So, Albania and Macedonia. How do I begin?
To be honest, I really do not know how to start. It is not that it was a bad experience
or anything; it is just getting all my thoughts sorted and down on paper is
difficult. So much happened, yet
not much happened at the same time.
I guess I can start by saying that I am not going to be one of those
people who come back from missions and says we saw this miracle and that
miracle, and thousands and thousands of people gave their lives to the Lord
(That would be awesome if I could say that), but that is not the truth. I know a lot of times people want to
hear these AMAZING testimonies of mission trips, but on a standard trip, in my
experience at least, I can have awesome stories about the people I met and
worked with, but I will not always have these crazy intense stories of
revival. I want to be honest in
sharing what happened. However, do
not get me wrong, many really awesome things happened and many amazing
relationships were built, but sometimes that is what needs to occur before some
other crazy things can happen. And
God still works through all of those things.
It all started bright and early on Saturday, March 29 at
around 5:00am. We said our
goodbyes to Peter, Taryn, and Hayley, climbed in the taxis and headed off to
the airport. The travel to and
through the airport was painless, quick, and easy. We then boarded the plane and headed to Vienna for a 9 hour
layover. Since it was Garrett’s
birthday, we planned a special time out exploring the beautiful city of
Vienna. Trying to find a budget
place there where we all could eat together was slightly difficult, so it was
decided that a little café would do, then we could all split up and explore on
our own in smaller groups. Simon,
Garrett, and I went off to look at the AMAZING buildings! As some of you may know, I am slightly
a MAJOR fan of architecture. So,
exploring with two other people who appreciated the history and beauty of the
buildings was GREAT! Oh, and of
course we also got Garrett gelato for his 19th Birthday! We then all met up back at the airport
to sit, relax, and have dinner until our flight to Albania. It was nice to explore the airport with
friends and just have some free time to walk around.
We finally arrived in Albania, and got to the YWAM Albania,
Durres base every late that night, or early the next morning. To be honest, I do not remember what
time it was, I just know it was late, and we were all quite tired from
traveling. But it was a GREAT
surprise when we pulled up to the base, and got out of the vans and we heard
the waves of the sea, crashing on the shore! We heard we would be near the sea, but we had no idea that
the base was right ON the beach!
We were so spoiled! We had
a short little welcome and orientation from the Amazing Durres base leader,
Alket. Then, we headed off to our
assigned rooms and went to bed. We
were able to sleep in the next morning, which was a huge blessing!
The first week we were there, we had an “Albania
Orientation”. We were taught about
the culture, and all of the do’s and don’ts that we should keep in mind. We received a tour of the city and were
able to have some time chatting with the locals. It was actually quite surprising, and something that kept
surprising me the entire time we were there, Albanians love Americans. Why, I’m still not sure, I mean we’re
awesome people! Haha but a more serious probably more accurate answer is that
our government did a lot to help them out in the past, so therefore they like
us. It was actually also a great
opportunity to meet people and start up conversations. So, the first week, we had a few
opportunities for “outreach”. I put
it in quotes because so many people view outreach in a variety of ways. We mainly view it as an opportunity to
talk to the people around us about Jesus, and His love for all people. We view it as an opportunity to share
the Gospel, the whole Gospel message.
With that being said, this area is a majority Muslim culture. Many of the people there who would
identify themselves as Muslim were culturally Muslim. This meaning that they did not actively practice the
religion, the identification with the religion is mainly with family ties. Family ties are a huge part of the
culture, so someone leaving the religion to switch to another would be a MAJOR
thing.
With that being said, a lot of the conversations I had with
people focused more on the differences between the two religions and why I
believe what I believe. For
example, one of my more memorable conversations occurred during one of our days
of “pioneering ministry” in Durres.
Pioneering ministry, or at least what my team calls pioneering ministry
is when we take time to pray about different ways we can do different
ministries, and pray about different outreach opportunities. Basically it is a “pray and do”
evangelism. It can truly be
anything from spending time with a Roma family to playing soccer (football for
my European friends) with a group of kids to coffee shop evangelism, worship in
the streets, really it can be anything at all! So back to the story.
One day during our Pioneering outreach, Chey and I went to town to meet
up with some university students.
We then found out after getting to town that the University was closed
for the day however, the girls we asked directions to were very friendly, so we
decided to invite them for coffee.
