On Thursday evening Dominik and I left Žilina. Arrived there around 11.00 pm and went to do some little shopping for food for the next day. So we ended up going to bed after 2.00 am. Next morning we woke up 5.00 since we were suppose to leave to Romania at 6.00 am. So I woke up, took a shower and got into a car. The way there was quite peaceful and everything went smoothly. When we were crossing the Hungarian-Romanian border we had a little fun experience. We stopped to change some money and some Romanian guy was there with a bucket and asked us whether we want him to wash the windshield for us. We said no but he was kind of ignoring that. So he began to wash it. When the driver came to the car he was about to leave and the Romanian guy was like: Hey dude, I washed your window. Come on. Give me some €. So after this begging he gave him 1 euro. And he was like: What?! 1 euro? Give me more! After that we just drove away. It took us 8 hours to get from Žilina do Arad. And, we crossed a time zone. It was my first time.
After we arrived we met with the pastor of the church. And he explained us the history, the strategy, the goal of the church. How they work and what is their aim and how they are to reach it. I was impressed by the system they have. How their small groups and youth and Sunday services are all so well connected. They have a great strategy. They've planted few churches and are doing missions. Actively involve the small groups and youth into the ministry.
Then we visited their youth. It was really nice. We sang worship songs and the youth pastor was preaching. But there is a little thing that was too much for me - the youth pastor was talking too long for me - over an hour. But it was a good talk. And the churhc has this cool wireless thing there that you carry with you and you have headphones with a translator translating right into your ear. That was really good. Then we got split up into host families and went "home".
Next morning began quite early (I mean the previous night was only 3 hours long:) at 6.30 am. We went to a village about 20 km from Arad. A french couple is doing a mission there with kids. They're doing an awesome job. We were helping out there with chopping wood and making sidewalks. The girls were "playing" with dirt :D Here's a clip when I was working.
Then we went back to Arad because we had a meeting with the youth pastor to talk about the youth. But there was a think. A huge one. There was a protest in the WHOLE country. The government raised the car taxes. Have a look at the clip that Zac (one of my teachers from ŠPM) took. Please, notice the track that is pulling over to prevent another car from getting around.
Nobody knew how long this all might take. So after an hour of waiting and deciding we've decided to walk back to the city (it took us about three hours of walk - try it Americans! jk). It was a good walk. We were talking and it was a good time. When we got to the church we were 4 hours late for our meeting so we went to a coffee shop close-by and spent some time there. Then we all went for a dinner and back to our families.
Dominik and I wanted to spent some time with the guy we were living with. He is the worship team leaders and he just got back from the States where he spent 5 weeks learning how to do worship even better. Well, we were talking and then it ended up going to bed at 3.30 am! I woke up at 7.00 am and got really for the church. The guy's mother offered me a cup of coffee while we were eating breakfast and I thought that it would be really stupid and not good to fall asleep during the sermon. So I took one and I quite liked it so asked her for another one! Then we left to the church where we had our re-scheduled meeting with the youth pastor. And they had there coffee as well and I wanted to be sure I will NOT fall asleep during the whole service. So I had the third cup (it ended up I went to sleep at 9.00 pm without even sleeping in the car on the way back :)I so enjoyed the sermon. This pastor went to college and seminary in the States and I love the way he preached. He preached the kind of way to he was living what he was preaching. He was using his voice and volume and his body and all of that made a really good impression to me. He made not to fall asleep. And the translator was perfect. She was like she would be reading it all off of a paper. Amazing. I dare to say the best translator I've ever heard so far.
After the service we took some sandwiches and left for home. The way back took only 6 hours since we used highways and we went to Trnava and not Žilina.Well I got to tell you all it was a great weekend and I hope I'll be able to use as much as possible from all that I've learned this last weekend.
