How Desperate Are You?

Happy almost New Year! My hope is that this holiday season was filled with remembering the Lord’s faithfulness and His goodness in His provision of our Savior, Jesus! Christmas looked very different for me this year… it was spent in the desert in Jordan! However, before I share more about that, I would like to catch you up and share about the amazing ministry we got to join for a month in Kosovo. 

The local church in the capital of this country is alive and determined to make Jesus known! We got to partner with so many different ministries and I would love to share them with you. It was a busy and beautiful month. 

They have a program called Mercy Ministry that helps people in need with food, clothing and the gospel! There are around 130 families that are a part of this program. Each week they have people coming to the church on Thursday’s to receive a box of food or other recourses and to hear a message from the Bible. Some of the people in the program have even given their lives to Christ! My team got to help prepare the food packages, distribute the items and lead the devotionals! One day a few of us even got to hand deliver items to the homes of these families. 

Another ministry was called Mozaik which is a secondhand shop that helps to support the church. My team would spend hours going through clothes donations and sorting through them. We would separate them by seasons and determine if they were in good condition to sell or put in the Mercy Ministry pile to be donated! Sorting through the clothes is a big task and we were thankful to get to make a dent in the large warehouse of donations. 

Next I will share with you about one of the funniest days of ministry I’ve had so far. On Fridays we got to be a part of the kid’s truck ministry called Ark of Life. We would take a truck to a school in a village and do a skit to share about Jesus, dances, games and face painting. The first day we did this we arrived to a parking lot with maybe 50 children. Suddenly I was asked to go into the truck with my teammate Katie and before we knew it we were Mario and Winnie the Pooh. I could barely see through Winnie’s mouth. I was walking around, giving hugs and high-fives to the children. Everything seemed fine. Then suddenly more children were released from school. I was then getting hit in the back of the head and there were older boys trying to rip my head off. I reached my limit and pulled my head off to tell them to stop. I then realized that any little kid that really thought I was Winnie the Pooh was probably traumatized. Katie was also getting hit in the head so we quickly decided to go back to the truck to get out of these costumes. Later we laughed until we cried about the whole thing. One thing I learned that day is you really never know what ministry will look like on the World Race so be prepared for ANYTHING! Haha

One of my favorite things that we got to do was door to door evangelism in various villages throughout Kosovo. The church has a goal to reach every home with the gospel. Kosovo is a smaller county and within 5 years they have covered around 30% of the villages in the country. We would walk through villages and call out to people’s homes to see if they would answer and open the door. We then would greet them, chat and give a brochure that explained the gospel with information about the church as well. People were very kind and receiving and there were a few who did not want to receive it due to being Muslim or other reasons. I was inspired by the determination of this team of people who would go out every Saturday and sometimes other days of the week to do this. How bold they are and how desperate for others to know Jesus as well. Every single week many seeds are being planted across the country! 

One of the most impactful moments for me was on a day that we were invited to a Roma community. The church has centers throughout the country and one is the Roma center which serves the local Roma community and provides different programs for them! There was a family that was one of the poorest in the area. We were told that the mother left this family and the father was now on his own with 3 children and that their living condition is not good. I shared previously that my team got to clean out a house in a village in Albania. This month we were asked to go to this home and do some cleaning. We truly felt like the Lord prepared us to serve in this way the previous month! We did not entirely know what we were getting ourselves in to. On arrival the father did not want us to go in and help. He was embarrassed. We insisted and shared that we wanted to help. We then got to spend the next few hours cleaning, scrubbing and organizing. After I finished the kitchen I felt led to go outside to play with the 3 kids. My heart broke for them. I have never seen worse living conditions. The apartment was very small and there were already 7 people cleaning so it was tight. I have to be honest that kid’s ministry isn’t always the first opportunity I jump to. But on this day, throwing a ball, sharing smiles and interceding for these children felt like exactly where I was supposed to be. The church later delivered mattresses because the children were sleeping on small pads on the floor. The father cried with thankfulness. It was a beautiful experience showing this family that there are people who care and more importantly a God who cares for them. 

The last thing I wanted to share was that almost every morning we got to be apart of the staff’s devotional and prayer time along with other missionaries who are there. I was able to lead one of the devotionals one of the days. I felt led to share about the emphasis the Lord puts on remembering His faithfulness. While reading through the old testament I’ve seen it as a theme many times. The Lord is so good, gracious, patient and faithful to us and it is worth remembering and reflecting on often. One of the staff later shared with me that she felt the Lord was speaking that to her the night before and specifically the word “remember” and that the devotional was a beautiful confirmation. I was thankful to get to encourage those who will be there long after we leave. 

All of this may seem like a checklist of things we “did” but I truly hope what is communicated is that the local church of Pristina, Kosovo is alive, desperate and determined to share the love of God through various ministries! It was a blessing to be a part of what God is already doing in this country. 

Next up… Ukraine!!