There are many things that have happened in this last quarter (April-June ’24) and I will try to be as concise but thorough as possible.
I can only tell you that it has been three very intense months for all of us, but we are happy with how the Lord answered our prayers and resolved many situations that were causing us some concern.
Summer camps
At the end of June, after school ended in Romania, the summer camps organized by Denis Zlatan and his staff and sponsored by Bethesda began. This year, with great joy and gratitude, we will be able to cover more than 80% of the fees. We expect around 400 children to be attending the 7 scheduled camps from June to September.
This year we were directly involved in the camp organized in Rebricea. In addition to me, there was Claudia Pignatelli and two families from the Christian Group of Parma (Lorenzini and Olivero) who were able to give a hand in carrying out the camp on the farm. For these two families it was the first time in Romania and certainly the experience they had was truly as touching as it was unique. You can read their report here.
Personally after these days, I remember the commitment of all the leaders (young men and women, students, eager to dedicate their holidays to this work), the songs sung around the campfire and the relaxed faces of the parents, who participated the last evening, seeing their happy children running around and laughing happily among the trees on the farm.
All this sparked a prayer in me: “Lord, it is really worth it to work in your Vineyard!”
Stroi family and the Fandaracs
A few months ago the Stroi family moved to live in their beautiful house with their foster children a few kilometers from the farm. This
allows them to focus their energy exclusively on following “their kids” in the thousand school and extra-curricular commitments, as well as finally being able to enjoy the house they built over the years with their hard work and savings. God bless them!
In the meantime, some details on their academic progress.
Luiza, 17 years old, who this year offered to help us in the kitchen during the camps. We can now speak to her in Italian or English, she lives in Brasov where she is attending a professional school. Her journey with the Lord is making her a very mature girl with many dreams for the future.
Lorena, 15, has just won the competition to enter the teachers’ school in Iasi. She has always stood out for being the “nerd” of the school. Again this year she won first place as the best student in the village.
Denis, Ionela and Patri (she also seems to be very good) continue their school career without any major problems.
We continue to pray for their lives and that they may always put the Lord first.
We pray for Luigi, with whom we are constantly in contact. He decided to go and live in Germany where he has a job doing manual labor. May the Lord protect and guard him.
New family on the farm
We give a huge and blessed welcome to the Nestian family (Andrei and Naomi) who have been living on the farm since the end of May.
The Lord put them in our path when we were looking for a couple who could help us as caretakers and managers of our headquarters, while they were looking for a way to serve the Lord full time!
Andrei and Naomi got married on May 19 and have a huge heart for children and we can see that they are very suited to working in this field.
For them the road will have to be built but we will do it together, with godly advice and prayer, in order to form two spiritual pillars that can continue the work started many years ago and allow this place to see even more of the Glory of God, manifested in the works He wants us to do.
In particular they will be responsible for the care of, the maintenance and organization of the “Saturday Kids’ Club”. Together with them we will try to make the farm economically self sufficient by using all possible resources and ideas.
We are also trying to obtain the funds to be able to give them adequate support for their commitment.
At the moment their humility and their willingness to get involved has really amazed and encouraged us. Let’s pray for them!
Saturday Kids’ Club and After School
We are so excited about how the Lord has blessed both programs. I report the two reports below.
Dear friends,
With God’s help we finished the Saturday Kids’ Club program in Rebricea.
We are so happy to have the opportunity to spread the Gospel with the children of the Rebricea area again and we are so happy that we will have a family who will continue this work (the Nestians).
This year, an average of 20 children were present at each meeting and not all of them were the same age. Some of them were quite old for the program held, but they came anyway because they liked it and wanted to know more about Jesus.
In addition to a biblical lesson, we engaged them in multiple group activities and games. After each lesson we ate something that we had bought just for them.
Now the children are waiting for our summer camp! It will be from July 1-5.
Please pray for this work!
Thank you and God bless you!
Denis Zlatan
During our stay on the farm (July 1-7), we met Miriam Ciobanu, her husband and her children.
We were impressed by her determination and commitment along with her teaching assistants to use their time to offer free support to the most disadvantaged children in the area. Below is her report.
On June 15 our team celebrated the end of the school year together with some of the children enrolled in the after-school program. The volunteers enjoyed spending the last after-school session with 9 children, having them participate in geography, history and general knowledge quizzes and rewarding everyone for their efforts. The team paid special attention to an eighth-grade girl, preparing for her final exams while the others participated in a friendly quiz competition. It was a lovely small gathering for the end of the school year. The children had fun, learned in a more relaxed way, playing and had lunch together as we always do, because all this knowledge makes you hungry, as one child said at the beginning of our program in the spring. We can’t wait to start the after school program this autumn, the kids have already asked us about it. During these meetings every other Saturday, we were lucky enough to see the children’s progress, both in terms of emotional development and in knowledge and skills.
We are grateful to the board of CHEDES Agape, for allowing us to have this ministry there and for supporting us in such a pleasant and loving way. May God’s blessings be upon them!
For next year, our team is already trying to develop a plan to be more efficient in communication and more focused on the needs of each child. However, it was a blessed beginning and for this we are grateful to God and to you!
The Rebricea After School Volunteer Team
Work on the farm
This year, thanks to the 5X1000 of 2023, we are carrying out a water supply project. Unfortunately, low rainfall and little snow in winters are making the region very dry. We started by digging a new well, finding water, but it must be stored to avoid running out of it. We are planning systems that will allow us to carry out all the activities without having to ask for the help of the Mayor, who for the second year had to send a fire truck with their tank to allow us to continue the camp.
In addition to this, we are trying to set up the farm in order to have more areas suitable for carrying out activities.
We need many furnishings such as bunk beds, wardrobes, bedside tables, kitchen appliances and other accessories.
If you think you can help with this please contact us.
Relationship with the Romanian authorities
I, as President of Chedes Agape, together with part of the board of directors, Abel Corogenau and Denis Zlatan, met the Mayor of Rebricea in order to continue to guarantee a mutual partnership and to share resources to achieve the humanitarian and spiritual goals that they represent, the reason we are there in Rebricea.
We invited the Mayor to report to us any situations of hardship that may arise in order to intervene where possible with our volunteers. We believe that working with the authorities also allows us to be good witnesses and always guarantee transparency that everything we do is done with full approval by the institutions. The Mayor was very helpful towards us and greatly appreciated our efforts.
Visit to the church and help for the families of Berezeni
On Saturday we visited the evangelical church of Berezeni, 80 kilometers from our farm. We were able to carry out a program for the many children of the village and then they reported to us about ten families and elderly people living alone in the countryside around the village of Berezeni, to whom we brought aid.
It was the first experience distributing food packages by our families arriving from Italy. It was nice to donate, talk and pray for them and invite them to the local church where they would surely find both material and spiritual support.
Happy summer!
I know that summer is a time of relaxation, of well-deserved rest, but I would like to close this update by reminding you to pray for us, because we often lack energy and it is easy to become discouraged.
May God put it on your heart to continue to support us with any the means you can.
See you soon for a new update.
Orazio Gentile
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