leovamoldova

We are home! Arrived safely if late tonight.

From Leova to Chisinau, from Chisinau to Munich on Friday and Saturday. It’s about a 2 hour flight from Moldova to Germany, and it is hard to believe they exist on the same planet, same moment in history.

Today from Munich to Chicago to Omaha and finally to Lincoln. Met by family, got into our cars to head to our homes, and feeling the responsibility of all we have been blessed with, of all that we get to return to.

This wasn’t a vacation, and not really even a missions trip, but a part of the journey God has for Christ’s Place and Leova together.

It doesn’t end tonight.

The team will continue to pray, to stay in touch with new friends, and to seek God on how they need to live differently here.

Our challenge to you is – what part will you play in this journey with Leova?

We left Leova early this morning with mixed emotions. Glad to be heading in the direction of home. Sad to be leaving people we connected with. Realizing that life will go on in Leova without us this next year but that doesn’t mean God won’t be working there. Knowing that one of the most powerful things we can do is pray.

We had an amazing team meeting tonight, sharing what God’s done in us this trip and things He’s speaking to each of us about how to live differently once we’re home.

Loving Leova and Loving Lincoln too!

Our last full day in Leova was a culmination of the projects we have been working on all week.

The medical team continued to see patients, and over the week, has seen more than 400!

The schools team taught their last classes and invited students and their families to the picnic tonight.

The projects and construction team finished up the widower’s house.  Stan was able to share a powerful encouragement to him to find friendship and family at church as he struggles as a single parent.

The highlight event of the week was the picnic in the park tonight. We served American hot dogs, chips, and soda to over 500 students and parents.  Almost ran out of food!  Took and printed almost 300 photos of students.  Some of the schools team had significant conversations with students from their classes. The girl who crashed her bike in front of our van on Tuesday showed up tonight at the picnic, helped us serve and clean up!

This town that has been so hardened seems so open.

“We are not here to defend the status quo; we are here to change the destiny of a city called Leova.” – Michael McNamee, COHeu

Amazing moments today.

The schools team taught another day of classes, presented 80 chairs to the Leova school and had a time of appreciating the English teachers after school.

The medical team saw many patients and were guests of the hospital administrator for dinner.

Pastor Bruce, Pastor Nathan and Susan met with the Leova mayor this morning and presented him with a gift of appreciation. We asked about the needs in the city, and he mentioned the kindergartens. There are three for ages 2-7 and are a combined daycare and preschool. He then offered to walk us to the nearest to visit. It has 250 children, and we visited several classrooms and met the head teacher. There are some immediate opportunities there to help.

The projects and construction teams spent most of the day at a widower’s house. His wife was killed in an accident a few years ago, and he has two children, Katya and Gabi, about ages eight and four. We are building another room onto his house and trying to improve his living situation.

It’s been emotionally draining and a few people are feeling like they have a cold, so please be praying as we finish out our last full day in Leova tomorrow.

Today was another full day of continuing our focus areas from yesterday:  the medical clinic saw 91 patients, the schools team made continued connections with students, the construction team poured a sidewalk, and most of us spent some time at Grandpa’s house.

At the medical clinic today, a woman was telling us how her grandson had gone to the school and played soccer with our team last night.  She went on and on about how much fun he’d had, and how even if they couldn’t speak the same language, they could communicate anyway.

At the end of the afternoon, we were cleaning and packing up at Grandpa’s house and a young woman crashed her bicycle on the street by us.  Several of the women immediately went out to see how she was and to see if she needed medical help.  At first she didn’t want to come sit in the van, or go to the doctor, but eventually let us take her to Dr. Eric and Dr. Brett, who cleaned her wounds and bandaged her up.  We gave her a ride home, and found out she lives just behind Grandpa’s house.  And the person we saw with her attends the Leova church.  I love that there are no “just happened” moments in God’s plan.

At our team meeting after dinner, we were sharing stories from the day, and one of the medical translators was saying how many people asked her about our medical team, and commented that they were so different in how they cared for people, and especially how the men on our team interacted in love and respect for women.

We are excited to see what connections God has for us tomorrow!

Stories from today…how God works connections together.

Several weeks ago a 2011 Moldova Team member asked me if we needed anything for the trip.  I suggested a gift for the mayor, maybe a pen set.  A few days later, he brought a sack to the office filled with several things.  When I asked what the other items were for, he said, “I threw in some extra gifts.  God knows where they need to go.”  So we packed them without any idea how they would be used.

Saturday, Dr. Eric and Dr. Brett visit the hospital administrator.  I thought maybe we could send one of the ‘extra’ gifts with them for him.  Then we find out he has a son in Lincoln at UNL, and the gift we sent with them was a pen and key ring set with the UNL logo. (:

Today, the schools team goes to the English classes at the Romanian school, and find out that one of the teachers know the hospital administrator (they are neighbors), and had already heard about his son being in Lincoln and our team coming from Lincoln so was warmly introducing our team to the classes that way.  How God creates connections and opens doors!

The medical clinic opened today, a lot of chaos in the beginning but saw 80 patients. At the end of each exam, the doctors would pray with the patient.  One patient said, when Dr. Eric went to pray for him, “I know what church you go to.  I saw you help my neighbor, and because of that, I will let you pray for me.”  Whether it was the team painting a fence or fixing “Grandpa’s house”, we impacted a neighbor without even knowing it.

These are just the connections we know about.  How many more conversations are happening in this town about us, why were are here, and about what we are doing. We want to show we are Christians by our love for one another, in tangible ways.