we're back! Be home in less than 3 hours!

p.s.

Flight arrives about 11:30 AM and we hope to be in Madison around 3pm. We'll let you know (via cell call when we leave O'hare) if it will be any different. See you soon!

Our last hours in Budapest

Were sitting in the Budapest airport, only about 20 minutes until we head back. Just wanted to let you all know that everything is on time. We're very sad to be leaving Budapest and Romania but i think we are all excited to be home in our own beds.

Budapest was amazing, reminded me a little of New York City. We ended the trip with a couple hours of debriefing, sharing cool stories from the past two weeks. After that, we headed over to the Szechenyi Baths (natural hot springs) to relax in their "thermal-medicinal" therapeutic waters. Check out the details: http://www.spasbudapest.com/furdo.php. After the baths, we had our last group dinner and Lief made me snort pepper to help me sneeze. Let's just say that didn't go over well. I can't wait to get home and see my family and my dog - and everybody else is feeling that way too, now that we're on our way.

We know we didn't post as much as we would have liked the last few days, but we'll be able to share all of our stories with you on Thursday night.

peace out,
Brianna & the team

Living Large in Budapest

Romania Team Friends and Family,

We apologize it has taken us so long to post. Since beginning the debrief leg of our journey our schedule has been jam packed between digesting all God accomplished in and through us and taking advantage of the choice opportunity to enjoy beautiful Budapest.

Our overnight train ride from Turgus Mures, Romania to Budapest, Hungary was an unexpected blesssing. Most of the team slept for the majority of the 12 hour trip. We arrived in Budapest a bit grimy but replenished physically. Pat made arrangements for the team to stay at a wonderful little hostel nestled near the city center in the Pest section of Budapest. After a well needed hot shower the team hit the town. Budapest is home to over two million people. It dates back to the 8th century and is rich in cultural and historical significance. Along with Prague it is a celebrated stop for anyone desirious of experiencing European highlights. We spent the afternoon debriefing at the city's largest park. Susie is doing a wonderful job leading the team through discussions and exercises designed to allow us to fully appreciate and meditate on the last two weeks while also preparing us to reenter our normal lives. At the center of the park is a large castle. Lief scored us a deal and we enjoyed a fabolous Hungarian feast at a restaurant connected to the castle.

After a hearty night of sleep we attacked the city with vigor this morning. We played the role of tourists and signed up for a bus tour of the city. While we have a few days here it is not nearly enought time to see all the worthy sights. We figured this would be the best way to get the most our of our time. We spent much of the day traveling by double decker bus throughout both Buda and Pest. We had the freedom to get off at any stop for closer examination and explanation. We spent the majority of our time the older Buda part of the city famously known as the castle district. Many of us got to visit and pray in Matthias Church which was built by a king in the 15th century. We also bought some handcrafted gifts by local artisans at a summer craft fair. We concluded out time in Buda by doing some personal debrief on at a citadel that is located by a park far above the city. It was pretty surreal to overlook this beautiful ancient city split by the Danube that holds so many secrets, treasures, and lore. After finishing our bus tour we explored the vast labrinyths under the city by oil lamps and then walked across a bridge that when originally constructed was the first suppension bridge in all of Europe. Lief again scored us an amazing Hungarian feast on a boat anchored in the Danube. The city was lit up like a Christmas tree and provided a breathtaking backdrop to our food and laughter.

Yeah, I know, missionary work is pretty demanding. We recognize that we are living large and that we are indebted to all of you for allowing us this opportunity. Just know that the team deserves it. I cannot begin to tell you how hard they worked and served over the last two weeks. They literally poured out their lives. I am incredibly proud of them. We hope to share the countless stories of how God worked over the next days and weeks. Presently, I have two more minutes before the internet cafe closes and I need close.

We love you and are incredibly grateful for your prayers and support.

Grace and peace.

John for the Romanian Team

Leaving Romania

We just left camp today, it was an amazing experience. We are at an internet cafe in a little town on the Romania-Hungary border called Targus Mures waiting to board an overnight train to Budapest in about an hour. We have a 11 hour train ride ahead of us and our team while is exhagusted they are also encouraged about all God has done over the past week. The stories are many and we look forward to filling in the details during our three day debreif and stay in Budapest when we have more time. Everyone is healthy and well and looking forward to some sleep on the train. Please pray for a safe and restful evening and for our navigation in Eastern Europe for the first time without a native speaker.

