Third DS School held in Jordan

Madaba, Jordan

About 50 people from across the Eurasia Region gathered in Madaba, Jordan, in April for the third District Superintendent Training School.

Objectives included encouraging the district superintendents and providing opportunities for them to learn from other experienced DS. In the past five years, the number of districts led by missionaries has dramatically decreased as indigenous leaders take over.

"So you've got a lot of DSs where the district is new and it's the first time they're being a DS," said Brad Firestone, a missionary who helped to facilitate the event. "There are a lot of people who are new to the job and need to understand how to do it well."

U.S. MidAtlantic DS Ken Mills, U.S. South Carolina DS Eddie Estep, and Netherlands DS Arthur Snijders were the featured presenters, along with Eurasia Regional Director Gustavo Crocker.

The participants divided into smaller groups based on district characteristics, such as whether the district is missionary- or indigenous-led, new or mature. In these smaller groups, participants talked about their particular challenges and steps to grow and mature as a district.

"At the DS School, I learned more about how to form and cast vision for our district," said Tamara Hudson, a missionary and DS for the Romania District. "As we grow and implement healthy structures and systems, we need to be clear about our missional purpose. Forming a missional strategy that will guide our efforts is essential so that we do not lose sight of our purpose of making Christlike disciples in Romania.

"These kind of events give us time to reflect on our ministry and to encourage one another. It was wonderful to be together with other brothers and sisters from across the region who face similar challenges and carry similar responsibilities."

Missionary Nancy Firestone, who helped to facilitate the event, said the participants seemed to learn a lot from one another.

One evening, the group invited the Jordan pastors for a time of special prayer.

"That was really special because many of them don't get a lot of support or see a lot of outsiders on a regular basis," Nancy said. "They really seemed to appreciate the support and prayers."

Reprinted from NCN News

Shelter in the Storm

By Gina Grate Pottenger
Eurasia Region Communications

A Christian nonprofit organization, directed by Monica Boseff, a member of Blessings Church of the Nazarene in Bucharest, Romania, is planning to open the first emergency shelter in Romania for survivors of human trafficking.

The ministry, Open Door Foundation, purchased a house in December which it is outfitting with rooms for survivors to stay in while they receive medical care, counseling, spiritual guidance and other help to transition back into society.

The organization is already working with seven women and girls from abroad at a temporary shelter provided by another nongovernment organization, and is in the process of hiring three full-time staff members from the Blessings church. When all the staff are in place, the ministry will have the director, four guards, a psychologist, a social worker and a house manager.

“My greatest desire is that … I want this to be a haven of God’s grace and mercy for every single victim,” said Boseff.

How it began
The organization was originally called Open Door Medical Foundation, and was started by two American Christian doctors in Bucharest who opened a social work ministry with a medical clinic in 2002 for those who couldn’t afford the expensive governmentrun hospitals and doctors. For many years the clinic helped anyone from poor to wealthy. However, over time, many private doctors and hospitals opened and medical care in Romania improved nation-wide. It became clear that the medical side of the ministry wasn’t needed as much as it had been.

Those who ran the foundation put aside the medical work and began seeking God’s direction on where they could be of most help next.

Then, in June 2011, an Americanbased nonprofit organization called MATTO, (Men Against The Trafficking of Others), contacted Open Door and suggested they work together to host an awareness campaign in Bucharest about men’s role in trafficking.

“We prayed about this and God just gave us tremendous peace, so I said ‘Yes, we’ll help you.’ That was  starting point,” Boseff said.

The only problem was that the two groups had just a week to organize the city-wide event and there were a number of obstacles. For one thing, they had to get permission from the mayor’s office to find a space to rent in the city. One possibility was the main park downtown by the People’s Palace, but until then it had been closed to all public gatherings after a riotous concert left behind trash and damage to the park.

The committee met right away to review Boseff’s request, and their response was shockingly positive.

“It was our unanimous decision to give you the main park for this event downtown,” they told her. “You should have had this event years ago, we need more like this. You can use [the main park] anytime you want for any amount of hours you need.”

