Wednesday, July 30, 2008

2009 Mission Experiences to be Announced at 2008 ABCRM Gathering

The ABCRM Missions Team will be announcing the 2009 ABCRM Mission Experiences at the 20008 ABCRM Annual Gathering in Cheyenne, WY. There will be two workshops centered around the ABCRM Missions Team and the workshop on Saturday morning will be the workshop that the 2009 trips will be announced. Please come join us for this amazing weekend in wonderful Wyoming. You can find more information at http://abcrm.org/2008gathering.htm. Come, enjoy the fun!

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

June 27-30 – ABCRM Bulgaria Mission Trip Project in Pleven and Bulgaria Sight-Seeing

After spending the previous five days in Guliantsi, early Friday June 27 the ABCRM Bulgaria mission team left our temporary Guliantsi Baptist Church home for the nearby city of Pleven to complete our last in-country project at an orphanage there. The many sunflower fields we passed along the way reflected the bright morning sun. What a beautiful sight!

Our Bulgaria mission team soon arrived at the Pleven orphanage, met the orphanage’s acting director, and started assembling the new playground equipment (paid for by ABCRM Bulgaria mission trip funds) and painting the orphanage’s fence. Thankfully, temperatures at the orphanage were a lot cooler than in Gulliantsi and we complete fence-painting by later afternoon.




Also, some of our mission team members enjoyed spending time with some of the kids who live at the Pleven orphanage. Although most of the children were away at a summer camp being held on the eastern shore of Bulgaria, the special-needs kids who needed to stay behind greeted us with big smiles and hugs. Although we didn’t share the same language, our mission team communicated with these kids through a language of genuine care and love for them.


Later on Friday after finishing our projects at the Pleven orphanage, the ABCRM Bulgaria mission team started the Bulgaria sight-seeing part of our trip by going with the Myers family, Katya, and Pepi to the central Bulgarian city of Veliko Tarnovo, a city that dates back to 300 BC and the medieval capital of Bulgaria. After staying overnight in 200-year-old house converted to an inn in the nearby village of Arbanassi, the mission team walked through the ruins of the Bulgaria fortress that was captured by Turkish Muslims on July 17, 1393, beginning the 500-year reign of Bulgaria by the Turkish Ottoman Empire until Bulgaria regained its independence in 1878. The view from the church built above the old fortress in the 1900’s gave the mission team a wonderful view of Veliko Tarnovo that may Bulgarians call the most beautiful city in Bulgaria.


On Saturday evening, we arrived back in Sofia from Veliko Tarnovo after making a visit to the small village of Etera with its many hand-made crafts shops, as well briefly stopping to see the beautiful “Shipka” Greek Orthodox cathedral at another place along the way. We now had only one full day left of our mission trip. It was amazing how quickly our time went by in Bulgaria!


Our last Sunday in Bulgaria was spent by first attending again the Sofia Baptist Church with the Myers family. Team leader Kerry Hassler briefly spoke to the congregation about our ABCRM mission trip, and extended greetings and prayers for the church’s well-being from fellow Christians in the Rocky Mountain Region. After the service, our mission team traveled with the Myers family to see one of the most popular sights in Bulgaria, the Rila Monastary, located in one of the highest mountainous areas of this country. First founded in the 10th Century, the monastery is a masterpiece of “Bulgarian national Revival architecture’, and still is an orthodox school of theology today. We ended the day with a a farewell party at the Myers home in Sofia, that also included Pastor Ivan and his family along with our dear friend, Katya. Our ABCRM mission team members will miss them all!


Early Monday, June 30, the Bulgaria mission team members flew from Sofia to return to the U.S. and (for some) other locations. Many thanks to the ABCRM mission team members who heard the message of “Been Called? GO!” and responded by participating in our region’s June 19-30 2008 Bulgaria Mission Experience. Thanks also to all those in the ABC Rocky Mountain Region who provided funding for the team’s Bulgaria in-country projects through “ABC Missions Basics” contributions from their respective churches Lastly, the mission team is indebted to ABCRM special-interest missionaries Tom and Terry Myers for coordinating and leading our June 19-30 ABCRM Bulgaria mission trip. It provided a wonderful mission experience for us all!

June 22-26 – ABCRM Bulgaria Mission Trip Experiences and Projects in Guliantsi

After traveling in two vans from Sofia to Guliantsi with the Myers family and Sofia Baptist Church member Katya Raichinova during the afternoon of Sunday, June 21, the ABCRM Bulgaria mission team met Pastor Ivan Vassileff, wife Teddi, and their children at the Guliantsi Baptist Church for the first time later that afternoon. We moved into our guest sleeping quarters in the upper levels of the church, prepared for the first day of Vacation Bible School on Monday, and helped celebrate Teddi’s birthday with cake and ice cream later that evening in the church sanctuary. It was a wonderful way to start our 5-day mission team’s stay in Guliantsi to do our VBS and work projects!