A few hours ago we had an emotional goodbye - but we were equally encouraged by how well our two teams bonded and look forward to what that might mean for our continual partnership with the Craiova church.

Off to catch a train -

Grace and peace,

Lief & JR for the team

Quick Update from Camp!!!

Friends & Family,

Even though it is just 1am here and we just got a dial-up internet connection for the first time - we wanted to let you know that now 3 days into camp things are going great. The time here has been powerful and challenging. The days are packed, but the work is good and worthy. We have made many good relationships with both the campers and romanian leadership team. I am so proud of our team for the ways they have stepped into leadership roles the first day we got here. They are responsible, loving, and willing to do whatever it takes to make this camp happen and impact the campers lives. Everyone has been healthy and safe. Please continue to pray for God's provisions and for his spirit to move in our hearts and in this camp. As I type my eyes are starting to close - so we will do our best to post a more detailed description of what we've done (hopefully by students) tomorrow afternoon. Sorry we haven't been able to communicate for the past two days - but now that we're here, it makes complete sense - we're far up in the remote and beautiful Transylanian Alps of Romania. What a place to be. We miss you all, and we'll do our best to keep in touch during these last 3 days of camp.

Iubesc Romania!

-Lief & the team

Some pictures for you

Here are a few pictures from the last few days... we've also added a few on the posts below.

A Final Post from Craiova

Greetings,

This morning we had the opportunity to worship with our brothers and sisters in Christ here in Craiova. Our local church partner decided that it would encouraging to our team and to their community to have a church service in their partially completed new church building. We were also joined by a small team from Pennsylvania. Paul, Susie, and the Yoons did a great job leading the congregation in worship. I preached from Psalm 90 which was particularly relevant because one of the church's key members is on death's doorstep in a battle with cancer. Our entire team was joined by some Romanian youth for a lively rendition of the song "God of This City" which was written by an Irish worship band while in Calcutta experiencing the slums. The song captures our hope at what God might accomplish in Craiova. Rich Millhouse, the church's pastor, concluded our worship service with communion. Sorry parents, but some of your kids may have tasted wine for the first time.

Presently we are preparing to leave Craiova for camp. We will gather at the church in a few hours for dinner and then board a bus around midnight. The journey to camp will take 8-9 hours. The camp is located due north of Craiova in the Carpathian Mountains. Apparently it is quite beautiful and the temperatures will be cooler. (It is in the mid 90s today in Craiova.) Due to your generosity we will be taking over 60 Romanians with us to camp. Many of these students are not Christ followers and have never been exposed to the gospel. A majority of them are part of the Orthodox church. We are also bringing along a number of orphans who have never had the means to travel outside Craiova.

We realize you have enjoyed the frequent blog posts but we are unsure how often we will be able to post from camp due to limited internet accessibility. We will do our best to post a few times but may be unable to do so. If you have emergencies you should be able to reach us on Daniel Vieru's cell phone.

The most important thing you can do for us is pray. We know that you have been doing so and we encourage you to continue. Our team has been flooded by the powerful presence and peace of the Spirit over the last few days. He is unifying and renewing our hearts in preparation for what awaits. We all acknowledge that God has something significant in store for us in the next 10 days. Here are a few specific ways you can pray for us during this stretch:

-Pray for safe travel.
-Pray for physical and spiritual health and vigor.
-Pray for team unity and deepened community. Pray that others would see Jesus in both our words and actions.
-Pray that we would be dependent on the Spirit and open to His leading.
-Pray for the Romanian adults and students who follow Christ. Pray that God would grant them the capacity to serve and love their non-Christian peers. Pray that they would have the vision to see what can be accomplished in their city through their community.
-Pray for the Romanian students who do not have a relationship with God. Pray that God would tune their hearts to the grace of truth of the gospel.

Please know that our students and adult leaders have been simply amazing. They have risen to every challenge and are representing Christ in a way that is glorifying His name and expanding the Kingdom. You should be very proud of them.

Our team does not have adequate words to thank you for you continual and abundant support. Your generosity, your prayers, and your love are air for the lungs of our faith. Thank you for partnering with us we share the good news of Jesus with those who desperately need his grace and love. May God be glorified in and through us.

John R.

thank you

The last few days we've been blown away by your generosity. I'm so grateful to be a part of the Blackhawk Church community and our greater community of Christ Followers. Two days ago we sent out an e-mail and posted on the blog about the financial crisis facing our Romanian partners in getting students to camp. Within one hour of the need being made known $700 had been raised. Within one day over $3000 had been raised. As of this morning, $6,891 has been raised. Wow. Thank you so much.

