Dag 1

Na een goede aankomst gisteravond van de 6 dames uit Nederland, hebben we vandaag een goede start gemaakt. Om 10 uur de kerkdienst in Micleuseni meegemaakt en om 15 uur de kerkdienst in Huzum bezocht. De kinderen in Huzum hebben er zin in deze week en ze kijken uit naar de dag van morgen: dag 1 van de vakantie-activiteiten-club! De grote vraag is: zouden we ook een kado krijgen?? Tja, dat blijft natuurlijk nog even geheim...;-) Morgen voor ons iig weer een drukke nieuwe dag.

Vandaag net op de valreep nog een fotootje kunnen maken....de rest van de dag te druk gehad met allerlei andere dingen...maar wie weet, morgen misschien meer tijd voor kiekjes....wordt vervolgd...

Merry Christmas from Micleuseni!

This morning we celebrated Christmas in the church in Micleuseni. With the children I prepared a small skit, 3 poems and 3 songs. The kids had some emotions but all went well and nobody forgot their words or actions;-) And as Maria said at the end of the skit: Jesus is born for us!

Josef and Mary.
(Praise God, this time Josef received the gifts from the 3 wise men....during the practice he told the wise men, he does not need the gifts! hahahaa.....)

Shepherds on their way to see baby Jesus

The shepherds arrived and worship Jesus

The 3 wise men are following the star

Singing the Christmas songs & saying poems.

The Christmas stable

This afternoon again many children came to the church in Lozova and all together we were singing about Christmas, we made a Christmas stable and we thanked Jesus that He was born for us. Praise God for the great time we had!

Operatie Schoenendoos / Operation Shoe box

Deze week drie verschillende scholen bezocht in Varzaresti, Nisporeni en Dolna. In Dolna heben we ook de lokale kleuterschool bezocht. De aanleidin van ons bezoek was de schoenendozen die we hadden gekregen om uit te delen aan de kinderen maar we hebben natuurlijk dankbaar van de mogeijkheid gebruik gemaakt om de ware reden van kerst uit te leggen aan de kinderen. Voor de kleuterschool en de kinderen van klas 1 tot 4 hadden we kerstliederen en een poppenkast die uitlegde waar het met kerst om gaat. Voor de kinderen uit klas 5 tot 9 hadden we een programma met goocheltrucs, kerstliederen en een korte boodschap. Over het algemeen waren de kinderen en de leerkrachten erg blij en dankbaar en we werden uitgenodigd om nog eens terug te komen....(en natuurlijk hopen we zeker van deze uitnodiging gebruik te maken...)

Aankomende donderdag gaan we naar de school in Micleuseni. We bidden dat God de deur voor ons zal openen want de Ortodoxe priester is niet eel erg blij dat we toestemming hebben en wie weet bedenkt hij nog een plan om het niet door te laten gaan maar we weten dat onze God grotere plannen heeft dus vertrouwen we op Hem!

The weekend passed quickly

As usual time is flying when you are busy...Thank you for praying with us for the meeting last Friday in Lozova, it was a blessed day. In the morning we went to the kindergarten and about 100 kids were present at our small Christmas program. Many of the workers of the kindergarten, listened very carefully because now they finally had a chance to see and hear with their own eyes what these Christians have to say. And praise God at the end many of them said that they were encouraged and liked the program. We didn't teach wrong or weird things and now they saw themselves that the rumors are not true...

In the afternoon we had the chance to visit some families who have been coming to the church meetings lately. We had some different welcomes. One grandmother served us cookies and chocolates and her dream came true that "Americans" came to her house. But in another family we were shouted at and were told to go and take our God with us. Leave my house....
In the picture is Juria who received a Christmas Shoe Box. It was a great joy to see how incredibly happy she was unpacking and looking at all the stuff she got!

At 17 hour we had a service at the church and around 30 people and 30 kids came. The room was full! When it was time for the kids to go to their program, there was NO space left. Try to fit 30 kids in a room of 3 meter by 2 meter and still keep them happy and do a Christmas program with them. Wowie, it is quite challenging! But we managed, praise God!

On Saturday we went to a wedding of our friends from OM, Pavel and Becky. It was a nice wedding and again like normally, no lack of food!

Today we attended church in Micleuseni in the morning and at 15 hour we had again service at Lozova. Around 20 people came and 14 kids. (So this time we had a bit more space per child!) Below a small video of some brothers from Micleuseni singing a song this morning:

We thank God for this weekend and we pray that He will bless the coming week! 

Nieuws uit Moldavie

De winter is begonnen en dit betekent dat veel mensen in kou leven in Moldavië en vaak slechts 1 keer per dag eten omdat er niet genoeg geld is...In de komende weken gaan de zogenaamde winterprojecten van start: voedsel pakketten voor arme families en ouderen brandhout voor mensen die in kou leven, etc. Gods liefde laten zien op een praktische manier!

Een van de organisaties waar OM Moldavië mee samenwerkt is de Nederlandse organisatie Mensenkinderen. Ongeveer 3 keer per jaar komen ze naar Moldavië en bezoeken we samen allerlei projecten die met hun hulp zijn gesponsord. Hieronder een link met hun nieuwste tijdschrift, met daarin verhalen en foto's uit Moldavië.

Tijdschrift Mensenkinderen December 2013

Christmas season is starting!

This morning we woke up and there was a nice white world waiting for us! Already some snow has melted but it defiantly gives us a bit of a Christmas mood! Tomorrow we plan to go to the kindergarten in Lozova and we will have our first Christmas program there. Besides that we will visit some families in the village and at 17 hour there will be a church service. We pray that during this Christmas season many people will start to celebrate the real reason of Christmas: the birth of Jesus Christ, our Savior!

Vers nieuws uit MD / Fresh news from MD

Onze nieuwsbrief = klaar om gelezen te worden! Zie hieronder voor de link:

Nieuwsbrief December 2013

Our newsletter = ready to be read! See below for the link:

News letter December 2013

Tragedy in Micleuseni

Last Wednesday a house burned down in Micleuseni. Fortunately the neighbor was around and he rescued the  two youngest children from the burning the house. Father was not at home when the fire started and also the oldest boy, 12 years, was not present. Mother has abandoned her children and husband years ago and lives in Israel. She doesn't want to have to do anything with them anymore. She told father to take the younger children of 5 and 6 years old, to the orphanage because she doesn't want them....

Neighbor is pointing out how the fire destroyed everything

The fire probably started from a plug where the fridge was connected. A curtain got on fire and soon the whole house was on fire. The fire department was called and when they arrived they discovered that they didn't bring any water with them. When they came back from getting water from a local lake, there were only two wall left, the rest of the house was burned.

Nothing was left and so people from the village started to bring clothes for the children and all kind of other stuff that might be helpful. On Saturday we brought a food parcel to the family. For some time the father and the 3 children can stay with the neighbors and now they look at options to rebuild the house but of course finances are a big problem.

The local team in the Centre of MD started!

This week all the team members of our local team arrived in Micleuseni. We started the team life in a great way: first we played settlers and the next morning we celebrated the start of our team with cake and coffee!

I would say, so far, so good! We started well and let's continue this good work! May God bless our team!