Scott and I finished teaching two 3-day conferences on Pre-Marriage and Marriage Biblical Counseling in two locations in Moldova.  We began in churches in Cahul in southern Moldova last Sunday, followed by 3 days of teaching to a group of about 70 hosted in Emanuel Baptist Church.  Then we drove 3-4 hours to the village of Anotonest (Ahn-to-nesht) where we taught a group of 35 people for three days.  Saturday afternoon we drove to Anini Noi where Igor and Mariana live and pastor a church.

We spend the night in a guest room at the church. The accommodations were simple but nice. The church is in an excellent location, very central to the activities of the town and surrounded by hundreds of apartments and thousands of people.  The story of how God provided the property is interesting, but too lengthy for this post.

The highlight of our weekend was to share a meal in Igor and Mariana’s home Saturday night.  they are wonderful servants of the Lord and Mariana prepared a wonderful Moldovan meal for us with fresh salad greens and other wonderful foods.  With internet connection at the guest room where we spent the night we learned about the terrible earthquake and Tsunami that hit Japan.

Sunday morning Mariana prepared breakfast at the church for us and Igor described their ministry and remodeling plans for us.  They hope to finish the rooms upstairs so that they can host teams that may visit and also to host church-planing trainees.  He wants to have a church planting school where Moldovan missionaries can come for a period of months and learn how to evangelize and how to plant churches.  He also has plans to expand their ministries to families and children as well as their outreach to the poor in their area.

After our time together at breakfast and our tour of the property, we attended their church service where Scott shared a greeting on behalf of our church to theirs and I preached to the group of about 40.  Immediately after the sermon, we left with Igor for the airport in Chisinau where we began our travel back home arriving at home about 18 hours later. 

We thank God for your prayers and support.

In the service of the King,
David Selvey & Scott Meinema

Today is the last day of the second of two conferences we have taught in Moldova this week.  It is Saturday, March 12, 2011.  Only four hours of teaching left … I outlined some very basic biblical principles of finances in one hour … 30 minutes of teaching after translation.  Then Scott taught for one hour on parenting … only the very basics to prepare a young couple for the change coming from adding children !  to their family ingredients.  Then I, David, finished the day with two hours of biblical principles of sex. 

The last session was fun.  There was one older guy … well, older than me and I’m 55 … who liked to cut up a bit and make some jokes.  He didn’t over do it, just enough to bring some levity to the class environment.  I was teaching on 1 Cor 7:3-4 regarding the responsibility of each spouse in the sexual relationship.  When I said that this means that the biblical responsibility of the husband is to give pleasure to his wife, this man remarked, “It’s good my wife is not in here.”  Everyone cracked up … including his wife who was sitting two rows behind him!  He had a good laugh at himself, too.

We rounded out our time with about 20 minutes of question and answer time followed by a good lunch and parting good-byes.  Some of the comments we heard in closing were …

“We have been nourished by the Word of God this week.”

“Will you please come back and help us more with your teaching?”

“Never before have I heard the Bible taught in such a practical way.”

After our good-byes, we loaded up in the van with Igor and Mariana and drove to their town of Anini Noi.  More about the visit to Anini Noi in the next post.

Thursday we ate breakfast at the church with the others who traveled here for the conference.  It was absolutely delicious!  Some kind of omelets with fresh bread.  We made sandwiches that beat McDonald’s or Burger King’s breakfast sandwiches any day of the week.  We each had at least two.

It was still cold enough that everything was frozen in the morning but it seemed like today may be a bit warmer.  The sun was shining and the sky was pretty clear so it is a nice day.

We had a great time today in the counseling conference today.  I, David, finished up the husband’s role and the we shared the wife’s role.  Then I taught the four rules of communication and Scott taught a session on forgiveness.

In the evening we were invited to preach in the church in Cogmaz.  This church has been without a pastor for 10 years!  They are maintaining at over 100 in spite of losing almost 1/3 of their congregation in the last year to emigrations to other countries such as the US.  Scott preached an excellent sermon on Psalm 1 and I preached again on Romans 14 and building unity in the church.  Afterward the pastor insisted that we stay for refreshments.  We were served hot dogs and potatoes and some other Moldovan foods … our fourth meal of the day!  Don’t worry, we are not going hungry! 

We praise God for a good day of ministering the Word and look forward to tomorrow.

Sunday, March 6 in Southern Moldova

Nadie prepared a great breakfast for our first morning in their home. It is nice getting to know Anatol, Nadie and their three boys, ages 13, 11 and 7. The boys have a lot of energy, especially young David!

My good friend, Misha, picked me (David) up at 9:30 to transport me to the village of Vidul lui Isac where I preached in Brother Andrei’s church. Andrei is Naty Tully’s father. The church building was pretty full, about 200 people. After preaching on Romans 14:1-12 and building unity in the church we went to the home of Andrei and Lydia Ciobanu, Naty’s parents and enjoyed a delicious meal. I enjoyed the fellowship with the Ciobanus and with Mish and Angelica Caraivan. I especially like Lydia’s stuffed red peppers!

After resting a bit, Misha drove me to the village of Colibasi (Ko-lee-bahsh) where I preached at 3pm to a group of about 350-400. The people are very warm and friendly. I met Scott and the Dunas family back in Cahul around 6pm.

