The Women’s Team
We arrived at the PIEI Center in Alba Iulia, Romania, a team of six, soon to become a team of seven! Cornel is our leader and driver; Gabi, Cornel’s wife, and our main speaker for this team, Rodica, our administrator and overall food and lodging person, (first time without her husband Alex, who will be coming to Romania with a team of men after we return home) Laura, our worship leader, (a return from last summer’s mission trip when she was with Cornel and her husband Ben both in Romania and Ukraine), two first timers from our Fellowship Church in Florida: Andrea and Amanda who are the most excited women on this team. They have powerful testimonies and are true servants. That’s six, yes, I know! However, we found our seventh team member already at the PIEI Center! That’s Olivia! She is 22-year-old young lady, our niece from California. Many of our home friends know about her because about a year ago she was severely injured in a motorcycle accident and we fervently prayed for her. She is delightful and helps our team with whatever is needed as well as taking pictures and videos. Looking back, I can see how the Lord has put together this team of women who all have the gift of serving in such a way that would bring Him all the glory and honor that He only deserves. No celebrities, just women who were called and answered Yes.
Preparation
We started by preparing the gift bags for the women who will be attending, and we will be setting up our meeting room. We have two days of meetings in Alba Iulia at the PIEI Center, Friday night and Saturday all day, with lunch included. Saturday we’re providing lunch for everyone “American style” prepared and served by our team. We are looking forward to serving our Romanian sisters in Christ. We made tacos (yes, we brought tortillas and taco seasoning from America), Spanish rice, pistachio and pineapple fluff, coconut and pineapple fluff, and Jello! It was a hit!
Meetings in Alba Iulia, at the PIEI Center
Tired but so joyful as we wrap up a very meaningful evening with the women tonight. The worship, the meaningful gifts, the challenging message with the personal application with individual activity were soul searching. God’s Word is so powerful! The women were challenged and had a moment of personal prayer and reflection about things to let go at the foot of the cross in their personal lives. Saturday was day two of meetings with the women in Alba Iulia, an attendance above expectations. Our team did well with all the tasks, including the lunch prepared and served by all of us and also heard two heartfelt testimonies by Andrea and Amanda. The main subject of our meetings is “The Time has come!” We had a beautiful story about a Treasure Box that captured the audience. Many thanks to our sister in Christ Laura Lindgren from La Porte, IN who wrote this story for us. This is how the body of Christ works! We have a support team back at home who works behind the scenes by praying, encouraging, and supplying us with what we need, using each of our spiritual gifts in one way or another. This story had a great impact, just as it was meant to be! We also talked about seven things that are needed in the life of a godly woman.
Sunday Harvest Celebration
Our team attended two Sunday Services, one in the morning, in the village of Sohodol, and one in the evening, in the village of Bucerdea Vinoasa. These are two locations that were church planted by two of PIEI national missionaries, Florin and Magda Botar, and Tani and Lili Nemes. We had a wonderful time in both churches, that were decorated for the occasion with fruit, vegetables, canned goods, flowers, etc., and we were served sandwiches and lots of desserts right after each service, right inside the church. We were well fed! It was a real pleasure meeting the missionary families and hearing about their mission work, as well as meeting other people in their congregations.
Meetings in Curtea de Arges
Next is a post about our trip to Curtea de Argeș, both Wednesday and Thursday- such amazing meetings with sisters in Christ and women who need the Lord. Both groups are special in their own way. They touched us more than we imagined! You will have to ask us for details! Two days of God pouring His grace and love on these women who truly felt loved, accepted, and encouraged. Many were also challenged to make changes and leave their burdens at the cross. We had two categories of truly special women: first is a group of ladies that some of us have known for decades. They grew up in an institution as “orphans”, and are now all mature, grown women, still living in a half way house type of homes, but still institutionalized. They are very marginalized by society. The second, also very much marginalized by society, are a minority in Romania, Roma women, also known as Gypsies. Quite a few of these ladies were illiterates, so they were not able to write their names on their own name tags, but they were so happy to decorate it with a fall design with the markers and color pencils we gave them. They told us that it was the best day of their lives! Some were never hugged before! We have a lot of stories to tell!
Rural Home Visit and Church Service
As part of our Curtea de Arges ministry, we took an afternoon and evening to go and visit the home of three sisters and also a local rural church in one of the nearby villages. This place is inhabited mostly by Roma people. The quality of life is striking compared to most places we’ve ever seen or experienced. The family we visited was the home of three sisters, with their children. Their mom was in the hospital, with one of the sisters with the mom. The living conditions are hard to describe, below poverty level. The kids were intelligent, and delightful. We enjoyed attending the local church service, worshipping and spending time with the believers there.
Breakfast and Meeting in Cisnădie
Saturday October 24: Women’s Fellowship Breakfast at Stânca Baptist Church in the town of Cisnădie, Sibiu County, Romania. We had such an amazing time of delicious breakfast, worship in music, story time and truth from God’s Word, as well as exchange of information and wisdom from other women. A delightful group of sisters in Christ that we got to know and love. Thank you, Felicia, and everyone who prepared the food, the room and welcomed us with so much love. Thank you Rodica Ispas for such meaningful and lovely gifts you made and gave us! We received more than we gave here, with these amazing women! On the road again! Tomorrow is our last day of ministry, and it’s a full one. We will be traveling to the city of Victoria for a Harvest and Thanksgiving Celebration and our last meeting with 35-40 women. We need a good night’s rest!
Sunday Service and Women’s Fellowship in Victoria
Our last Sunday in Romania with the Women’s team from the USA was in the city of Victoria. Our national director Timotei Stinea is the church planter and the pastor there. He invited us to participate in the Harvest and Thanksgiving Celebration, followed by a traditional Romanian luncheon (oh yeah, sour soup and stuffed cabbage, pastries); the women ate first and the men served us! We returned into the Sanctuary and held the Women’s Fellowship Meeting in the afternoon, where there were 44 women who attended from Victoria and several other locations, including Brad, Avrig, Fagaras, Mârşa, Sibiu, Cisnădie, and others. It was such a blessing to see some familiar faces of some dearly loved sisters in Christ!
Wrap-Up
On Monday was wrap-up day with a visit from PIEI national missionary Tani Nemes and his wife Lili. They shared how they planted the church in Bucerdea Vinoasa, where we attended the Harvest Celebration the previous Sunday. We got to say “good bye” to our new friend Anca who made our meeting with the women in Alba Iulia possible. We made friends for life! Looking back, we rejoice to have also met Florin and Magda Botar and attended the Harvest Celebration at the village of Sohodol on our first Sunday morning – what a display of fruits and vegetables and beautiful decorations, grapes hanging on every pew! We enjoyed a heartfelt lunch at their home, and it was so wonderful to get to meet some of PIEI national missionaries and get to hear and see – firsthand some of the churches that they started, built and now pastor. In the same way, at Timotei Stinea’s church in Victoria, as we attended the Harvest Celebration there, we learned that the church in Victoria was the very first project that PIEI in Romania took in building the church building and supporting Timotei as the very first national missionary when PIEI first started in Romania in the early 90’s. So nice to see 40+ years later that the ministry is still going on strong and lives are being touched and changed. Side Note
While the women were busy emptying their luggage and packing goody bags for all the women in the large meeting room upstairs at the PIEI Center, as each woman received not only a goody bag, but also prizes for certain things during their meetings, Cornel was also busy working on changing the flooring to hardwood floor on the second floor of the PIEI Center. He received a lot of help from Laura, our worship leader, who helped him a lot to almost finish the floor that looks so great! Everyone worked so hard and with so much joy!
Cornel and Gabriela Stef