Side note. One of the many
AMAZING things about this culture is that it is not unusual to just randomly
meet people in town, stop what you originally had planned and just go to one of
the hundreds of coffee shops and sit, and chat over a cup of coffee. It is just fantastic. But it did not help my major coffee
addiction at all!
So, these three
young girls had varying levels of English knowledge. One girl could speak and understand English quite well, one
could get along well enough, but had a limited vocabulary, and the third could
only understand some English, but could not speak it at all. The girl who could speak English the
best was very interested in the conversation and in learning more about the
Christian religion. She was raised
Muslim, but her family did not actually practice the religion. She asked a lot of questions about why
I believe what I believe. She said
she really respected what it is we do.
Chey and I were able to share the Gospel bracelets with the girls. And the cool thing is, the girl who was
Muslim was translating for us for the other two girls. (Side note, the other two girls with us
were Christian, but just like with a lot of the people there who were Muslim,
it is more a cultural thing rather than a practicing the religion thing. So with that being said, it was awesome
that the friend was translating and sharing the Gospel with her other two
friends.) Another cool thing about
our friend who was Muslim was that she asked for a Gospel bracelet to give to
her sister. She said that she and
her sister are really close, so when one of them gets something special they
feel that they need to share it with the other. She said that they feel bad if they do not share with each
other. Which of course lead into a
great transition to sharing why it is we (our team) do what we do.
I was able to share with her that we know that what we have
with God is so special and so amazing that we want to share that with everyone
so that they too may have that special relationship with the Lord. I told her that just like when she has
something and she feels she needs to share it with her sister, we feel like we
have the best thing ever, and we need to share it with others too. And just like her, we feel bad if we do
not share it but instead keep it to ourselves. She really received that well and considered it a lot. She also kept going on and on to Chey
and me about how much she valued and respected what it is that we do. She continued to ask questions the
remainder of our time together over coffee.
Another cool thing about that conversation is we found out
that one way the one girl was learning English was by reading. And, after talking for a bit with the girls,
some verses from the Bible came up, so Chey and I pulled out our Bibles. That one girl seemed so excited by
seeing the Bible, she asked to see it and was reading verses out loud. I asked her if she had access to any
English books or Bibles, and she said she did not, so I gave her mine. She seemed really excited by it and put
it right in her bag so she would not forget it.
Our team spent a lot of time doing such a great variety of
ministries over the two month time period. At one of the locations, we went to a home for the elderly,
and shared songs, danced, shared a testimony, and a skit. We were not able verbally share about
God or Jesus up front, but we are able to share about His stories and the themes
of the stories. We had a great
time bonding with the individuals there.
We could not speak their language and they could not speak ours, but we
were able to connect with them in an awesome way. They seemed really excited that a group of young people came
to spend time with them.
We spent some time in the local hospitals, praying with and
for the people staying there. In
addition, we played a lot of football with the local kids and young
adults. Football was a great way
to meet and get to know people who do not necessarily speak your language. We ended up being able to meet up a few
times with some of the kids that played football with us. Some of them were really excited about
receiving their own Bibles in their language that they sat down right then and
there and started reading them. (I
was not there for that particular opportunity, but I heard amazing stories of
how excited they were.) But, a
good majority of the time we ended up getting in natural conversation with
people at local cafés either during our free time, or while we were specifically
there to meet with people.
Sometimes at the cafés we would have English lessons.
Another type of ministry that we spent a lot of time with in
multiple locations was going into the public schools. The people we worked alongside in two of the three locations
in Albania were other YWAM bases.
The people at those bases had been working with the schools for a while
volunteering and building relationships to be able to work inside the schools. Now at the schools, we had to respect
the rules and not speak of the Gospel directly up front, but we were able to
share of the principles of Christianity.
The schools had us in for English classes as well as teaching crafts and
running an internet safety course.
The school that we ran the internet safety course at was in Tirana. At the end of our teaching time, we
were able to invite the kids to an afterschool program that we were running
that was outwardly Christian. That
was a really neat opportunity to work on English with the kids as well as speak
about Jesus and share with them who Jesus is and how much He loves each one of
them.
Something else we did while in Albania was work alongside
some of the churches that were there.
