Coffee Shop opened.... at last!!

Here it is. The grand opening of Karis Pizza at high noon on 19th December.

This dear man centre of the picture waited about 40 mins to get a pizza to take home to his sick wife ( it wasn't the pizza it was the non pizza dish that delayed us )

Fortunately he is a believer ( and a very forgiving one at that )

Actually these were our first customers and they came at 11.40 am.

It threw us out of sync and since it was busy all day we never stopped chasing our tails.

Both Mari and I worked all day there as waiters and me also on the cash. Unfortunately I did not have time to show anyone else how to operate the machine it so I couldn't leave.

Fortunately we did get one or two minutes at various times to touch on the objectives of why we have built this coffee shop.

As a pastor I hardly ever get time to meet and befriend anyone other than our own "sheep" or ones that come to the church.

But here were two pensioners that have never been to our church that I was able to spend 5 minutes talking to and befriending. I would never have gotten to their home but God brought them to our "second home".

As ones become regulars our hope is that they will feel the love of Christ in us for them and eventually want to come and be part of our family the church.

One lady whom I got talking to yesterday said she would come to our Christmas meeting on Sunday 21st.

From the oldest to the youngest

Couldn't find out her name -when I came to ask she ran away back to her father

This is another objective of the coffee shop - a quiet place where families feel they can come to.

We had parents with kids all day probably because they know we don't serve alcohol and they believe it is going to be a family atmosphere.

Earlier in the week someone had taken our meniu because they wanted to order ahead of time for a party of 20 but later when they discovered we are not serving alcohol they decided not to come.

I know the family and they would not have been rowdy etc but their friends all wanted to have a drink with their pizzas so this was disappointing for us but when we saw all the families that came on our opening day we knew this was why we were paying the cost of loosing the other customers.

On the Tuesday we gave the teachers in our two schools in Gotesti a complimentary pizza meal

They work hard and get paid little - they deserved it

On opening night one of the ladies came with her husband and two kids for a meal

Close friends Anatol and Nadea, who is pastor of Emanuel church in Cahul came to encourage us along with the leaders from their church singing carols and bearing gifts.

Gelu their youth leader who is at the back of the group made this Karis sign by hand.

Keep us in your prayers

Pastor Mark