect weather for it.



Then on Wednesday night we had a church service…all the kids came. During the service Victoria got up and shared her testimony. It was beautiful.


After the service we all hung around and watched a movie. I was really encouraged to see all of the students there.


I was able to have some great conversations with Victoria and her sister during those few days in Novi Sad. We got to hang out a lot at the planned follow up events and even during the days I walked around the city with them.


Please continue to pray for the students in Novi Sad and that they will continue to follow the Lord. Being a Christian is far from easy in Serbia. Most people are not open to it and think we are a cult. These students need prayer.

Serbia camp

Camp began and when the students arrived and got out of the van…we were a bit confused. These students came from Novi Sad but were not your typical Serbian students. They were Gypsy students.

After doing some placement testing to see where their English was so I knew what level to put them in for their classes….I realized they spoke NO English. What I mean by NO is, I asked one student his name and he responded quickly with, “Novi Sad, Novi Sad”. I think he thought I asked where is he from. At that moment I knew this camp was going to be interesting. Gypsy students do not have to go to school if they do not want to, so most of our students did not go…even the 13 year old girls that came said, “we don’t go to school because we are Gypsy kids and we are not required to go to school.”
The first few days of camp the students were not very responsive and did their own thing. They sat in their little groups and seemed a bit bored at times. This camp had the same theme as our camps in Slovakia…THINK AGAIN, and we had all the activities to go along with the theme for the day. It is interesting to watch the Serbian culture, they are so different from any other culture around here. Even though there was a schedule for camp to follow each day…they kind of came at their own times. They did much better than last year but non-the-less they still function on what we call “Serbian time” (my fiance’ would do just great there…sorry honey, but it’s true.) By the third day of camp the students began to come together and no longer sat in their little groups. It was amazing. You could tell God was moving throughout the camp. This camp was definitely different from any camp I have done. You could see walls coming down and students beginning to open up. I think we just needed to find a way to reach this culture of kids on their level. Most of them were into hip-hop music and came from rough living. So we put on some music and did the typical “American wedding song”…the Cha-Cha slide but they LOVED it! I got my workout every night. We did it over and over…but it related to them and their world.
Around the middle of the week some students began asking questions about God and wanted to know more. By the end of the week we had 3 students accept Christ and others on the edge. PRAISE GOD!

Here are some pictures from camp:






Here is the story of Victoria and Emilia, two sisters who accepted Christ at camp:
Victoria and Emilia come from a broken home where their dad died a few years ago along with their cousin. (Not sure of the story but I think their dad was sick and their cousin, not so sure). They come from a rough part of Novi Sad where there is gangs and they fear to walk in the streets. They said that at any moment if someone wanted to kill you for no reason, they would. Victoria (16) lived with her grandmother and Emilia (the youngest of the two, 15) lived with their mom and brother. They were both heavily involved in drugs and drinking and also they were stealing things that they could take to a pawn shop and get money for so that their family would have clothes and food. (we probably should have been concerned for our things at camp…) They heard about English camp and figured why not. They both spoke great English but not because they learned it in school. It is because they have seen it on tv and from movies. (which is how most kids on this side of the world learn English on top of going to school) They decided they wanted to change the way they were living.
Here is something that Emilia said to me;
“Every time I walked into your room I saw your cell phone sitting on the bed and I wanted to steal it. I knew it was Satan telling me to do it but I did not. It was tempting because I know I could get good money for it and have food and clothes for my family.”



What a testimony! God did have big plans for this camp and I am thankful I was there to see it. God is moving in Serbia. Keep praying for a revival among the youth in Serbia, it is much needed.

Serbia facts

Whenever I mention going to Serbia a lot of you start to worry so I wanted to give you some facts... Here are some vague facts but non-the-less they are facts...

Serbia is largely mountainous. Its northeast section is part of the rich, fertile Danubian Plain drained by the Danube, Tisa, Sava, and Morava river systems. It borders Croatia on the northwest, Hungary on the north, Romania on the northeast, Bulgaria on the east, Macedonia on the south, and Albania, Montenegro, and Bosnia and Herzegovina on the west.

