Middle School Class
Hi!
My name is Salena and I had the privilege of teaching
English this past week in Albania. We were in the same village of Sheqeras (Shay-chair-ess)
where a lot of ministry has been going on. Each day myself, Dandan, Brynne,
Alex, Alison, and Ruth would ride a bus with enough sandwiches to feed the
construction team and our translators/local friends Angelea, Valentina, Lenea,
and Taulant. We spent time and taught in the one room church. At around 3:00
o’clock, middle school students would go to the church and high school students
would go to a local coffee shop to learn English. The first half hour was games
and connecting with the Albanian people, then the team would teach for about an
hour with directions interpreted into Albanian.
High School Class
[Co-written by Salena & Isaac G.]
It was easy to become friends with our students when smiling
is a universal language; however, we had to be careful when smiling at people
on the street because in Albanian culture that can sometimes give the wrong
impression. It’s amazing how much one can learn by simply walking around and
observing the people of a different culture. Albanians carry around everything
in a bag. It doesn’t matter how small it is. They will always have it in a bag.
On Saturday we had the opportunity to host a church service
to the people of Sheqeras. We got to share a couple of our testimonies from
Ruth and Dandan. Our team had an awesome experience singing worship songs in
English, and being sung to in Albanian. One of the moments we will certainly
never forget is when the whole church was singing the same song in both
Albanian and English. During the service, 5 people from our team performed a
skit for the people. The star of the skit was Isaac Giese. He has outstanding
juggling skills which really helped in getting the attention of the people. The
skit showed how we try to juggle all the things in our life including sin, only
to end up failing over and over. Jesus comes and takes those struggles so we
might be at peace. This is not to say we don’t struggle as Christians, but
having Jesus with us changes the way we try to juggle things. During the week,
the missionary we had been working with, Amos, said a lot of kids came “out of
the woodwork” to attend English class. This was good for the Sheqeras church
plant because Amos and other nationals will be able to more easily connect with
families in the village via these students, after we left.
Something to pray about for the Sheqeras church is that
there won’t be a stigma that church is just for kids. There have been a lot of
kids programs and ministries for the simple reason that kids are more
accessible and have more free time. That was something we were praying about for
the Saturday church service was that adults would also come. Thank the Lord
that 120 people came to the service and a good number of those people were
parents and 60 children!
Thank you for praying for us while in Albania. Please continue
to pray for the missionaries in Albania, especially Amos, Meredith, Andrew, and
Rebekah, who we had the most contact with.
Pray that their passion for Jesus
would continue to blossom and that the Albanians they come in contact with
would be receptive to God’s Word.
Saturday Evening Meeting
Right now we are driving to Tirana to take a plane from there to Istanbul to Bangkok. Our trip is not even half way over and yet so much has happened. Pray that in Thailand we may have a renewed ministry with fresh eyes and an energized body. We love you all.
