R & R

Wow, it’s been a few days since I’ve blogged, sorry about that.
After getting back from Moldova I kind of just vegged out there. Teaching two weeks in a row was great, but after working 14 straight days with two travel days in the middle, it was kind of nice just to sleep in and not have to do anything for awhile. Although I have to say that by the third day I was starting to get a bit restless. Now I’m back into a routine again. I’m at the Haus getting my grades ready to hand in to Cathy our registrar.
I’m also getting all my class papers ready for another two weeks of teaching. This coming Sunday I leave for Bucharest, Romania for a week and then travel to Brno, CZ for my last class this year.
John

Okay One More

Right now I’m in the airport with a couple of hours to kill. I’m watching a Jackie Chan movie dubbed in English which has a Russian translation going on the same time you can hear the English, AND there are Romanian sub-titles going on at the same time. So that means if I listen real closely I can enjoy it, the Russian speaking Moldovans can enjoy it, the Romanian readers can enjoy it, about the only ones who can’t enjoy it, is the Japanese and it’s their film to begin with. There have even been sometimes where I was watching a movie in Hungarian and it was being translated over the original language. But there was only one translator so all the parts - male and female were in the same male voice. I’m not sure how anyone can follow the story line.

The airport has been fixed up nicely since the last time I was here. In fact every country has been improving their infrastructure. It’s getting easier to get around now. I can’t imagine what it might have been like just 10 years ago.
John

The question is...

To continue the story a little bit more. The other student (I'll call him Peter) comes from the same city as Zauri. This morning he told me that last night the police drove by the pastor’s house again. Peter is one of the preaching ministers there. Because of this, he is not sure when he will go home now. He does not need a visa to go between Moldova and Azerbaijan, but he can only stay here for three months before he has to go back home. It is about 990 miles from here to home in Aliabad. He has a wife and two daughters that he loves very much.

I had two Vlad’s in class, Vladislav and Vladimir. Vladislav means the Glory of the Lord on Earth. Vladimir means Lord of the Earth as in King. Vladislav comes from Moldova and Vladimir comes from the city of Shemkent, Kazakhstan. He is the lead pastor there of a church of about 80. The church houses a medical facility, and a radio station which reaches into Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgstan, and Tajikistan. He also told me that the church their planted another church. The new church plant speaks Kazakian not Russan like his church does. Later on tonight Vlad will take a bus from here to Moscow. That trip will take about 30 hours. The plane trip from Moscow home will only take 4 ½ hours. We used to complain that the 4 hour drive to church camp that was a week long was too long!

Trying to have a conversation between the three of us was very interesting. Vlad spoke almost no English. I do not speak Russian, so that left Peter. Peter tried his best at translating. Sometimes it took drawing pictures and sometime it was like a game of Password and even at times it was a game of Charades trying to guess what we were all trying to say. He does understand a lot more than he can speak though. He said that he would like to learn English better because he wants to go on for his M.Div degree at TCMI. He said he has three classes left to take and his thesis to write.
This afternoon I'll take a short two hour flight to Vienna, take a 40 minute ride back to TCMI and sleep in my own bed next to my wife. The question is after this week.... will I be able to?
Later.
John

