It’s springtime in Oradea, and what a joy it has been! I must say, after years of living in Portland, where it is still raining up to this day (not to even mention Montana… pretty sure it’s still snowing over there), it has been a real treat to get to enjoy consistently sunny weather and temperatures that have routinely reached into the 70’s and even 80’s. The sun proves to be yet another one of God’s blessings on our time here, reminding us of the joy and warmth of His goodness to us. He has truly been so faithful!
The past weeks have been mostly calm when it comes to events, and while there have been a few specific highlights, these days have primarily consisted of manual work. With the weather becoming fairer, there is more to be done outdoors and more opportunities for Noah and I to spend our days working in the sun, getting exercise, and building MOOSCLAISE (this is an inside joke that we share with our high school boys. Truth be told, Noah and I are in pretty decent shape thanks to all of the physical tasks we’ve undertaken). We’ve certainly had a wide variety of jobs to take on, from pruning the trees in the church orchard to cleaning out and painting the church’s well. One of our more ongoing tasks has been the chopping and stacking of wood for next winter. This task starts months in advance in order for the wood to properly dry and age for burning when the winter months come. A little over a dozen truckloads of wood have been dropped off, and every Wednesday, our faithful friend Iulian comes to help us gradually split the wood in preparation for stacking. Our high school students will come by as well to offer their services, and the job has been one large group effort. The task that surprised us the most has certainly had to be our poor concrete shed in the back of the church property. Last year, a fierce windstorm blew in a corner of the structure, rendering the rest of the small building unusable. We had been gradually demolishing it in small chunks, with the most difficult portion still to be done, as it included a major support beam, a garage door, and two entry doors. Apparently the Lord saw our hard work and wished to offer us some help, as yet another wind storm blew down the aforementioned wall, sparing us the difficulty of taking it apart ourselves. Perhaps the most significant project has involved taking the two and a half hour drive to Arieseni in the mountains, where the church owns a plot of land upon which they intend to build a camp. We have spent some time there preparing the newly acquired land to be built upon. We will likely be making trips fairly often, tidying up the land and breaking ground on the building there in the coming months. There have been other smaller projects and tasks here and there, but suffice it to say that Noah and I have kept adequately busy tending to each one as they come up, and this has made for some satisfying days of good work.
As mentioned, things have been fairly light on the “events” side of things. Of course, we continue to hold youth meetings every Thursday night, and these are continuing to go well. We are presently in a series in which we are exploring the Character of God, which has provided a great opportunity to present to students exactly who God is based on who He Himself says He is in Exodus 34. In addition to these youth nights, we’ve had two “breaks from the usual” in the past month or so. At the end each month, there is a youth event called “Freedom Night” in Timisoara, which is about a three-hour drive away. This youth event brings together several youth ministries, and for the month of March, our very own Pastor Ted Ciuciui was the speaker. This seemed to us the perfect opportunity to break from the usual routine, and we thus planned to travel with our students to Timisoara for this event. We took a group of 12 to this event, leaving at 3pm immediately after school and arriving back home at 3am! It was an incredible time as we enjoyed the service, crowded into McDonalds, told stories and danced wildly to music on the car rides to and from the event. It was an amazing time of worship and receiving of the Word, but also an incredible time of fellowship and bonding together. In the weeks following, we received another ministry team, this time from a Bible college in Hungary. This team spent two days in Sebis with our friends at Barnabas Ministries and two days with us in Oradea, doing evangelistic outreach in the city and putting on a program for our Thursday night youth meeting. They were an incredible group to have with us, and they ministered excellently to our students, putting together a worship set, several testimonies, and a primary message. We have felt so incredibly blessed to now have had multiple excellent teams come our way and serve our students so excellently!
To the left: Katy translates for the Hungarian team during their Thursday night program. To the right: scenes from Freedom Night with our group in Timisoara.
As the months go on, Noah and I continue to see amazing growth in our youth students and are greatly enjoying our time with them. It seems as though each week, there is a new level or dimension of growth and development that is taking place, and we praise God for His faithfulness in growing our faith together as a community. Our high school boys have been one of our most dynamic groups, led by Marcus, who’s been one of the true leaders among his peers. There is a group of about five boys who both go to school and work out at the local gym together, and they are continually pulling in new guys to train physically at the gym and grow spiritually at Oxygen Youth. Many of these boys have their own incredible stories of how God radically changed their lives. For example, one of our guys has testified to formally identifying as a Nazi idealist who was radically saved and transformed by Christ, while another who grew up as an Orthodox believer is now desiring to learn about scripture in a depth that has been previously unknown to him. We thank and praise God for each of these boys and the stories of how they have been found by the Lord, and we are so excited to see what is next for them. Additionally, we have a middle school girl who regularly attends our Thursday gatherings who responded to an alter call at the Jesus Revolution event back in March. Since then, she has been asking questions and diving deeper into her faith, and has invited her entire class to join her at youth to journey with her! We even have a young man who is a professed Atheist, yet has found community at our gatherings since being invited by his younger brother and has the opportunity to hear the Gospel at each of the gatherings. Please pray with us for all of these students as well as those not mentioned here, that God would continue to grow and strengthen these young people as they walk with the Lord, and that they in turn would continue to bring others into the family as well!
Various moments enjoyed with our youth. It has been a special journey!
Here in the month of April, we are preparing to celebrate Easter (the Orthodox calendar places Easter on May 5th as opposed to the Protestant date of celebration that came on March 31st) and are steadily making plans for the summer months. As we continue into the final four months of our year’s time in Romania, we would love if you would join with us in these specific prayer points:
The season of discipleship: In these final months, Noah and I are strategizing with our team to begin to seek out specific students to disciple directly in a one-on-one context. Additionally, Noah and I are preparing to start a high school guys Bible study and discipleship group, as there is a hunger among our guys for a greater understanding of scripture and its application. Pray that as we take these next steps with students that the Lord would be directing us with all wisdom and discernment and that our students would continue to bear fruit in an even greater capacity!
The “after” and our next steps: The time for Noah and I to return to the states is already fast approaching. This month in particular, we both have been seeking the Lord to determine what the next steps are following our departure in September. The Lord has begun to reveal some of these steps (more information in the coming reports!), but there is still a great deal for us to determine regarding the future. Pray that the Lord would continue to reveal His will for us, for Salem, and for the youth here. Pray that we would continue in obedience as the Lord opens the doors that need to be opened and shuts those doors that He sees fit to shut.
The newly acquired church land in Arieseni: A specific prayer need right now revolves around this new plot of land in the mountains. The church has bought this land with the intention of building and hosting camps and retreats, and the sale recently went through. At this stage, there is much to be done in preparing the land to be developed, and the church is trusting the Lord for the finances and resources to begin building within the next year. Pray with us that as we prepare the land for development that the work would be fruitful and that the proper resources would be available to start moving on this vision!
Thank you for your steadfast prayers, your faithful love and support, and for following along with us on what has been such an incredible journey! We marvel at what the Lord has done in the past seven and a half months, and we can’t wait to see what is still to come! To Him be the glory! Much love to you all!
– Nate and Noah
Nate and Noah to Romania 
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