They also said they would “rent” the park to the trafficking awareness event at no cost. Boseff viewed this positive response as God’s clear confirmation to Open Door that getting involved against human trafficking was where God was leading the organization.

Boseff talked to other nonChristian NGOs (non-government organizations) as well as the National Agency Against Human Trafficking to find out what the needs were in Romania. Every group said the same thing: they needed an emergency shelter where survivors could stay for up to six months, because there wasn’t a single shelter for this purpose in all of Romania.

So Open Door decided to open a shelter. The house they bought in December has three large bedrooms, and they’ve put three beds in each room, meaning they will be able to accommodate nine women and girls. When the attic is renovated, it will add four more rooms with space for more
women.

‘If it’s not now, when?’
Staff members are already working with seven survivors at a temporary shelter, and they’re learning how to do this kind of ministry.

For instance, they discovered that it’s best not to share about Jesus Christ right away, but to let the women and girls develop curiosity about spiritual things on their own and then come to the volunteers with their questions and prayer requests.

“By spending time with them, cooking with them, going out shopping, laughing with them, crying with them, they turn around … and ask us ‘Why do you do all this stuff for me?’”

Two of the women asked for reading material, and the volunteers offered to give them some small devotional booklets with short stories, Bible verses and written prayers. The women eagerly accepted the booklets, quickly read them and asked for more.

 One young woman asked a staff member, “How is it to be in Christ? What is it like to have a relationship with God? Can I have a Bible?”

Through her research and spending time with the survivors of trafficking, Boseff has developed an unquenchable passion for the ministry. She quoted figures, such as that there are 27 million people currently in slavery around the world, and that it is the highest slavery rate in the history of mankind.

“Why should I wait until someone that I know that is close to me [is trafficked] before I take action?” she asked. “If it’s not now, when? If it is not us Christians, who is going to tell them that a life can only be restored in Christ alone?”

Please pray the staff, director and women of the trafficking shelter that recently opened in Bucharest, Romania. Pray for God to bless the ministry in its material needs, as well as to bring spiritual and physical healing to the victims of trafficking.


“Reprinted with permission from Where Worlds Meet; June 2013 issue

Third Romanian woman ordained

Pictured: Magda Cini, Paula Creely, Roberta Bustin

It’s not every day that a Romanian is ordained, so when a Romanian was ordained at the Philadelphia District Assembly on April 22, it was a time of celebration.

Paula (Cini) Creely grew up in Sighisoara, Romania, where she started attending the Church of the Nazarene as a teenager and became very active in the life of the church. After graduating high school, she attended European Nazarene College in Büsingen, Germany. She then moved to the United States and continued her studies for ordination.

Paula is married to Gary Creely.  Together they pastor the Macungie, Pennsylvania, Church of the Nazarene.  When they arrived in Macungie, there were no children in the church. Paula has been active in developing a thriving children’s ministry and in helping the church to double in size in three years. Paula and Gary have a five year old son named Everett.

Two people influential in Paula’s life were able to travel from Romania to attend the ordination service. Paula’s mother, Magda Cini, who pastors the Tigmandru, Romania, Church of the Nazarene, and Roberta Bustin, Mission Corps missionary who served as pastor of the Sighisoara Church of the Nazarene while Paula was growing up there.

Roberta has known Paula for almost 16 years and when asked to describe her feelings about the ordination she said, “I was very excited … I was also thinking about how proud I was of her that she persevered to finish her course of study even when it was not easy (studying in a language which was not her first language, studying after she had a family and church responsibilities, etc.)”

There are 3 ordained Romanians in the Church of the Nazarene – notably all women: Magdalena Balaban in Romania, Simona Berdowski in Poland, and Paula Creely.

“Paula’s passion is to be doing ministry,” Bustin said, “She is a natural leader [and] I see her continuing in ministry, thinking of new ways to do things, developing new ministries and being faithful to God’s call.”

Reprinted in Eurasia Snapshots

Mentoring Course in Romania

Michael Hudson, Romania Learning Centre Coordinator, reports some of the latest developments. In March, EuNC students in Romania began Part 2 of the Mentoring component of the Nazarene course of study for ministry. Sixteen students from three different locations participated in the course, three from Țigmandru, seven from Sighișoara, and six from Bucharest. The course is being taught and facilitated by Tamara Hudson, Superintendent of the Romania District and Local Faculty Member of the Romania Learning Centre.

