News from Romania – family support, youth camps and student bursaries are just three of the many initiatives MBC’s Romania Support Group champions

As part of MBC’s continuing involvement in Romania, earlier this year we were pleased to be able to send the following support totaling £4,500 to the churches we are linked with there. They are:

Manastur Church Cluj: Family Support £500, Young People’s Camps £500 and student bursaries £500. Other Initiatives in Cluj: Nicu children support £500, Gypsy Church Pastor £500 and the Gypsy Church Floresti £250. Cserefalva / Udvarhely/ Vlahita shared £1,250 and VIA Church Cluj £500.

Huge thanks to everyone here at MBC for enabling us, the Romania Support Group, to support this work.

We have also received the following letter from Zsuzsi and Andor Ferko both of whom are ministers at the main church in the Hungarian speaking town of Udvarhely (Hungarian name) or Odorhei Secuiesc Romanian name) in central Romania.  Some of you will recall that Andor and Zsuzsi spent a year with us here in Leeds and Zsuszi is the daughter of pastor Noemi.

Dear Moortown Baptist Church, Romania Group, our friends and our English family!

We would like to greet you with the word of God: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

With your love and mission and help we could organise the camp for the youth this year also. We were in Lokod, between 2-6 of August. There were 64 young people in the camp. From this 11 students as we started a new student bible study group and they came for volunteering in the camp. It was a great help for us and also for the youth so that they could see that even when you are older and you are studying in a different town or country, God is still part of your life wherever you go. We asked them to share their faith and how they met God. It was very powerful because not just the pastors shared God’s word.

Every day we had two evangelisation led by the pastors, we had worship, many team building games, camp fire, we had an excursion to a nice cave and after that we ate fish and chips.

There was an opportunity for the youth for pastoral care and counselling. I was amazed how many young people used the opportunity. I was very happy that God also in this camp used my pastoral care studies (here this is not a common thing). I was thinking also and I am very-very grateful for how God used you in shaping my future. Thank you very much!

During the pastoral care, many youth came and I was shocked how many serious problems they have like abuse, family alcohol problems, parents are not attentive enough, they do guarding. The world is giving them so much false teaching and we have a week when they come and we can evangelise them. That is why it is so important to keep the camps and we are so grateful to you all that we can do this. There are many families who struggle financially especially now and it is a great help for them the support what you give.

From your gift we gave 350 Pound to the camp. We supported the students who came for help so that they don’t have to pay their whole costs. They were helping us a lot and their presence was a great gift for us. We also helped those who were not able to pay. We gave 200 Pound to the small church in Vlahita as they are struggling very much to stay alive.

God bless you richly! We are very-very grateful for all your help and support. We keep you all the whole church in our prayers. We miss you a lot and looking forward to see you!

We send our love and blessings to you all! May God in His richness bless you with all you need, keep you safe and in faith.  

Zsuzsi and Andor 

BMS Annual update, and it’s good news on the giving front

Support for BMS in 2020 and forward into 2021.This item starts with a BIG THANK YOU to MBC. Despite the impossibility, during most of 2020, of collecting donations to BMS Birthday Scheme and Monthly Donations via envelopes in the collection bags people have adapted their giving methods. As a result, the total given to BMS in 2020 increased by £771 over 2019.

Here are the comparative figures:-

 

The Monthly Giving and Birthday Scheme include donations sent direct to the BMS website, but only those gifts notified to me, Other MBC members may have sent donations. So again – Thank You.

How is this money used?

BMS supports around 100 mission workers in 17 countries across Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe – many of them marginalised and least evangelised. Among them we particularly support:- John and Sue Wilson – Pastoral Leaders in Paris and Mark and Andrea Hotchkin  – Doctors in Bardai, northern Chad

We have posted their regular news and videos in this newsletter and website throughout 2020 and you can also learn about their vital work on www.bmsworldmission.org searching Personnel.  As the Covid pandemic continues worldwide the demand on BMS resources is growing. The numbers of people in MBC giving through the Birthday Scheme and monthly gifts are declining. As well as your prayers for this work, we need more people to support these schemes financially and, as we are no longer able to collect envelopes etc through offerings in Church, here are Ways You can help:-

Monthly Giving

The best way to do this is by setting up a monthly Standing Order with your bank to

Moortown Baptist Church BMS account  Sort Code 05-01-06  Account no 10225334

(it would be helpful to let Roger Robson know the date of the month the order will be paid)

If you are unable to do this, or prefer to use monthly envelopes, please let Roger know on  07929100598.

Birthday Scheme

You can join this as a way of making an Annual Donation to BMS. Please contact Roger on 07929100598 or email roger.robson1@ntlworld.com giving your Birthday (not age!!) and Address. You will then receive a Card on your Birthday and details of how to donate by bank transfer or cheque.

Please consider these schemes seriously and help BMS to continue its vital work of supporting and growing the Worldwide Church.

One Further Request

Following mission service with BMS in Congo in the 1970’s I have acted as Moortown’s BMS Representative for around 45 years. We badly need younger people on the Church Overseas Mission Group and to take over some of the roles in supporting Worldwide Mission. If you are interested in finding out more to see if God may be calling you, please get in touch with me on

0113 2941759 or roger.robson1@ntlworld.com

Thank you. Roger Robson

                                     

 

With links that go back almost 50 years some pictures from Romania to gladden the heart

In 1972 two young students who worshipped here at MBC (Paul Hicks and Jean Mackintosh, later became Mrs Jean Hicks) travelled to Romania on a mission to deliver books to a local pastor who had returned home after studying at Regent’s Park College in Oxford. The rest as they say is history.

In brief, between then and now members of what eventually became MRS G (The Moortown Romania Support Group) have made dozens of visits to numerous parts of Romania. During these trips they have, either with their own hands or by way of donation and fund raising helped to fund churches, pastor’s salaries, children’s summer camps and village building schemes as well as a whole host of other projects and plans.

However, in more recent times all this travelling hasn’t always been one way with members of several Romanian churches, their families and friends, often leaving their homeland for the very first time making visits to the UK.   

In one of the first groups to visit Leeds was a nine year old pastor’s daughter called Szuszi Soos. Fast forward to today and Szuszi and her husband Andor, alongside another minister are themselves co-pastors of a Hungarian Reform church in the town of Odorkeui Secuiesc, a fellowship that pre Covid-19 regularly attracted a Sunday morning congregation of over 400 people.

Recently Szuszi and Andor, who now have two children of their own and who only moved in to their present church in January sent us these charming pictures of a suitably socially distanced Confirmation Service. 

It’s lovely to look back over all those years and to see how such a seemingly simple gesture (although I’m sure nothing was that simple in 1972 in Communist Romania) as delivering some books to a newly ordained minister could have led to what has to be one on MBC’s longest, warmest and mutually rewarding initiatives.    

 

 

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