July 25, 2006
Michael Baby
I can hardly stand to look at him, he's so adorable.
My dad said, "I don't normally like newborns, but he's a pretty good lookin' kid."
Only one more month till I go visit him. If I don't come back to Atlanta, will someone bring me my dog?
Posted by hannah at 03:50 PM | Comments (1)
July 24, 2006
Notes From Another Land
While we were in Romania, one of my duties was to send e-mails to our supporters and families back in the States. Because I wrote them daily, and because I still don't really know how to summarize the trip, I thought it would be easiest to repost edited versions of them here.
Wednesday, July 12
We are here! After a short delay leaving Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport (what's new?) we arrived in Stuttgart, Germany with just enough time to make our connection to Timisoara. After an uneventful flight on one of Carpatair's finest 54-seater prop planes, we arrived in Romania about 3 p.m. local time. The airport in Timisoara is surrounded by fields and you can't even see runway until you're on it. Once we stepped off the plane (via stairs onto the runway) we loaded onto a bus for a very short 100 feet trip to the terminal. (That's service!)
Our prayers were answered when ALL of our luggage made its way off the conveyor belt and we made it through customs with only ONE person's bags even being opened! This was a huge deal, as we were later told that a church group who arrived last week were delayed for hours in customs.
Our accommodations in the church are wonderful - it almost feels like we are in an Ikea showroom! We each have our own bathrooms and are only two to a room and (the most wonderful of all) each room has its own air conditioning. It is HOT in Romania in July!
Thursday, July 13
What an AMAZING day! It is almost midnight and we just finished our group devotional and recap of the day and everyone headed back downstairs to finish painting while I ran up to e-mail all of you about our second day in Romania.
First, we will not starve. They are feeding us three huge, awesome meals a day, cooked right in the church's kitchen by two wonderful Romanian women. For breakfast we had cereal, milk, cheese, meat, bread, hard-boiled eggs, jams, coffee, juice, tea... a real spread. After a leisurely meal (no eating in the car/at your desk/over the sink for the Romanians - each meal is conversation-driven and relaxed), Gelu (the senior pastor) took a few of us over to the college campus to exchange money. The Romanians recently changed their currency, going from Lei in the thousands to tens. (They used to have a bill that was half a million lei that is now a 50!) On our way back we got stuck behind some Gypsies who were "driving" a horse-drawn wagon.
We broke for lunch at about 12 p.m. and sat down for another full, amazing meal. We broke bread with the Romanians who were here for training and got to know a lot of great people. A few of us sat with a man named Barry, who is an American ex-pat who moved his family to Timisoara about 12 years ago to be a missionary. He gave us a brief explanation of the money and taught us a few key words. (Thank you, good morning etc.)
After lunch it was time for projects. We got so much accomplished! We went through ALL of the supplies we brought with us (that filled 1,000 pounds worth of luggage!) and organized everything. We taught some women how to make homemade Play-Doh. We taught three of the children's worship songs to several of the volunteers and one of us even went on an adventurous journey to buy paint at the Romanian (actually German) version of Home Depot, Praktiker. We also sorted through toys and cleaned everything salvageable, constructed about three packs of cardboard blocks, cleaned out closets and moved furniture!
Around 5:30 p.m. we were called back into the basement dining room/fellowship hall for dinner. It was rice and a sort of mushroom-based creamy soup (but thicker) with chicken. We were then served homemade Romanian doughnuts! They were a little like beignets, but instead of massive amounts of powdered sugar, they were lightly dusted and the Romanians ate theirs with jelly.
After dinner it was time to start painting! We were given free reign to makeover the babies' room, so we moved everything out and we're painting all four walls a light blue. We also took on the HUGE job of painting the fellowship hall! It is a fairly large space and it used to have four stark white walls with no decoration or color. Now the walls are a light olive with an accent wall of a slightly darker green. Tomorrow we are going to paint some accent stripes and a church member artist named Radu is going to paint some sea creatures on the walls of the babies' room.
Many of the Romanians helped with painting and we made quick work of the initial coats. Tomorrow we just have to paint the accent colors and touch-up. It's going to be a huge change and hopefully it will add some life and cheer to the much-used space.
We made many new friends today and got much accomplished - however there is still much to do! We have to complete our "extreme makeover" tasks and continue teaching them about our preschool/school age curriculums and procedures. Florentina, a mother of 5 who came today to the training, said that she thinks the children will be very receptive to a new system, but it will be the parents who are hesitant or unreceptive. She said that they really view Sunday School as childcare, not as a separate environment where their children can learn about God and worship. Pray that the Romanian parents will have open hearts and minds when it comes to the children's ministry.
