A Summer of Weddings

We have had a rich summer of weddings this year with 3 taking place and another due in late october.

The first was between Claudia Caraivan and Roma Cheptene. Claudia is one of the 4 daugthers of Avraam and Veta whom many of you know. I have done the cunonia ( marriage ceremony ) for the 3 daugthers that have now been married ( Nadina the remaining one is just turning 18 so watch this space )

Claudia and Roma were married in Vad lui Isac church were Andrei Ciobanu ( whom many of you know) is the pastor. Andrei afforded me the priviledge of doing the cunonia while Misa Caraivan, Claudia's brother preached the message which meant the many non Christians had a chance to understand something of God's love for us.

Claudia and Roma have decided to live in Vad lui Isac which is his home village

As the summer progressed we had our second wedding this time in Gotesti between Viorel Regus and Olesia Vladimirov. Viorel assists Igor in the running of our youth group so all the youth took part in his wedding.

Slavic Bufenco was M.C for the celebrations afterwards and led us all in many interesting and original games - he's becoming quite proficient in this role

Finally at the end of the summer Mariana Cara married Andrei Taranenco the assistant leader of the sports ministry at O.M Moldova.

Mathew Skirton, the leader of the O.M work in Moldova and an old close friend, ( that is to say the friendship has been for a while not that either of us are old ) came to bring the message in the wedding along with many amusing anecdotes. Thus the whole wedding was conducted in Romanian by 2 English missionaries ( although I for one have spent more time living in Moldova than I did in England - having left NI in 1982 to live in England and then come to Moldova in 1994 )

Again there were fun celebrations afterwards.
In one case Mari and I were called out to participate in one of the games - something I hate doing after I was called on a previous occassion to participate in a game where I was blindfolded and needed to pick out Mari from 5 other women by feeling her hands - I chose the wrong wife's hands!!!

However in this case it was a game of Charades and Mari and I won easily - no pictures of this historic moment I am afraid ( and no prize either !!!)

Pastor Mark

Mariana has gone with her husband Andrei to live in Chisinau and the are serving together on the staff of O.M.

Pastor Mark

Summer Ministries

We had 3 teams from Mission Direct come out to us this summer and as always they were involved in many and varied things in our minsitries in both Gotesti and Chircani.

Their building project was helping us with our church community centre in Chircani. This is the trench they dug by hand at the back. Unfortunately because of all the hassle we've been getting regarding the documents we were unable to start construction on the main body of the project so the team helped renovate the house of a needy believer.

We had 3 summer camps for children - 2 in Gotesti and 1 in Chircani. Around 80 came to the first camp in Gotesti of which quite a number responded to the gospel while around 30 came to Chircani. Our final camp was for a group from our Sunday school.

The MD teams got involved with crafts and games and also helped much with cleaning and dishes and other such things

Each year the teams also participate in our meetings at the churches in Gotesti and Chircani

This year we were very pleased to have some old friends on one of the teams. John and Marian Shaw in the centre of the picture.

We first met them when they came out to Moldova around 1995 to visit their daughter Julia who was on our team at the time.

John preached in all the meetings while he was here.

The teams also went out on visits to various needy homes in both villages taking aid packets to them.

We'd value your prayers for these things especially for the Chircani Community Centre which we have now been released into working on

Pastor Mark

Dedication of Sasa

At the church we do several dedications each year usually of babies whose parents are members in the church.

They are all special to me and the church.

Many are often children of a couple who were both saved in the church and baptised as adults.

Some of the parents were saved as children and have grown up in the church

So I trust you can see why they are all special to us but this one had even more significance

This is Sergiu and Lilia Traistar dedicating their first child whom they had named Sasa, after Sergiu's late father.

Why is it particularly significant? Because Sasa Traistar was the brother who planted our church in Gotesti.

It was in it's infancy when he was discovered to have terminal cancer. He worked until it was no longer possible for him and then moved with his family including the young Sergiu to USA to get the care he deserved until he died.

A few years ago for various reasons Sergiu came back to Moldova and to Gotesti where he met Lilia whom he later married and here they are dedicating and praying along with us for the young Sasa to grow up in his grandfather's footsteps in the very church that his grandfather planted those years ago.

I am sure Sasa senior was in that cloud of witnesses watching on with his hands raised in praise to God the pose of him most remembered by those of us who knew him
I know I was thinking of him as his son prayed for his grandson.

What a faithful God we have

Pastor mark

Cristina and Ovidiu's wedding

The day after Kate and William got married in late April our own royal couple Cristina Cara ( sister of Marina ) from Gotesti and Ovidiu Voicu from Pitesti in Romania got married in his home town.