At the beginning of each segment of the six-part course, which is integrated throughout the students’ years of study, students gather for a seminar that introduces the emphasis of that particular part of the course. Part 2, for example, focuses on the students gaining practice and experience in exercising the tools of theological reflection in ministry. Then throughout the semester, students complete other growth exercises such as journaling and written reflection, and they also meet in both small groups and individually with their local mentor (Tamara or Michael Hudson in Bucharest, Roberta Bustin or Jonathan Phillips in Țigmandru and Sighișoara).


Each segment of the course only requires that students invest about 13 hours of time, but the benefits derived from these few hours spent in community with fellow students, in conversation with their mentor, and in communion with the Lord through prayer and reflection are essential to the development and formation of this great group of Romanian ministerial students.

The “gathering” of the students for the seminars happens in a creative format. The teacher travels to one of the sites to personally meet with the students there (alternating sites for each segment of the course), while the other students participate in the class through live video conference. The advantages of this approach are that more students are able to participate in the course and that the teacher’s efforts are maximised. However, there is still some work to do to get the technological components updated so that students in the video conference location feel more “present” with the teacher and the other students.


European Nazarene College, "In Touch" Newsletter, April 2013

April Missionary Prayer Focus

From NMI's Prayer Mobilization Line, April 10, 2013:

Pray for Michael and Tamara Hudson, serving in Romania.

• Every Thursday at 9 p.m. Central European Time (CET), we are united in prayer with our Nazarene brothers and sisters around Romania. We are praying during the Lenten season for revival and renewal. We long for God to do something new in us and through us and we are waiting on Him in prayer and fasting.  Please pray for spiritual growth and new opportunities for ministry. 
• Please pray for the Romania District as we continue to sharpen our vision for making Christlike disciples in Romania. 
• Please pray for the Theological Education (TE) program and the students who are currently studying. We have two classes taking place now: "Mentoring" and "Nazarene History and Polity." Please pray for Michael as he leads TE in Romania and as he is preparing for the doctrine class he will be teaching in the fall.
• Please pray for the development of the district land near the mountains. We hope to have youth camp there again this summer and are praying that we can have water and electricity in place to make the camping a little less challenging!

Click here to read the Hudson’s profile on Engage magazine.

New Book Published

The Eurasia Region’s Literature Ministry has translated a new book in the Books for Pastors program be used by ministers and lay leaders in  Romania.

In the Name of Jesus, by Henri Nouwen, was translated into Romanian by a team of one translator and one editor, and 500 copies were printed.

The books will be given to pastors and ministerial students, and after that they will be made available for purchase through local Nazarene churches, said Michael Hudson. Some of the books may be shared with Romanian Nazarenes ministering in the Republic of Moldova as well. There is also a pending arrangement to make the books available for sale through some Christian bookstores in Romania.

“The biblical principles of servanthood in church leadership are helpful to all of us, Romanians included,” Hudson explained. “The model of Jesus, as Nouwen effectively brings out in this book, is one of servanthood, servanthood, servanthood. This is particularly helpful in a country like Romania where models of ministry in the Church of the Nazarene are still in the formative stages of development.”

The denomination in Romania is just 20 years old.

Reprinted from eurasiaregion.org. Also published in NCN News.

They Came to Love Jesus

By Gina Pottenger
Republished from Where Worlds Meet, Year 10, Issue 2, March 2013

When Cristi and Monica Boseff first met the Nazarene missionaries to Bucharest, Romania, in 1992, Cristi was convinced they were American spies.

The Boseffs had gone to meet the missionaries Jon and Margaret Scott, because Monica had been asked to serve as a translator for them. The Scotts shocked the Romanian couple by welcoming them into their home with hugs, smiles and friendliness unusual in that culture between strangers.

“I said, ‘Something is missing, because nobody is nice and polite with strangers, only if they need something from you,’” recalled Cristi. “When I suspected them of being American spies, I decided to catch them and I was very alert.”