This is a wonderful country full of contradictions (billboards for mobile phones next to torn-up undrivieable roads... a McDonald's across the street from a hospital where you "go in well and come out sick"). We are learning a lot and are so excited to see what the next few days have in store for all of us.
It's past midnight now and most of you are probably just heading home from work or are perhaps off to the gym or out to dinner. We will be turning in shortly (hopefully!) before we greet Friday with happy hearts and servants' hands. Keep praying for Vox Domini and for the work we are doing here. Pray for Romania as her people recover from generations of oppression and depression. Pray for her children as they grow up in the ever-growing chasm between the new world and the old.
Friday, July 14
We are trying to turn in earlier tonight, so only a quick update. Today was much less stressful than yesterday as most of what we accomplished today was simply finishing up projects we'd already started.
The painting was completed entirely by Romanian volunteers and they did a fantastic job. The fellowship hall has been transformed and the babies' room is almost complete. We sat down with Gili, the youth pastor, today and gave him an overview of NPCC's teen ministry.
Tonight we had a parents' meeting so that we could talk to them about the planned children's ministry and answer any questions. We followed up the meeting with an ice cream social and it was fun to interact and mingle with the Romanians. Several of them brought their children, so we finally got to meet some kids!
After the meeting/ice cream social our team walked to McDonald's to recap our day and talk about our plans for tomorrow. After morning sessions to work further with the volunteers, Rodica, the pastor's wife, is taking us into the town square tomorrow to tell us the Revolution story.
Saturday, July 15
We worked hard! First, we had a final meeting with the volunteers and we did actual run-throughs of the curriculum and what Sunday morning would look like. After a lunch of meatball soup and Romanian doughnuts we recruited everyone to help set-up the preschool classrooms. Vox Domini runs a weekday private kindergarten (not like ours - a mixture of ages 4-7) and so their classrooms hold materials for the kindergarten as well as Sunday school. We had quite the task of prepping these rooms as we pulled out EVERYthing and reloaded them with just essential materials. It took us most of the afternoon but with many hands we made quick work.
After dinner, Gelu and his wife Rodica took us to central Timisoara and told us the Revolution story. We started at the exact spot where the Revolution began: On Dec. 15, 1989 a priest was arrested outside his church. Members of his congregation were upset over the arrest and so they began gathering, holding a quiet protest. No one was speaking or shouting, they were just standing silent, holding candles. Rodica saw the group and wondered what was happening. Eventually, someone shouted that what was happening was wrong and that they should be free. Rodica said this was very scary, as they were conditioned to turn in instigators or anyone who spoke badly about the government. She said it was a foreign feeling to hear someone speak out against the Tyrant. (She rarely called him by name, just "the Tyrant.") Eventually this gathering grew and within a few days they began marching towards the central square and many people were killed.
We then traveled to the Cathedral where the bloodiest "battle" occurred. A group of young people were gathered on the steps of the Cathedral (which faces the square), mourning the loss of their loved ones who were killed early in the protests. Rodica said the square was filled with secret police and army and they had guns and tanks and the young people opened up their shirts and said, "If you want to shoot us, shoot us, we have nothing to lose." So the army and police open-fired on them, first with rubber bullets and then with real ones, and many people lost their lives. The survivors began to run to go back into the church but the priest had barred the doors. "I guess to save the building," Rodica said. "Save the building by sacrificing its people." After that day more and more people began to come to the square to protest. Rodica and Gelu said it was so full of people that it could take you hours to move a few meters.
The first night only Gelu went down to the square, with another male friend, and Rodica and the other wife stayed behind, afraid it would be too dangerous. The next night the husbands told their wives that they must come out - it was too important. At one point they were questioning and praying about why the army was fighting against them - their own people - when they heard a commotion further up the square. When they asked what had happened, there were told that a woman had been throwing bread and flowers at the soldiers when suddenly the army joined in with the people to fight alongside them. Later, when they were still in the square, the couples were praying about what to do in this situation, as Christians, asking for guidance. As they were praying, a woman near them said aloud, "We should shout that there is God." So they began to shout, "There is God! There is God!" Gelu said it quickly spread throughout the entire crowd until everyone was shouting, "There is God!"
By the next Friday (exactly one week), Cecescu had fled and they were free. Gelu and Rodica said, however, that the next two weeks were very scary and that there were times when they had to lay on the floor of their flat to avoid being shot. (The interim government was just as corrupt, there were rogue secret police, etc.). Cecescu and his wife were killed on Dec. 25, and Rodica said that morning it finally snowed, covering the entire square with a perfect white blanket.