Republic. Serbia was one of six republics that made up the country of Yugoslavia, which broke up in the 1990s. In Feb. 2003, Serbia and Montenegro were the remaining two republics of rump Yugoslavia, forming a loose federation. In 2006, Montenegro split from Serbia.

Pre-Serbia camp Vs. Satan

Off we went to Serbia for another camp…and Satan did not want us there. We originally planned on doing 2 camps but then the second one got cancelled. So we started our journey at 6 am to Belgrade, Serbia. It was a HOT drive and roughly SUPPOSED to be 7 hours. Here is where Satan started his battles….just before the boarder crossing into Serbia Mike said “Do we have the insurance card for the van?” Well, I had just paid it the week before with Danny so I knew it was there….we searched and searched, NOTHING. Well, you can’t go into Serbia without it. They check passports and insurance. Serbia is a country that likes to have control over the littlest things, it’s a power trip for them. We don’t have it, we tried to give the police the receipt but that was not good enough so we pulled over and tried to call everyone we knew in Sk to find it and tried contacting the insurance company to fax us the card, still nothing. After an hour at the border we bit the bullet and paid for a month of insurance ($150 Euros...OUCH). This process only took 15 seconds. (again, here is there power control)



On we go….we got to Belgrade and planned on picking up the church team that was flying over to help us out from Indiana. There flight was delayed and the couple that was supposed to come in before them did not make it and was flying in the next day so we walked around the city of Belgrade for a while before they got there.
Finally we got them and headed to the campsite….it was in Opovo, Serbia. A small little town…it’s the same place we had camp last year. This year God blessed us with a variety of people on the team…Serbians, Americans, Slovaks, Czechs, Norwegians, and Brittish. It was so neat to watch everyone come together for the same purpose and listening to everyone pray in their own language was beautiful!

When you enter Serbia you have to turn your passports into the police because they like to register everyone who comes in the country… (control issue #2)…while our passports were getting registered some of us decided to go for a bike ride into the “town” of Opovo. It was so small we peddled right though it and had no idea…haha on our way back we decided to stop for water, all 12 of us on bikes. The next thing I know, here come the police…ugh, not again. Satan was on the move. He asked for our passports and started shouting a lot of other things in Serbian to us and the only thing I could think of was “oh man…we are all going to the Serbian jail…” So I immediately got my phone called my Serbian friend Mark and handed the phone to the police officer. We were clear…but by the grace of God. One of the police officers happened to be a Christian and was being discipled to by a man named Andy and this officer reads his Bible to his family every night. And because we all knew Andy, he let us go. Normally in Serbia, if you don’t have your passport when they ask for it, you can go to jail if they want to take you…it’s crazy. We found out that the reason the police came was because there was so many of us in this little “town” that it overwhelmed some folks and they called the police. That shows you how small it was. ☺





During all of this commotion…Mike is off in Novi Sad with the American team showing them around the city and the van the Serbian team is in breaks down and Mike had to tow the van and it’s trailer on and off till the engine cooled down. What a day!

Satan did not win his attacks….there is obviously some reason Satan did not want us here. I believe God has big plans for the Serbian camp.

“From one man He made every nation of men….”

After camp Mike, Ryan, Ben and I decided to go to the Tatry mountains for a little Q.T. It was much needed. We wanted to have a few hours with the Lord before we headed of to Serbia.
It was beautiful where I was. The day was perfect. There was a cool breeze coming off the lake where I was sitting and I could see the fish swimming around in front of me.





During my time with the Lord, I read Act 17:26-27 –
“From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth, and he determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us.”
I feel it is so true that God placed me exactly where I am for His glory and purpose. WOW! When I start to have fears of going back to the states the Lord reaffirms to me that He has a purpose (besides me wonderful fiance’) and that I need to trust Him. It’s comforting to me when I start to feel like maybe I am not where I should be or wonder where God will have me go next that I don’t need to worry about it and that He already knows…He is in control. I am thankful for him placing me here in Slovakia (Eastern Europe)…I have gained a broader perspective on life and the life of those around me. The statement, “From one man He made every nation of men…..” – after living here, that has a whole new meaning to me. We are all children of God and what an honor that is.