Those who were raised under Communism developed a mistrust of others, even friends, Monica said.

“You definitely didn’t trust your neighbors, or not even some of your relatives,” Monica said. “You never knew who was an informer for the security.”

Despite Cristi’s objections, Monica agreed to translate for the couple, and over the next two months she was exposed to something she had never seen in anyone before – the love of Jesus Christ. She was so moved by what she felt around them that one day she told her husband, “I don’t care what you think, but I need my life to be changed. I really want to have what they have.”

In October 1992, she prayed with Margaret to receive Christ, beginning a long journey of transformation in the image of Jesus, and became part of the Church of the Nazarene in Bucharest which was just beginning to form at that time.

Cristi did not share her enthusiasm for her new faith, but did not discourage her. They’d gotten married after knowing one another just two weeks. When Monica became a Christian, they had only been married a few months.

In training to be a nurse, Monica received a scholarship in 1993 to study in Oklahoma, in the United States. The Scotts connected her with the Calvary Church of the Nazarene in Tulsa. They helped her through a difficult adjustment to American culture. And they helped to carry Monica’s burden for Cristi’s salvation.

“The most powerful lesson about prayer I learned in the church,” she said. “What I learned is that a whole church that has never seen this man knelt at the altar crying out for him Sunday after Sunday. I didn’t even have a picture of Cristi to show them. I would even get calls throughout the week [saying], ‘I’ve been praying for your husband.’”

God answered the church’s prayers through Cristi’s job in working part-time for the Scotts and their nonprofit organization.

“I was surprised because they started every working day with prayer. They eat together, they fasted together…. And I wanted to have what they have,” Cristi said.

Over time, God wrapped him up with love and mercy until he began going to church with them while Monica was out of the country. Over time, listening to the sermons and what was said at church, he gradually realized that he had come to love Jesus.

At Christmas, Monica’s mom called her and told her to sit down for some news. Then, her mother’s voice announced, “Cristi accepted Christ at church.”

The leaders of the Church of the Nazarene wanted Cristi to pursue theological education. It seemed they sensed a potential pastor in him. But Cristi was virulently opposed to entering studies. He had a list of excuses: he didn’t speak well in public; he stuttered; his memory was poor; he was too old to study and didn’t like it, anyway.

Then, eight years ago, Cristi was running out of excuses in face of an increasingly clear call from God. The pastor of the Blessing Church of the Nazarene in Bucharest had left, and Cristi needed to serve as a temporary leader. He did such a good job that the church officially asked him to be their pastor.

He came home and sat down with Monica and their two children. He asked his kids, “I need you to tell me if you think I should be the pastor of the church. If you think so… you’re in this with me, because this is not my ministry, it is not something I do. If we do it, we do it together.”

Their children looked up at him and told their father to “go for it.”

Cristi has been the pastor ever since. It’s tough for Nazarene churches in Romania. By law a church cannot be registered officially with the government until it has 10,000 members. But it’s difficult to get members without being seen as a legitimate, government-recognized organization.

So the church registered as the Nazarene Christian Evangelical Organization for Aid and Development. Compassionate ministries are a strong focus of the Blessing church, which is located in a poor community. The congregation has been steadily growing in recent years. In 2010, the church expanded the sanctuary and remodeled several rooms to accommodate the growth. They also built a tank for baptisms.

“We find that people are so open to hearing god’s plain and simple truth,” Monica said. “You would find 99 percent of the Romanian population says they’re believers – they believe in God and belong to religion and the church – but their life is messed up. We are still very high on abortions and extramarital relationships and sex before marriage.”

Monica said that she and Cristi are not trying to bring people to the church but to a relationship with Jesus Christ. She tries to live her life in a way that demonstrates becoming a Christian and joining an evangelical church doesn’t mean the end of fun or freedom in life.

“We laugh so hard together and we enjoy life so much together in a clean and nice way. They realize that in Christ you are full of life and joy and so they start to understand that belonging to a church is vital to your Christian life. And so meeting with some of my friends makes them say, ‘When do you have your service?’”

Also published in NCN News.