Your amazing acts of generosity have bolstered our faith and the faith of the Romanians we're working with. Everyone is humbled by how God has provided through all of you. I wish you could have seen the look on Daniel's face when we told him the news, you could see that a heavy load had been lifted from his chest. I wish you could have seen the look on his student's faces when they heard about almost $7000 being raised. It's surely hard for them to understand how people some 5000 miles away who've never met them would care so deeply.

Because of your generosity Daniel was able to open up more spots and some additional students who weren't able to go to camp will now get the opportunity. Additionally, students who've been planning to go will still get the chance. I'm personally confident that you're generosity will have eternal consequences. Thank you. Thank God.

-Paul & The Romania Team

ps: please stay tuned for final details about your pledges. we ended up raising more than the amount needed for camp. we've been made aware of some additional needs within in the orphan community here. some of you may have the opportunity to move your funds in this direction. kristin will be in touch.

jon preaching

do good jon. we're praying for you.

-romania team

gypsies.

The other day we were walking to the most beautiful and breathtaking park (the third largest natural park in Europe) for games with a portion of the kids coming to camp. It was about fourty-five minutes away, so as we walked Lisa told Cassidy and I about the Gypsies. I had never really thought of them except what I have seen in movies or heard of their deep and beautiful music. But as Lisa explained, the Gypsies came from India and are not looked kindly upon. (for example, In World War II they were targeted along with the jews, homosexuals, and invalid.) They do not have Romanian citizenship and do not really follow the laws of Romania. Lisa told me to talk to our host family to see how they view the Gypsies and about their history. For this reason I will elaborate on how this topic showed us a small bit of the character of the people we are working with. One morning our host family (of Hanna and I) and another host family (of Esther, Mackensy, and Tess) let us wake up early to go to a market for clothing. It is run by Gypsies and quite inexpensive. While we were there we saw the compassion and love that they showed to those that are viewed as the "lowest" in their society. At the end of our time there, instead of a sardonic thank you, they chatted with this one lady and were more kind than most are to even storekeepers in america. I have such great respect for the people of Dan's church youthgroup they are simply amazing and have such great influence in this city.

hope all are doing well!

audra

Hot dogs and honey

Greetings from Romania,

It's your friend Lizzi. The other day during breakfest at our host family something quite funny happened. Bryanna and I sat down to a table full of food. On the table was bread, cheese, sausage slices, hot dogs, butter, sugar, tea and honey. We took the food we felt comfortable eating (the bread and hot dogs and began to eat) the hot dogs were stuck together in pairs so we each took two. When we had finished one our host girl told us the honey was good with the bread, but she pointed to it and from my angle it looked like she was pointing at the hot dogs. So I decided to try it. I put some honey on my plate, thinking this was an Romanian treat. The daughter, DeAnna and mother, Carmen both looked at me like I was crazy. They asked if I ate this at home and I replied an awkward, "..no" realizing this was not an Romanian food, "I just wanted to try it...?" Actually it wasn't as bad as I thought, but it does have a weird after taste. When we were done eating Bryanna and I laughed about the whole thing. We went to church and had team time later that morning and it came up when the team was telling funny stories and EVERYONE told me I HAD to post it on the blog. So there's my story, thank you for all your prayers and support, it means a lot to us!

Love, Lizzi

Aqua Project

Hey Friends and Family!
Yesterday we took a bus for 2 hours until we reached a medium sized town with a super-long name I can't pronounce. While we were there, we did a clean-up Madison Mission style project called Aqua Project. We picked up trash in the park and around the city. Laying in the trash, we found a tiny dying puppy laying under a car. We adopted it and took it back to Craiova with us. It didn't make it through the night. Side-by-side with Romanians from various churches, we tidied up the city. After a two course lunch, we ventured down to the longest river in Europe, the Danube. Across the river, we could see Serbia. We dipped our feet in and a few brave people [Paul and Daniel] went swimming in the most likely toxic water. After that, we painted the walls of a stadium kind of area and prepared for the concert that was planned for later in the evening. Dinner was simpler than lunch; we had salami and salty cheese sandwiches. We wandered around the dock and then found a spot to have a soda. Finally, at 9:00pm we grabbed seats in the stadium and the concert began. The music was great. There were two bands that played. The first was a christian rock group and the second was more mellow worship music. It was really cool to see all the people coming into the freshly painted stadium since it hadn't been used in around 20 years. After the concert, we were super tired and we piled onto the bus. We reached Craiova at 2:00 am, it was a really late night. Today we slept in really late. I woke up at noon, but some of the team awoke at 2:00pm. We're doing great [especially with the extra sleep] and feeling great.
Miss you all,
Cassidy Trier