We then walked to the very center of Timisoara (the city is laid out in a circle), where there are outdoor pubs and restaurants and live music. The buildings are yellow and blue and green and pink and Gelu said during Communist times all these buildings were gray - it's only been in the last 17 years that there has been so much color. Timisoara is a beautiful city and we were blessed with a beautiful night to experience it.
Sunday, July 16
Today was the big day! Vox Domini holds two services - 9:30 and 11:30 - but our plan was to only hold the children's ministries during the first service. (It ended up happening twice, but it was great!) It went beautifully. The volunteers were enthusiastic and took to the material and the kids seemed really happy and excited. Since most people are currently on holiday there weren't a lot of kids, but we think that worked to our advantage. The volunteers didn't get overwhelmed and they were able to really work through the curriculum. During both services, Wendy had an opportunity to speak to the congregation about what we've been doing this week and she was also able to put in a plug for volunteers. She mentioned how our team is made up of men and women, marrieds and singles, parents and non, and that it doesn't matter who you are or whether or not you have children, investing in the spiritual lives of children is vital, both for their sake and for the sake of the church.
We were all able to sit in on one of the two services and I'm so happy we could experience it. Three of the four worship songs were songs we all knew ("How Great is Our God", "Blessed Be Your Name," "On Christ the Solid Rock I Stand"), and it was special to hear some of us singing English intermixed with Romanian. During the sermon, we wore special headphones that were connected to a microphone and one of the Romanians translated the entire sermon for us and we heard it right in our headphones.
After church, we went shopping! At one point, Autumn and I were sitting in the mall's food court (on the terrace level that you can reach by taking a glass elevator that overlooks a huge patio and two rock walls - yes, rock walls) and as we were sitting there I said, "Let's take this in. We are sitting in a huge mall, right next to a KFC, drinking Coca-Cola, listening to Beyonce and we are in a country where, in my lifetime, there was a Communist regime." Quite the dichotomy.
Tomorrow, we are going to venture into Romania to see a castle and some Roman ruins. It will probably be a long, tiring day, but we are all excited to see more of this beautiful country and just to have some time to relax and not think about stuff left to do! Tomorrow night we will meet once more with the church leadership to say goodbye and have one last night together. We've all made friends here and that has really been the most wonderful gift of all.
Monday, July 17
How can I possibly put this day into words?
Today Rodica and Gelu took us sightseeing around Romania for our day of rest and relaxation. We traveled farther into the state/province of Transylvania and we visited the ruins of an ancient Roman city (established sometime after 106 AD), went to a monastery and saw a castle in the Carpathian mountains. It was a lot of driving (small winding roads going very fast - typical European driving!) but we saw a LOT of incredibly gorgeous countryside and had great conversations in the car. We stopped for lunch at a restaurant, Caffe Barrio, in a small village where Gelu and Rodica have friends. They served us a huge meal - soup, salad, chicken, potatoes, crepes and coffee for dessert.
When we got back to the church the volunteers that we've worked with this week were waiting for us. We ate a late dinner and then we sat down together and shared our thoughts about the week and it was pretty emotional, to say the least. We had Communion as we worshipped with songs in both Romanian and English. We then exchanged gifts and hugs and e-mail addresses. It's amazing the connections you can make with strangers in a short period of time when you're all serving together for God's glory. I honestly don't think I can adequately explain it.
We appreciate your prayers and we know that they were heard, as we had a week without injury or incident. The 10 of us worked so well together and we worked so well with the Romanians and we know it was 100 percent God. We thank Him first and foremost and we also thank you.
Posted by hannah at 04:53 PM | Comments (0)
He's my Guy
My brother is now officially someone's daddy, as his son Michael was born a scant two and a half weeks ago.
I talked to my mom on the phone last night and she was gushing over Michael and how beautiful he is and then she said how amazing it was to watch my brother with the baby and with Laurie. "He really takes care of them," she said. "Well, that's his job," I told her.
A lot of women have a hard time seeing their sons as someone's husband and as someone's father and I think the transition from son to husband was a bit difficult for my mom, but she's handled it pretty well. The key, I think, is to keep your mothering-in-law mouth shut, which she's done to the best of her ability. (We're not a mouth-shut people.)
But it doesn't surprise me that my brother has shown himself to be a remarkable father already; it doesn't surprise my heart. There are dozens of baby and childhood photos of me where Guy is hovering over me. We fought a lot, don't get me wrong, but in the way it only can be in family, he was also my biggest supporter. There was no way he ever would've stood for someone else roughing me up or teasing me. (That was his job - badumbum.) Guy taught me how to tie my shoe and how to read. His love for all things science is infectious and I already know he and Michael will sit around talking about stars and dinosaurs and how planes fly.
