Lights In A Dark Night

This week we had the opportunity to visit a city about an hour away and see the Christmas lights. I was pleasantly surprised at how the city transformed at night. It was obvious where the light shone from; just like in life, it should be obvious where our light shines from: Jesus Christ. We are very much like Christmas lights because we shine in the darkness, but one Christmas light is not very effective we must have fellowship with our brothers and sisters in Christ to really light up the night sky. Also, with out a power source, there is no light in us. We know that Power Source is from the Holy Spirit and we must continually seek Him and His Holy Spirit.

Here are some pictures :)

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. John 1:5                

"In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." Matthew 5:16  

"For at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light" Ephesians 5:8 

"This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all." 1 John 1:5

"For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace."         Isaiah 9:6 

Grace be with you,

The Georgebells 

Prayer Request:

Please pray for us as we plan and lead a New Years event at the church. We will be playing games and bonding but also Brandon will be giving a short message and we will be leading small groups for discussion. We are planning on about 100 people to attend, and many are youth. Please pray for open hearts to hear and discuss Salvation and what God's plans for them are.

The Changing Season

The seasons are changing. Coming from Texas where we only have two seasons: hot and less hot, I have always thought that “saying” was just a colloquialism; a saying for when people are having major life changes, but here in Romania the seasons are actually changing. ;)

This is really the first year we have had to prepare for winter and we have really noticed it approaching. Back in Texas we would make sure that we had jeans and a jacket. Winter preparation done! Now we are making sure we all have underlays, “regular” winter clothes, jackets, coats, scarfs, hats, mittens, socks, boots. 

Then there is getting the house ready, we are thankful that we have radiators that run on gas so there is less preparation needed than wood burning, just getting them flushed and making sure they are all working. 

One big adjustment we have had to make is line drying all of our clothes. It is wreaking havoc on our laundry schedule. We are very thankful for the sunny days, but when it rains can take up to three days to dry. Also, it is very humid here like 98% humidity on some days so we are constantly saying, “Are these clothes wet or just cold?” 

I know it may sound weird, but thankfully God has given me a nostalgia for “the olden days” and a husband who isn’t a neat freak. :) So, most days when I see the laundry hanging I am thinking, “Look, we are actually doing it, we are missionaries!! Its so beautiful.”

Really all the preparation for winter reminds me how God is preparing us for Himself, through sanctification. Just like we have earthly seasons, God has made HIS creation to have season. How great the season of Christ's return will be!

Grace be with you,

The Georgebells

Normal Everyday Life

As of lately, we have kind of gotten into somewhat of a schedule. Everybody has school and Paul and Brandon have been working very hard on getting Visas for all of us. For me life seems pretty “normal”. I wake up, work out, and take care of the kids until nap time  and then go to language school. After that, I will finish up school with Chay and Lydia and start dinner. Like I said, things seem very usual or normal to me, but there are definitely differences.  

The other day I was walking to the store with Shelby (because we don’t have a car, which isn’t normal for me) and I was telling her how I wanted to take pictures of some of the buildings that I honestly don’t even really notice most of the time. Really to me they look very different; not like apartments in the US, but as I stroll through my day to day life, I don’t even notice them. 

At least a third of the “vehicles” here are horse drawn carts, and although the first week I thought “how cool” after almost two months they seem completely normal. I mean at all hours you can hear hoofs clomping on the pavement, which is not normal for me!! 

In a way this is really good because God made us to be very adaptable and that is awesome! But sometimes we adapt to culture or to ideas that don’t really line up with the Bible and the sad thing is is that we don’t even see them. For now I am asking God to open my eyes to things in His creation that I have completely been over looking and even more that He would reveal to us ideas that we have always believed to be true but that just don’t line up to His Word, the Bible.

Grace be with you,

The Georgebells

Prayer Request:

-Understanding of the Romanian language

-Continued Unity in our Household and that we would be able to point each other to Christ 

-Wisdom for future building plans: the next step for completing the youth center (we just installed a bathroom and heaters today!! Praise the Lord!!)