Camp: Urgent Need for Prayer and Funds

In the past few posts, we have been writing about our opportunity to take students who do not have the personal financial means (many of them orphans) to a mountain camp in northern Romania for a week. As many of you know, the primary reason we came to Romania was to serve at this English/Sports camp. All this week we have been preparing and planning for it, spending evenings building relationships with the 50 or so students, not including ourselves or the Romanian leadership team.

Each year Daniel Vieru sends out support letters all over the world in hopes to provide this camp opportunity to students who would never otherwise have the chance for something like this - in hopes that a week-long trip would build relationships that would change these students lives forever. Every year, he raises thousands of dollars to send these students to camp. Last night, while we were celebrating together over traditional Romanian dinner, he got a much anticipated call from the partner church receiving funds in Minnesota (he had been waiting all week) - the news was not good. He found out that some of the money they were depending on did not come through. We realize now that we are short about what it takes to support about 15-20 students to come to camp. The last 24 hours has been a challenge to say the least. We have considered all the options, including the possibility of canceling the camp. After prayer and discussion as the two teams, we have decided to trust God and move forward with camp preparations in hopes that the financial means would be provided for not just those students who we expect to go, but that every student interested would have the opportunity to participate in camp (regardless of their financial situation).

We then met as the Blackhawk team alone and decided to trust God with this and how to move forward. We have changed some of our plans over the next two days to free up some of our budget to go towards camp and also have considered tithing our own spending money to go towards students at camp. We also wanted to make our church community aware of this situation and give each of you (and the greater body) an opportunity to join us in prayer that all of these students would be able to come to camp. While we understand that many of you have sacrificed much for this trip already, we are also asking that if it is financially possible, you consider giving towards this opportunity as well - whatever that means.

This was included in an email that Kristen Emerson sent out today after we spoke with her:

"Each students registration fee is $175. Consider sponsoring a Romanian student to participate in the week of camp. As you know, we are going to be in a long-term partnership with this camp in Romania, and this would be a way to further strengthen and support their mission. If you could commit to sponsor one student’s participation—or half—or anything, that would really help us out.

The camp starts on Sunday, so if you are considering donating money to sponsor a kid to participate in the life-changing camp, we need to know by Saturday night (yes, in two days). Please email your commitment to kemerson@blackhawkchurch.org by Saturday night at 10 pm *(or earlier), so we can contact the crew in Romania to tell them how many additional students can participate. (We will reply to let you know how to designate the funds; if you want to pay by credit card online, that may be an option.)"

Thank you for everything you've done for us, especially for your prayers - they make a world of difference as we face each day with new blessings and challenges. As for tomorrow - we're off to an early start (just 6 hours from now!) to a project 2 hours south from here on the Romania-Bulgaria border. There is a service day similar to what we do for Madison Missions (doing a range of community service projects) that we will take part in along with our Romanian student-leadership team. There is a concert celebration at the end of the service day. It should be a good day. We hope it further binds us together as a unified team as we serve alongside one-another. We'll hopefully post again tomorrow night. Until then, noapte buna!

-Lief and the team

A Note From Tess...

Hey guys! It's Tess here. So far, our time in Romania has been awesome. We've met so many nice people and started to build relationships with them. For the past few days, we've started to plan for the camp. We split up into teams according to what part of camp we're working on (games, crafts etc.) It's been really fun to work with Daniel's leadership team from the church in planning too.
Last night, we went on another trip to the park to play games with the campers. We had a chance to walk through the park and talk to the people to get to know them better before we head to camp with them. They are really great people and some of them have amazing life stories. After walking through the park, we went out to dinner at a traditional Romanian restaurant with Daniel's leadership team. It was a great experience and the food was really good. During dinner, there was a lot of spontaneous Romanian dancing. It was so much fun. It was good to get a taste of the culture here.

Here are some prayer requests for our team:
-Energy as we have a very early day tomorrow
-Money for camp for some of the youth and orphans that can't afford it.
-Ani , a woman from the church who is dying of cancer. It's very hard for everyone involved.
-Boldness for our team to engage in conversations with Romanians who know little to no English.
-That camp will be a life changing experience for all of the youth involved.
-That we'll see God working through everything here.
-That we will grow in our faith.