Last Day of Class

Worship Planning sessions


Planning meeting; The finale test


Vidjai, Nick, Zauri; Nick, me Zauri
And what about Nick and Nicolae and Nick who spells his name with a И, and Tania and Lena, Liliana and Lily and Ludmila and Viorell, Serge and Valerii, and Romeo, Mehman. Of course then there’s Vlad, really Vladislav and Vlad who is really Vladimir, Yurii, Vadim and Vadim, Igor and Vidjai, Zauri, Elenia, and my 2 translators, Irina and Slavic. We may all have a lot of different names, but we are all one family. We may have some different ideas about what worship is; well actually we have a LOT of different ideas about worship, but we all worship the same, one and only God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Zauri and other student both come from Azerbaijan. Zauri was just released from prison a couple of months ago, for his Christian belief. Vladimir comes from Kazakhstan. All the rest of the students are from Moldova. Half the class speaks Russian and the others speak Romanian. So the class is being taught in English, and then translated in Russian, while at the same time it’s being translated into Romanian (from English) by way of a sound proof booth. So some students are wearing headphones to hear the translation. The two translations are going on at the same time. When I look around it’s like being in the United Nations seeing some people with headphones on. Every now and then I see a nod of understanding. At least I hope it’s a nod of understanding and not a nod of because it’s boring. What’s really interesting is that most of the students from Moldova really understand both languages, but they prefer one over the other when it comes to class time.
Some come from small village churches; several are from the city here where one church is running about 1,500. There are a couple of house churches. Several students are from the Lord’s Army. And in Azerbaijan one church meets on Saturday.
There is a pre-class a paper on a Christian discipline that they have decided to practice and then write about it. I am constantly amazed at the compassion and serving that they do and with very little money. $100 and $200 if they’re really lucky, a month is a typical salary. The cost of living is a bit cheaper, but with prices going up everywhere it’s getting harder and harder for them. And yet someone finds some money to help a homeless child get to Russia to be reunited with her mother who left her here in Moldova to go to Russia to get a better paying job. Someone found the money to give a poor woman on the street, and another student helped a family in need. They find ways. They serve, they worship. I’m reminded of a quote from Mother Theresa. “I slept and I dreamt that life is all joy. I woke and saw that life is all service. I served and saw that service is joy.”

Today is Friday, review and exam day. It is also a day of a bit of anticipation for the students. “What will the questions be like?” “How many questions will be on the exam?” And every time they take an exam it’s always from a different teacher they don’t know what that teacher will really want on the test. And then there is the interpretation. Will the same words used in class to describe a point be the same words found on the test?


I spoke to Zauri a little bit more today and found out why and how long he was in prison. I thought it was best to ask his permission first before I put this on the internet. He told me that he was arrested while preaching. He was sentenced for 4 years. Then he told me that Jimmy Carter spoke to the president of Azerbaijan asking for his release. Praise God, he was released after only being in prison for 10 months. While in prison he woke up one morning to find he had a new cell mate. When he asked the man why he was put in prison, the man told him that the police had planted an Opium plant in his house at night. In the morning the police came and arrested him for growing Opium in his house. Let me tell you just one more story about Zauri. He said there were several times that the guards would come in to beat him, and there was always something that would happen that would make the guards leave before they could beat him. One time they came in, and the light was shinning through the window in such a way that it made a symbol of the cross on the floor. The guards were too afraid to cross over it to get to him, so they left.
Just this morning we found out that another pastor from Azerbaijan was just arrested and put in jail today. The poilce had a warrent to go into his house. While there the police planted a gun under a kitchen pot. When they 'found' the gun they asked the preacher if he had papers for the gun. He said he didn't because he didn't own a gun. They arrested him right away. Zauri knows this man. He asks for us to pray. Pray for this minister’s release. Pray for his country, that the government may start to allow Christians without fear of persecution. To not only meet but also evangelize.
After you read this, please pray.
John

Orthodoxy, Gypsy's and Christian Music

Nick and Igor



What do the Orthodox Church, Gypsy’s and Christian Music have in common?
How’s that for a blog title. Just come to one of my classes and there’s no telling what discussion of interesting combinations of ideas and topics we will get into. Here are just a few for today.
Several of my students are from a church/group called the Lord’s Army. This is a church, well it’s not really a church. They work along side the Orthodox Church and try and help the people have a greater understanding of scripture and Church doctrine. They don’t want to start another church; they are working with and along side the Orthodox Church. It was started by a priest by the name of Iosif Trifa in the Orthodox Church in 1923. When asked what does ‘Orthodox’ in Orthodox Church mean, Iosif said, “We are as orthodox as the Bible allows us to be.” The interesting thing is that this church/group is recognized by the Orthodox Church. There are priests that are in the Orthodox Church that work along side with the Lord’s Army. This group wants the people to stay members with the church. They feel that what they are doing is an addition to what the Orthodox Church is doing, so they even have their worship services in the afternoon, after the Orthodox service is over. They believe that the doctrine of the church is Biblical, but it is the practice of worship that has been changed down through the years through the inclusion of rituals and pagan traditions. And it’s these that the people understand and follow more than the original doctrines of the Church. An important teaching that they stress is on prayer. They try to help people understand that they can pray directly to God. Pray can be a personal thing. You don’t have to go to a priest to pray, you can, but you don’t have to. They want to try and teach Jesus as a personal savior. I think that here is a group that is trying to use a mixture of old worship, with new and current ideas as described by Robert Webber. Almost everything in the Orthodox Church is very symbolic. This group is trying to help the people understand what these symbols mean in today’s life.