Scott left a few minutes after I did and preached in the First Baptist Church in Cahul. Immediately after preaching he was taken to Emmanuel Baptist Church to preach. This is the church where Brother Anatol Dunas is the pastor. Afterward he returned to the Dunas family’s apartment where Nadie prepared and served lunch.

After I arrived back home, Scott and I compared notes and worked on getting ready to teach Monday and we enjoyed a light supper with the Dunas family.

Monday, March 7 in Southern Moldova

Nadie prepared breakfast again for us. This dear lady just had surgery last Wednesday! The conference began with Scott teaching the group of 70 people an overview of Pre-marriage Counseling. Then I taught on the Bible Basics of Marriage and Progressive Sanctification. With translation this took six hours. These folks will sit and listen intently for two hours, but coffee break is important to them so we learned not to cut into the coffee break with our teaching.

When they take coffee break, the all gather around small tables, maybe 4×4, without any chairs and remain standing the entire break. There is a man in the church that makes tea so he provides tea for all the church functions. It has an unusual flavor that is quite tasty.

Like the coffee breaks, lunch was served in the basement of the church … yes, they sit down for lunch! Brother Anatol kept the schedule moving with only 20 minutes for the coffee break and 45 minutes for lunch.

After the conference sessions we returned to the apartment and repeated our evening routine.

Tuesday, March 8 in Southern Moldova

Today we shared teaching on the Wife’s Role and the Husband’s Role and I (David) taught on the Four Rules of Communication. Some of the folks have been through at least part of the training we have provided before while others have not been exposed to biblical counseling before.

Several young pastors came to me today telling me about some of the struggles they are having in counseling and asking for suggestions on how they might get more training to be better prepared. When we began working with the church in Moldova, our hope was that at least three churches would take the teaching seriously and begin doing biblical counseling and at least one would eventually become a training center.

Today is Mother’s Day in Moldova so we took our host family out to dinner. They chose a local pizza place. It was fun and the pizza was good.

Wednesday, March 9 in Southern Moldova

Today we covered Forgiveness and abbreviated sessions on Parenting and Finances. We finished off the conference with Biblical Principles of Sex. Response overall was very good with lots of questions on the last session.

At lunch we shared a table with Anatol, Andrei and Lydia. The discussion was centered around their observations about how the churches in the Southern Region had taken up the challenge of biblical counseling. They told us of various churches doing biblical counseling and of the need for more training. They have invited us to return to do a series of conferences and perhaps set up some consultations via Skype. They think that if we would work with the handful of churches that are serious about biblical counseling for a few years they could take up the gauntlet and carry on the ministry.

After we finished our teaching, they honored us with small gifts to express their appreciation. Then we got in a van with Brother Igor and he drove us to the village of Antonesti (Ahn-to-nesht). We stopped in Chisinau for pizza. Igor’s two older boys, Theofil (11) and Marco (7), seemed to particularly enjoy it.

We arrive in Antonesti at about 10:30 and settled into our new home of the next 3 nights. Antonesti (Ahn-to-nesht), is a village southeast of the capitol city of Chisinau (Kee-shih-now). We are staying in the simple 4 room home very dear young couple who speak very little English. We are grateful for their willingness to open their home to us and serve us with what they have.

We had tea and visited with them until after 11pm. We understand that he is a farmer and a pastor. He farms potatoes, sunflowers, corn, wheat and walnuts and they also have 21 pigs and four young bulls.

Thursday, March 10 in Southern Moldova

It turns out the tea we were served last night had plenty of caffeine so we did not sleep so well.

We were served potatoes and meat for breakfast. Yum! Everyone showed up at the church at about the same time so set up for the conference took place from about 9:45-10:15 Then we got off to a relaxed start in the basement of the church. There were about 35 men and women in attendance representing about 10 different churches. Scott started us off with an overview of Premaritial counseling. I followed with Bible Basics of Marriage and Progressive Sanctification. Somehow my grandson Jacob seemed to come up as an illustration in all my sessions.  He is now an international celebrity! 

Scott ended the day with the first part of the Husband’s Role.

The outdoor temp is in the 20s to low 30s while the temperature in the basement of the church is about 60 degrees. I don’t think the dining room we ate lunch and supper has any heat. The temp in there is cold enough to see your breath.

It’s good to be back ‘home’ where it is warmer. I probably won’t update the blog tomorrow night as I have been invited to preach in one of the churches. We covet your prayers as we continue to serve the people here and will send updates as we are able.

David and Scott

David Selvey and Scott Meinema arrived in Moldova Saturday.  We split up Sunday morning and preached in two churches each, enjoying the fellowship of the brethren.  Monday morning we began teaching on pre-marriage counseling.  We ahve about 70 area pastors and leaders in attendance.  Scott started off with the first two hours and David taught the other four.  We had good response and lots of requests for materials.  It is a joy to be reunited with so man old friends, folks who have been through three tracks of Biblical Counselor Training with us.  Several pastors are telling us their struggles with counseling.  The pastors in the south are eager to get more training.  Tuesday is mother’s day in Moldova so we are taking our host family out to dinner to celebrate.

Brother Anatol has a wonderful heart for the Lord and for people.  He is working hard to instill a sense of servitude and responsibility in the people here.  It has been a wonderful blessing to be in his home.  We will finish up our teaching here in Cahul on Wednesday and then move to another town to present the same materials to another group.  Pray for us as we will be teaching through Saturday and then traveling home on Sunday.

Thanks,
David and Scott