While we were in Durres, we got really close with the church that we were
brought to on the first Sunday with the YWAM Durres base. The leaders of the church were a group
of young individuals who were really excited about God. It was really encouraging to see a
group of people who were so excited to worship God and to invite us all in with
them in doing so. It was also
really exciting because while we were out in town, we ended up bumping into
both those from the church, and the people that we had met up with through
evangelism opportunities time and time again. For example, while walking in town on another pioneering
ministry day when I was with Bethy and Matthijs, we bumped into the girl who
was Muslim that Chey and I met with who was really interested in hearing about
Christianity. She was really
excited to see me in town and introduced me to her cousin.
While we were in another place in Albania, called Korce, we
worked closely with a new church there that started up a few years ago. We met up with them everyday in the
morning and spent time worshiping God and praying, out on this beautiful hill
that looks out over the city. We
also had a lot of events in town with them where a lot of locals gathered
around and listened to the testimonies, and sermons, and worship music. We shared some skits and dances as
well. We were able to have some
conversations with the local people because some of the people from the church
spoke either English or Spanish, so they could translate for some of us. It was great! It was really amazing to see the church get excited about
sharing the message of Jesus with the people of their city. We had some nights where we were
able to pray for and to encourage the people of the church. A lot of the families of the church came
out for each of the events we were involved with which was really nice and
encouraging for us as well.
Another really interesting and exciting thing, for me at
least, in all the locations we were in Albania, and then as well in Macedonia
is interact a lot with the street kids.
We mostly interacted with and hung out with the street kids in Korce,
but in Macedonia, we “chatted” with some of the kids as well.
Now, I could go on and on for pages and pages about the
different things that we did. And
I truly would have loved it if I could have had my computer with me to type up
weekly updates of what all we did, but that was not possible. But I can tell you that my eyes were
really opened to how much God loves His children all over the world. I was able to see how simple people
like the members of my team and me could be brought together from all over the
world to love on people in their everyday life, and what a difference that
actually makes. I was able to see
the gratefulness of the people for just being willing to come and sit with them
and to listen to what they have to say.
It was amazing to see how God can use a group of young adults to run
kids camps and internet safety courses, and café ministries to really impact a
culture.
One thing that hit me when on outreach was how many people
were so shocked by the fact that we came to Albania and Macedonia. They all asked why the heck would we
want to come there. They all said
that they would never come if they were given the choice. It was encouraging to me to be able to
encourage the people there that they matter, and that God cares for them so
much that they would send a group of individuals from all over the world to
come to their city in their country to share the message that God loves them
and that Jesus died for them. It
made me sad to look around me and see that there was such an environment of
feeling trapped or stuck. Because
of all the recent history of turmoil and government control and communism, many
people become trapped in unemployment, or in terrible job situations where they
feel helpless. That was a lot of
what people would ask for prayer for when we talked to them; prayers for a
job. And it was hard to see that
and to feel helpless about the situation.
But, what I can share is that out of that and those times for prayer for
people, I was extremely encouraged by the amount of Faith that the people had
that God would provide. It was
such an example and a learning experience for me. Especially as I am learning to trust God to provide for me
as I step out in this next chapter of my life.
Now, I really would like to sum up by saying something that
I learned from this time. Missions
does not always just mean creating “converts”. In fact, I would say that is not what it is about at
all! It is about sharing the
Gospel message with those you come into contact with. That is all you can do. It is up to that individual and God and Jesus (Along with
the Holy Spirit) to carry out the rest.
You are not an unsuccessful missionary if you come home after months of
work and do not see one person decide that Christianity is the religion for them. But you are successful when you open
yourself up to listen to and obey what God is telling you. The location you are sent to may just
need people to encourage those who are there and to help strengthen the church
in that location. And you can do that
in many ways. You can definitely do
that through simple conversation keeping in mind that you are there as a
representative of Christ and that He has sent us to spread the Truth of His
Gospel. That does not mean that
every conversation must be about Jesus and about the Gospel message, but it
does mean that as stated before we must be aware and keep in mind that we do
want others to be able to have that same amazing relationship that we have with
Christ. Looking at it that way
allows relationships to be built naturally while still being focused on
Christ.
As I always say though, that is just my opinion and what I
learned from this time. I am
really excited to be able to share this little (long) blurb about my time in
Albania and Macedonia. I hope you
enjoy the pictures that will go along with this post. God Bless!
In Macedonia we went to a care center for children and adults with disabilities. I LOVED it!