Another one of the students Vidjai is from a gypsy background and will be starting a gypsy ministry soon here in Moldova. In fact his home church paid for his education, first a Bible college here in Chisinau and then for his degree from TCMI with the understanding that he would start a gypsy ministry. Here is a student who has a heart for the gypsy’s because he himself is one. It was interesting talking to him. We spoke a lot about different styles of music and why some would and some wouldn’t work with the gypsy’s.

We got on the subject of music in the church this afternoon. The question I asked was “What is Christian music?” We have 22 in the class and I got 22 different answers. But most of them really didn’t answer the question. What I got was what each student thought was good and bad music and if it was good music then it could be said that it was Christian music because it moved your soul. I never really did answer that. There’s not enough time in month of Sundays to give that the importance it really deserves. Actually what I got was why some music shouldn’t be used in worship and some music should be used in worship.

John

Monday

High rise building; Orthodox Church




A well right outside the orthodox church offering free water



Children from families that come from central asia who go to the college here.




Some of the students hard at work - HA.


See I do work; the building where the class is held. It also houses the library. the buliding is in two parts split down the middle long ways. On this side is the chapel and on the other side is housing for student families.


Monday.
We had our first day of class and with 22 students it was quite a handful. They are all great. I know, I know, it seems like a say that about all my classes, but I really mean it. The students that we have in our program really want to be in our program because of not only the Biblical and Theological teaching, but also because of its practical side.
I have several students from the Lord’s Army. I may have incorrectly called it the Army of the Lord before. Today I was able to sit and talk with one of the students. It’s amazing what they are trying to do. They work with people who would still consider themselves orthodox. I believe they have a very unique worship service, mix of old (Orthodox) and new. Hum, I wonder where I have heard those words before. Tomorrow I hope to have the time to actually find out how they are doing what they are doing. But with 20 papers that have to be translated to me, that’s going to take up a lot of time. Oh, the other 2 papers are in English. Yeah!!
I finally got some pictures taken, so you can see where I am teaching.
John

Comments and Chisinau

I hope you don't try and read all the comments from this last blog. I had about 14 of the 16 all sent to be by automatic response from someone trying to sell something. It's not the first, but it certainly has been the most.

I rode to the airport with J.K. Jones who was going to Tallinn, Estonia for the week. It was great to sit and talk with him for while. Even at the airport we had some time to catch up with what was happening with each of our families. When I taught at LCC, J.K. and his wife Sue were there also. Sue teaches in the music ministry program.
Slavic picked me up at the airport. Slavic has been my interpreter the past two times I'vebeen here. So I told him that this time, I was just going to put the notes in front of him, and he would teach the class. Coming in the city of Chisinau I saw a lot of change and growth. This is my third time here and each time I’ve seen changes. They are slow to come but there are changes.
I’ve taken a picture of the same building in each of the three years I’ve been here. The first one is when it was an elementary school. As you can see it needed some repairs. The next one was taken the very next year. They did some cleaning and painting. The last two come from this year. It is now a Health Care facility. It is has been fixed up quite nicely. And they’ve added on another story the the top.

This is a big class with 24 students and all of them except one are going for either an M.A. or M.Div. so they all have papers!. We have a lot of papers to read and all but one is either in Russian or Romanian. I have one paper in English. Looks like a great group of students too. I'm teaching in the 'capela' or chapel here. I'll have pictures tomorrow of students and buildings.

John