Thank you so much for all of the prayer. It has really helped us out a lot knowing that there are people on the other side of the world praying for us. We love and miss you all very much and can't wait to see you. Keep the comments coming!
Love, Tess

Craiova (Day 3) - Pictures and a Quick Note

Here is the larger batch of pictures I promised - more to come. Notice especially the series of pictures where the birthday boy is hoisted in the air - apparently John felt it necessary to show the Romanians the American birthday tradition of "Birthday Spankings" (All 18 - and that last one was a pretty good one). The last two days have been incredible for our team (we've bonded well with each other, with the Romanian leadership team, and with next week's campers that we've met in the park the last two days). We'll try to have a few students post about the their experiences in the past two days tomorrow. Today was a LATE night - traditional Romanian dinner and dancing - quite the celebration. You'll hear more about this later. For now, noapte buna!

Madison-Craiova Partnership

We’ve now spent a day and a half in the city of our host church, the Biserica Eveanghelica Libera (Evangelical Free Church of Craiova). While we did not spend too much time in Bucharest, I believe that Craiova is a city that is much easier to love as it was less visibly impacted by the staunch architectural vision of Nicolai Ceausescu (Romanian dictator for 30+ years). We’ve learned that he felt it was important to strip Romania of its culture and identity by tearing down old buildings and neighborhoods and building huge ugly cement apartment buildings to house the masses. We saw many of these buildings in Bucharest. Craiova, on the other hand, for the most part has been much more preserved and remains a beautiful Eastern-European city with a lot of character.

On the three hour trip from Bucharest, I rode with Daniel Vieru, the youth pastor we are working with. He spoke to me about the history of Romania, growing up as a teen during the revolution, and the repercussions for a Christian church in both communist and post-communist Romania. He told me about how 45 years of communist rule had specifically affected children and teens in Romania. Even after the revolution in 1989 and the fall of Ceausescu and communism, major problems persisted. For the first time in decades, the poor majority was able to escape Romania more easily and many left behind their children in hopes to make a living wage in the West. Abandonment had already been a major issue in Romania, but this only heightened once the borders were open. As a youth pastor for the past 10 years, Daniel has experienced this first hand, as many of his students are orphans themselves. He has also started a non-profit organization called Humanitas Pro Deus (People for God) which assists older orphans who are ready to live in their own apartment, move into one with little or no costs (at first). They teach them basic life skills (cooking, budgeting, getting and keeping a job) as they slowly transition them into a self-sufficient lifestyle. This is an amazing ministry that has impacted so many orphans (some we have met since coming to town - some are now leaders in the church). And there is the potential for so much more to be done. I couldn’t help but wonder how our Blackhawk church community could be part of this particular ministry in the future, offering both physical and financial support with the possibility of adult teams being involved as well. We also talked about the possibility of having Daniel and his leadership visit our church in the US with a similar vision as our own trip here. He is excited about this possibility and what kind of impact that might have on his leadership team (a group of 10 older HS students and young adults who are passionate about ministry in Romania). I am excited to see how their leadership team might impact our ministry and our lives during this “reversed” short-term trip.

Since coming to Craiova we have learned a lot about our camp experience next week. We will be traveling to the mountains with about 80 people total. This includes our own 20, Daniel’s 10 leaders and 25 students, and 25 completely new students, most of whom are orphans from the city that have shown interest and have been supported to come to camp with us. We met many of these students tonight as we played games (Ultimate Frisbee & “Energy”- a Romanian game) in the city park. It was so great to start to get to know them so early. They are a lovable bunch and we had a great time. I can’t wait to see how camp might impact both their lives and the faith journeys of us all as we are challenged to grow together at camp next week. What an amazing opportunity we have here in Craiova. Many of these kids have been rejected and abandoned their whole lives, with no parent around to raise them, love them, care for them. You can easily see how ministry specifically to youth in this country is so contextually imperative - that these students would know about a God who not only accepts them, but knows every thing about them, who loves and pursues each of them deeply. I think we are all starting to realize a little bit about why we came here, and why we should continue to come to and receive teams from Romania. What an awesome thing we’ve found ourselves a part of. Praise God.

Thanks for your prayers and love. It’s making a huge difference over here. We’ll hopefully put up a bunch of pictures in the morning when we get the camera (I put up a few pics from Paul's camera and a video in the meantime). Until then – noapte buna! Goodnight!

-Lief