First Day Of School!!

Hello all! We have internet in the house, which will make things much easier to keep you updated. :) Life in our new home has gone overall pretty well over these last couple of weeks.

This week Hope Church has been very busy with outreach. World race came to Draganasti-Olt on July 31, it is a team of 55 people. World Race is a mission program where participants travel 11 countries in 11 months, to learn more about it here is the webpage: www.worldrace.org. The team was broken up into three groups and came along Hope Church for three activities. One team went with the children director and other workers from the church to hold a kid’s camp. Another team went to Craiova, a city about an hour and a half away, for evangelism. The last team traveled to Greece to plan new mission possibilities with a local church in Greece.

Although we would have loved to go with any one of these teams, it is not what God had planned for us. We all feel very strongly that we should first concentrate on language learning so that we can actually talk and witness to people, so Monday was our first day of school. Chay-David and Lydia started 1st and Kindergarten. We are homeschooling them and thought that it would be good to start early so in December we could have a large break because we are anticipating a lot of ministry opportunities and events. Shelby decided to start her semester as well, she has been homeschooled in the US and is continuing here in Romania; this is her senior year!! For us adults, we started our language school Monday. 

One of the local Romanian missionaries is holding classes for us 5 days a week.  Although it has only been one week we have learned over 100 words, how to conjugate many verbs, and how to use the past participle the correct way. After only this one week we were able to go to the store and talk to the employees and ask questions. We are not conversational, but we are past being able to only say “how are you?” and “good”, so that is definitely a success for week one!

It is tough to do school instead of help serve with others from the church, especially because we really do love to serve the church and community. Learning the language is our top priority because we are not going to be able to develop the deep relationships with others that we know we need for evangelizing and discipling others to Christ without knowing the language. Please pray for us for understanding of the language and patients to wait for God’s timing in serving. 

Prayer Request:

-Relief/healing from physical ailments: mosquitoes— mosquitoes are no joke here, like 40 bites on one arm

-Lydia’s burn— Lydia got a 3rd degree burn from a watch we bought her for Christmas         that leaked battery acid on her arm, thankfully there is a very good doctor that goes to Hope Church who looked at it for us

-Language Learning— That God would give our teacher, Mihai, wisdom as to how and what to  teach us and that He would give us knowledge for the Romanian language 

-That we would be able to start building meaningful relationships with people around town through small daily interactions as we are able to speak the language we can talk to them about the gospel. 

We thank you SO much for your prayers!!

Grace be with you,

the    Georgebells

Recap: Getting to Romania

                  Recap: Getting to Romania

I know it has been a little while since I have blogged, but hopefully you received a newsletter from us Georgebells about a week ago in your email inbox. If you are not signed up to receive email and snail mail newsletters you can give us your information here: http://missionromania.f-pc.org. Remember to add a note in the comments section letting us know you want to be added.  Anyways, as with most moves, our move has gone by like a whirlwind. Since our last blog post Lydia enjoyed her 4th birthday, Chay lost 3 teeth, and we have finally moved in to our new home in Romania.

Thursday, July 9th was our big day. We departed from George Bush Intercontinental Airport at 3pm and made our way to Bucharest, Romania arriving about 24 hrs later. I was nervous that so many hours of travel with our three children was going to be painstakingly hard and long but they were amazing! 

It also helped that we had 10 people traveling with us with one goal: to help us on our move. We are so thankful to God for everyone who spent their time and money to help us because a move so far is physically and emotionally taxing! 

                                                                  We love you guys!!!

After days of hard work cleaning our new house and yard, done almost entirely by our “team” from Fellowship Church, we hosted a house warming party and invited other missionaries and workers from Hope Church. We tried our best to serve Tex-Mex with the ingredients we had and it turned out pretty good. 