When my mom's eldest brother laid dying in a hospital bed, she went to visit him and sat beside his bed. She said she grabbed his hand, careful not to upset the i.v., and as she held it she had the simple, yet radical, realization that this man was one of the closest things in the world to being her. Your sibling is the closest to what makes you you, biologically, than either of your parents or even your children.
And for Guy and I, it's just us. He's got me and I've got him and now there's this baby whose blood is my blood and I don't know how I ever got so lucky.
Posted by hannah at 02:18 PM | Comments (0)
July 21, 2006
Fool For You
I love my job; I always have. I work with great people and I enjoy what I do and I never dread coming here. (Not like I did when I was at the Brand, anyway, and I will feel sick to my stomach every Sunday night.) But the past few days it just feels sort of... pointless. What am I doing here?
I really didn't expect to feel this way upon my return. In the team training guide we got when we were selected for the trip, there is a whole section on returning home. When I first read through it, it seemed strange to me that there would be an entire section on reacclimating from a trip that only lasts seven days. It talked about depression and indifference from friends and family and how to deal with those things, and also about how it's common to experience culture shock coming back to the States. So far, I've been hit with it all.
My friend Autumn sent me an e-mail today that said that she went to North Point's mission page and watched a video from Vox Domini, the partner church we were visiting, and she said it made her so sad and wonder why we weren't still there. As I stumbled around Publix the other night, aghast at it all, I thought the same thing. As I got my paycheck today and realized that I bring home more in two weeks than the average Romanian makes in a year, I wondered the same thing.
I don't know where to start. I don't know how to summarize my heart change, my life change, the things I saw and experienced in a trite paragraph for a stupid blog. Not everyone in my life back here cares about what happened to me over the past week, and it has been a real eye-opener, the folks who are interested and those who are not. So when asked, I simply say it was great and a wonderful experience and if they ask more, I'll tell them. Otherwise, I leave it at that.
On Monday night our team from NPCC and the Romanian volunteers we'd worked with all week gathered in Vox's little fellowship hall (that we'd totally remade with several coats of paint) and we talked about the week, reflecting and sharing our thoughts and feelings. We then shared Communion and worshiped in both English and Romanian and to say it was emotional isn't doing that moment any justice. Gelu, the senior pastor, made the point that while we can hope to see each other again we probably won't, "not this side of heaven." And hearing that made me so sad - to think you can fall in love with people and invest in their lives and never see the fruit of it, it's not what we're accustomed to as people and certainly not as Americans. We like to see the (instant) fruit of our labors. But that's not why we went - we went just to plant seeds and to build relationships and wherever God chooses to take our efforts, that's up to Him.
As we were saying goodbye the Romanians kept thanking us and I wanted to tell them to stop - that it was our privilege. That I feel like I didn't even do anything and I feel more served by them than vice versa.
Romania is a country of contradictions - horse-drawn wagons and mobile phones; enormous modern malls where no one shops; luxury cars driving down torn-up roads. But her people have so much heart and they are so hungry.
Growing up in a country where we thank God in our pledge and on our money it is unfathomable to think that someone could not have heard of Him. (Though I know those people exist here too.) But in Romania, where a profession of faith was punishable by DEATH, not even two decades ago, they don't take our God for granted. Rodica, the pastor's wife, took us into central Timisoara on Saturday and told us the Revolution Story, and their first-hand account. On Dec. 25, 1989, when Cecescu and his wife were killed, Christmas Carols played on the once-government-controlled national radio, and Rodica said it was the first time in her life that she sang carols outside her home. They were free.
"I could search for all eternity Lord and find that there is none like you." - Garden Song, Watermark
Freedom is something I have always had, always known. And though I was once in metaphorical bondage to my sins, I was never actually in bondage. I was never controlled by someone who starved me, physically and spiritually.
"The message every politician knows - when we are fed with nothing, we'll believe it, and then do as we are told." - Wings of the Morning, Caedmon's Call
But despite the fear and the bondage and the control, God was still very much alive in Romania. There were underground churches and movements and despite knowing they could be jailed or killed, they spoke the Truth. It's one thing to learn about Communism in school and read about the bread lines and the secret police. It's quite another to have someone stand in front of you and tell you that they were followed, that they were watched and yet they plowed ahead. Gelu figured out a way to make photocopies in Jell-O so that his fellow college students could hear that God was not, in fact, dead. Photocopies in Jell-O, because you couldn't buy a Xerox or fax machine. You would raise a flag, raise an eyebrow - they would come after you.