I was invited to do the ceremony while Ovidiu's pastor brought a message from the Bible.

We and various relatives of Cristina all travelled to Romania together and stayed over night. They had a set meal for the reception.

They had planned to have the wedding out in the garden but just before the start time a thunderstorm swept in and the wedding needed to take place inside.

However the sun soon came out and the photos were taken in the garden.

Here's the bride with her sister Marina ( Iulian's wife )

Our friends Neil and Joan were still with us and came along to the wedding before travelling back to the UK the next day.

Cristina was one of our main worship leaders as well as being a children's worker so it is some loss to us as a church but she is already active along with Ovidiu in their church in Pitesti

Yours and His

Pastor Mark

Chircani's Easter Programme

On Easter Sunday in the afternoon we did a programme for the parents in Chircani.The kids smartly dressed as you can see sang songs and shared poems.

The outfits were made by some of our believers.

Joan Robinson, one of our friends, who with her husband Neil was with us over the Easter period, gave her testimony during the meeting.

Ruslan preached, explaining why Jesus, God the Son, left heaven and became a man. He used the example of lots of tiny birds being outside a house in winter time and a child opening the window and calling them to come into the house before they die.

The birds don'tt come. Then the father of the child comes and tells the child that they only way she can convicne the birds to trust her and come inside is to become a bird herself live among them and convicne them of the danger they are in then they will come into the house. Thus Jesus did becoming and man, sufffering in every just like us so that he was and is able to understand and empathize with us. Ruslan appealed to those parents that were there to come into the house - God's family through Jesus and be saved.

A word for us?

Pastor Mark

Easter Meeting

Easter time is the most significant time of the year in the Christian calendar and Moldova is no exception. All citizens greet one another for a period of 40 days with "Christ is Risen" and a reply of "He's risen indeed" - Tremendous testimony to the truth.

Here our kids are doing a sketch with 6 coloured flags as a means of presenting the gospel ( it's like the coloured beads of the wrist band ministry ). Black is sin, yellow is the grace of God ( the undeserved kindness of God that gave Jesus to die in our place to pay for and remove our sin which is a barrier to God so we can come into personal relationship with Him). Red is for His blood which he shed on the cross for the forgiveness of our sins etc

Unintentional comedy was provided as Jesus sitting on a donkey that was a little too big for his hooves almost fell off.

A goodly number of people came to honour God including the mayor of the village who brought an encouraging and interesting word - this reminds me to ask for prayer for the upcoming local elections June 5 for which the mayor is restanding along with several other candidates. Pray that honesty prevails.

I brought a message about Pilate. A man who had the authority to release Jesus and whose conscience clearly witnessed to him that Jesus was guiltless "I find no fault in this Man" and to whom God spoke - when his wife sent a message that she had a dream to have nothing to do with this righteous man. Pilate tried evey method to avoid having to make a decision about Jesus - trying to get the Jews to judge him and then Herod to judge him; trying to release Barabbas in His place. But in the end Pilate had to make a decision to stand with Jesus or against Him ( Jesus said in the Bible "If you are not for Me you are against me") Finally the people cried out to Pilate if you don't condemn Him you are "no friend of Caesar's" and when Pilate realised that to stand with Jesus would mean loosing his position, friends, influence, wealth etc he chose to stand against Him. At that moment Pilate lost his life for eternity. ( Math 25 tells us that Jesus is the judge on the final day and Jesus has already said he who is ashamed of me I also will be ashamed of him in the final day.) What a tragedy that a man that was not so blind that he did not see the truth still lost his life by the decision he made to choose position over Jesus. I tried to encourage all present not to make the same mistake.

We had some friends staying with us over the Easter period Neil and Joan Robinson. Neil gave his testimony during the meeting which helped many, I believe, to see the Father heart of God

May the risen Jesus reveal himself to you over this Easter period

Pastor Mark

Chircani adolescents at Table Tennis match

Jora, Sasa and Ruslan have started an adolescents group at Chircani which meets every week

They play games and have bible teaching and steadily a regular groups of kids has formed.

One of the games they play is table tennis using a table that was bought by funds provided by Eurovangelism.

Jora, Sasa and Ruslan decided to organise a table tennis match between the Chircani kids and a team from the Gotesti adolescents groups that Igor runs and here they are in the middle of the match.

Unfortunately, depending from whose perspective you look, Gotesti won the match but a great time was had by all.

Yours truly was asked to come and bring an evangelistic message to the group and encouragingly around 5/6 responded to an appeal whom Jora and Sasa are following up.

Keep these ones in your prayers

Pastor Mark