Oh and I almost forgot, we officially bought our house!! In Romania, the land has to be owned by a Romanian citizen but can be “operated” by a citizen of another nationality. So some of our new friends and fellow youth workers came with us to buy the house and land with us. Thank you Alex and Ancuța (pronounced Ann cootz a)!!  

There is much to be done before our official ministry is started. Our primary focus for the next couple of months will be learning the culture and learning the language. Please be in prayer for us for language learning, it is much needed! :)  

Grace be with you,

the Georgebells

FUGE 2K15

                           

Last week—ok, maybe week and a half ago— the Georgebells went with 63 youth and 8 other leaders to Glorieta, New Mexico for FUGE camp. FUGE camp is a christian camp that focuses on Bible Study, Worship, and includes some really fun recreation. We had a great time as we got to lead and watch our youth encounter God and learn more about Him. 

One fun thing that is kind of special about our youth group is that we have themed days. So some themes we have are tie-dye, Noah’s ark, and then dressing in our church youth shirts. It is fun to match as a group, but what is really great about it is that matching is a great way for our youth to get together more often and have things like tie-dye parties; it really brings unity by just spending time together. 

Honestly most of my time was spent hanging with my children. Even though the camp is not fitted for them, it is a great way for them to learn about God and that young people can love Jesus!! Plus, what child doesn’t want to be a teenager somewhere deep down? I am so thankful to God for how our youth at Refuge love on our children!! 

With only 5 more days before we make our move to Romania (!!) we are frantically packing ;) and you will hear much more in the near future. 

Grace be with you,

the  Georgebells

Prayer Request:

-Peace in the chaos of moving

-Continued unity in our two families

-Peace and excitement for friends and family stateside 

FOCUS Sports Camp

This week we were able to help serve our church and community through FOCUS sports camp. Brandon was an Ultimate Frisbee head coach, Becky was a Dance head coach, Paul was a Basketball head coach, and I was a Soccer head coach. 

Along with the sports we all coached, FOCUS sports camp also offered Karate, Volleyball, Cheerleading, Football, and Baseball for any kid in our community going into 1st-8th grades. 

The things that I like most about outreaches like FOCUS sports camp are that we get to spread the gospel to kids we don't usually get the opportunity to meet. Camps like this are not just about outreach, they really build unity with in the church. All the coaches are meeting daily and have to work together to ensure the camp runs smoothly. The daily worship sessions build MAD unity!! It really is awesome!

"By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:35

Another way we were blessed this week was by the campers raising "coinage" for our Romania mission. The kids brought all their coins to donate and had a contest between the boys and the girls to see who could bring the most. Their goal was to make their coin buckets heavier than Chay, who weighed in at 51.4 lbs. The girls won three days in a row with a final weight of 50 lbs, but the boys made a HUGE come back on the last day with a final weight of 72 lbs!! We want to thank all our campers who donated this week! 

It was a JOY to serve at FOCUS sports camp!

Grace be with you,

the Georgebells

Introducing the GeorgEbells

Introducing the GeorgEbells (pronounced Georgia Bells)

As you can tell -if you have ever followed this blog- things are looking a little different around White Fields & White Flags. To update anyone who doesn’t already know, the Georges (who created and wrote this blog up until this point)

 are being joined in God’s call to minister to people in Romania. Paul and Jessica (myself) and our three children are going with the Georges in full time missions to Romania. 

So what are we all doing?? Paul and Brandon are filling the spot of Student Directors in Draganesti-Olt Romania. We are all excited to come along side Hope Church in Romania to reach out to the 1500 youth in the high schools in the surrounding area. We are sad to be leaving the youth group that God has blessed us with being able to serve 

but again VERY EXCITED to bring along our youth pastor’s daughter (and dear friend) Shelby Smith. Shelby will lovingly help take care of our children while Brandon, Becky, Paul, and I take language learning lessons.

Please pray for us!! Our major prayer requests are:

-tying up loose ends state side 

-continued unity within our families

-travel for us and the team going with us July 9th

Grace be with you,

the Georgebells