On Monday morning, we were happy to see that over 20 Roma Bulgarian kids from ages 4 through 14 showed up for our first Vacation Bible School class. We made out name-tags for the kids (and our mission team), Sherry and Karla took photos of each kid for the “flat Charlie” paper-doll craft they would make later in the week, and Katya began the first session by leading singing VBS-type songs that included kids and adults. Katya was fantastic at getting everyone energized through our singing!

Next, some of the mission team members did a skit for the kids about Jesus making his first disciples “fishers of men” using costumes brought from the Laramie Baptist Church VBS sessions, followed by a time for crafts and games. The first day’s VBS session ended around noon with Katya leading more singing with the kids, talking about God and lessons taught by Jesus, and then the kids were given a snack and fruit drink. This first day’s schedule of VBS activities would generally be followed through the rest of the VBS sessions ending on Thursday.

After enjoying lunch at a nearby Guliantsi restaurant, the Bulgaria mission team walked several blocks from the Guliantsi Baptist Church to the preschool where our schoolyard renovation project for them was done in the afternoons. These included putting together new playground equipment purchased for/delivered to the preschool using budgeted 2008 ABCRM Bulgaria mission trip project, and painting of the preschool’s playground equipment and fence using paint also purchased from these same ABCRM funds. Despite daily afternoon temperatures in the high 90’s, the mission team completed these projects with help from the Myers and Vassileff family members, Katya, several Guliantsi Baptist Church volunteers, teenager Chrisie who lived in Pleven, and the director of the preschool, Matzidana Dasuvosa. One of the Guliantsi Church volunteers “Emo” (who had his own construction business in Guliantsi) helped improve the preschool by replacing wooden playground benches. The completed painting made the playground look alive with color again, and we could see the kids were happy with the results. A local Guliantsi TV station brought a reporter and video cameraman to the preschool on Monday to write a news story about our ABCRM mission trip preschool project shown later that same day. We were told that many people in this town of about 5000 inhabitants were in general amazement that a Baptist mission team from America had come so far to improve a preschool and the Baptist church in their city.



The other main Bulgaria mission team’s project in Guliantsi was to improve the grounds of Pastor Ivan’s church by spreading gravel over the area used for car-parking. This was another task made more difficult by the high daily temperatures. With shoveling and raking contributions by Dwight, Kerry, Tom, AJ, Nathan, Pastor Ivan, Emo, and particularly Kent on our last day of this project on Thursday, we were able to finish this task from Tuesday through Thursday. Church visitors were now had a designated place to park their cars at the church.

The Guliantsi Baptist Church VBS sessions led by Katya continued through Thursday with puppet shows and skits involving the ABCRM mission team along with the Myer’s kids AJ and Nathan, and Vassileff family teenagers Pepie and Monie. During the middle part of the VBS daily sessions, the kids did new crafts and games provided by the mission team every day. These kids worked hard to complete their crafts with materials brought from ABCRM churches in Colorado and Wyoming. The kids especially enjoyed doing water-related games in the churchyard to cool off from the daily high temperatures. On Thursday morning, we held out last VBS class, and said good-byes to the kids we had gotten to know during the week. It was a sad parting for all of us!



On Thursday afternoon, we returned for the last time to the Guliantsi preschool several blocks from the Guliantsi Baptist Church to complete the painting of playground equipment and the preschool’s fence. The preschool’s director and staff thanked us all for our hard work put in since Monday in very hot temperatures by providing the team members with special Bulgarian food snacks and small gifts, as well as certificates (written in Bulgaria) for each member of our painting team and their respective home church. The director said she wanted to use our mission team’s project to encourage people living in Guliantsi to also do volunteer projects to help improve Guliantsi schools. We all saw how the newly-painted playground and fence sparkled as we left the preschool to walk back to the Guliantsi Baptist Church to spend our last evening there.


After having an evening meal at the Guliantsi Baptist Church with Pastor Ivan, the Vassileff family, Katya, and Emo, we gathered for our last evening fellowship in the church’s main meeting room. After singing several hymns simultaneously together in English and, we finished sharing our testimonies about how we became Christians and are now serving the Lord in various ways. It was especially interesting to listen to Pastor Ivan’s testimony about how he endured persecution as a Christian during the Communist time in Bulgaria, during which he lost his job as a farm manager because of his faith. The ABCRM mission team received gifts of gratitude from Pastor Ivan, and we closed by singing “Blest Be the Tie that Binds”. Tomorrow we’ll go to Pleven to do our last mission team work-project to paint a fence and assemble new playground equipment at an orphanage there. Our Bulgaria mission trip is almost over already!