Before we took Communion on Monday night, Gelu reminded us that this moment - that the past week we'd shared together - was only possible because Jesus was broken for us. We were only there because of Him and all of our work and all of our best laid plans would have been for naught had it not been for the ultimate sacrifice. He did all of that, just so I could go to another country and see with my own eyes that it's not all about me. That I'm not the only one who loves Him and that Americans don't have the market on spirituality. I knew that anyway, in my head anyway, but I didn't fully understand it, not like I do today.
"You made me free, that's proof enough for me," - Fool, Nicole Nordeman
Posted by hannah at 02:53 PM | Comments (2)
July 19, 2006
Words
They say a picture's worth a 1,000 words and until I can find even one to describe my experiences in Romania, I'll allow the photos to do it for me.
Posted by hannah at 03:29 PM | Comments (0)
July 11, 2006
On a jet plane
My left eye is twitching. It's been doing this a lot lately. I know it's because I'm nervous and there have been a lot of life changes lately. A big birthday, a new nephew, new relationships. I know it's because I'm about to embark on the greatest adventure of my life thus far and despite all the preparation and planning, I feel like I'm going into this thing totally blind. I'm not though. Even in darkness, there is light.
Thank you all for your support and e-mails and prayers. Until then.
Psalm 67
God be merciful unto us, and bless us; and cause his face to shine upon us; Selah. 2 That thy way may be known upon earth, thy saving health among all nations. 3 Let the people praise thee, O God; let all the people praise thee. 4 O let the nations be glad and sing for joy: for thou shalt judge the people righteously, and govern the nations upon earth. Selah. 5 Let the people praise thee, O God; let all the people praise thee. 6 Then shall the earth yield her increase; and God, even our own God, shall bless us. 7 God shall bless us; and all the ends of the earth shall fear him.
Posted by hannah at 12:28 PM | Comments (3)
July 07, 2006
Light of the World
I leave in four days. My beautiful nephew, Michael Edward, was born yesterday and though this is a morbid thought, I am so glad he came before my departure, so that at least I would have seen his face, and known his name, if anything were to happen.
My dad sent an e-mail to his brothers and cousins alerting them to the birth of his first grandchild, and told them briefly about the man from whom Michael gets his middle name - my Uncle Ed, who was one of my maternal aunt's husbands. My dad wrote about Ed's WWII experience and how he went on to get his PhD and become well known in his field. At he end of the e-mail he wrote, "A name to be proud of, I think." Even recounting it now makes me cry because when you come from a fractured family, it's sometimes easy to forget that other relationships don't just cease to exist with divorce. That my dad would be pleased, and touched, that his son named his firstborn after his ex-wife's brother-in-law - I don't know how to explain it - it makes me happy and sad and proud, all at once.
I'm feeling really emotional lately and I know it's because the preparation for this trip has been so intense. I literally feel the prayers of hundreds surrounding me and it's awesome and humbling. Sometimes I don't feel like it's any big deal, and other times I feel so inadequate and scared. There's not only the fear of going somewhere you've never been and trusting in customs agents and airlines you've never heard of, but there's also the fear that I'm not good enough. Why in the world are they letting me go on this trip?? I'm hardly a good representation of anything, expect maybe a spoiled American. I've got that down.
But then I get an e-mail or a note or a check and it says, "We're proud of you," or "We're praying for you." Or I read and (reread) the amazing letter I got from my friend Melissa that talked about many things, like the gift of wisdom - a gift she saw in me that I never saw in myself. She wrote, "Human wisdom cannot teach the things of the Lord, instead we teach in words that are taught by the Spirit."
There is a song by Watermark that I've heard on the radio a lot recently, and I've begun thinking of it as my Romania song, my Romania prayer.
Jesus, light of the world
Shine on us, shine on us
Word of life, spoken for love
Breathe on us, breathe on us
Light of the world, King Jesus
God's beating heart, live through us
God's beating heart, live through us
God's beating heart, live through us
Light of the world, King Jesus
That is my only prayer - that His light be seen through me and that His word be breathed through me. I am not a teacher, but I can teach what He has shown me. I am not a wise leader, but I can share the wisdom He has made plain to me. "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me," Phillipians 4:13.
Posted by hannah at 05:22 PM | Comments (2)
July 06, 2006
Baby Merri11
Today, today. He comes today! My sister-in-law has a C-section scheduled for 2:30 this afternoon.
So, in like an hour.
Posted by hannah at 02:31 PM | Comments (1)
July 05, 2006
Flowering
I told him that I love daisies. He listened.
Posted by hannah at 01:51 PM | Comments (2)
