Mini heart attack about proving vaccination status
Ate dinner pre-flight, got to know the team (what you do, what got you to Albania)
Brian, engineer
Andrew, accountant
Allison (Alli), WM students team admin
Madison, PR & Social media
Allye, PR
Tobin, WM director of intl ministry & former pastor in hong kong for 20 yrs
Day 2
Monday Sept 20
Early meeting with Afrim & Marsel, Disciples of Christ church
Discussed their new building project. Tobin shared a bit about never having had a building in Hong Kong.
Orientation w/ Albanian team
Aldo
Kaon & Danjela
Albi
Jonida
Edi
Pal & Ueda came at the end
Lunch & souvenir shopping, including Gelato (getting it all out of the way)
HS meeting 1
7 or 8 new high schoolers
team introduction, getting to know you games
dancing - I missed it after a year
Andrew and Alli both set multiple coffees
I got Luka’s instagram, will set up coffee tomorrow
Meeting w/ Cornerstone
Ylli
Visi
Altin
Pal
Tobin
Me
Discussed small group formation - was a takewaway from the Church Leaders Conference
Discussed Re:Engage
Allye got to hang out w/ Alli and Bora to share fliers - got to pour into Bora for a bit
Dinner @ Artigiano w/ Re:Gen team
Carrie, Morgan, Marlie, Tobin, Lauren, Allye
Morgan said the hardest part was the ladies kept saying “that’s not our culture”
Goodbye to Re:Gen team, we are not waking up at 4am to see them off
Day 3
Tuesday Sept 21
AM coffee @ Sophie then breakfast with Allye
Morning devotional and prayer time
Coffee with Genti and Nikollin
Byrek for lunch
Coffee at Komiteti
Tobin
Alli
Alesso
Klevisa
Tod
Hotel break
3pm started the event, Alli shared about social media and anxiety
The girl in front of us turned around and nodded to her friend to say, “this is real”
Tobin & I had coffee afterward with Alban Pasho, new head of Student ministries
Alban is new to the role, still trying to figure it out
Dinner 7:30 at Pasta restaurant w/ Kaon & Danjela
Tobin left to get ready for bed, I took team to get Ice Cream and Bakllava
Day 4
Wednesday Sept 22
AM coffee w/ Allye at mon cheri
Met team at Office then spent some time at other coffee shop
Alli shared her devotional
Berti Berhami showed up - coffee with Berti & Marenglen
More info on new structure of CRU Albania, informative re: convo with Alban yesterday
On the way back to the office, ran into Skerdi w/ Edi Bicaku
12pm left w/ Edi N, Allye, Albi and Ueda for Peqin
Arrived around 1:30, stopped at market for snacks
2:45 started w/ games - 12 kids total, all believers
“Over the mountain” if…
Pictionary
Texas Trivia
Shared my story of grace w/ a challenge built around Micah 6:8
Dancing
Met pastor as we were leaving
Dinner in Tirana w/ Gedis and Celjeta
Great things in and around Elbasan - lots of opportunity to share the Gospel,
some Elbasan kids becoming key volunteers which is unusual b/c they are more Muslim typically
Re:Gen camp was good. Gedis decided he wanted to do Re:gen b/c of Berti Berhami sharing his testimony
Allye went to sleep, I stayed up for the Fier team
Day 5
Thursday Sept 23
Rest morning - rolled out of bed at 9:30
Allye felt so much better
Most of the group went for brunch and then walked around the city.
Allye and I took a taxi up to “Bar Class”
12:00 - met at the office to prepare for the “World Game”
1:00 - coffee w/ Brian and Luka
Believer, grew up in a Christian family.
Interested in Software Engineering
Talked about life purpose - challenged him to think about this for a purpose: seek joy
Discussed tithing and giving, not out of obligation. He had the advantage of watching his parents give 10%
3:00 meeting went well
World game
Pyramid scheme
I shared my testimony, centered around the concept of “Right vs Wrong” and “Objective Morality”.
Micah 6:8
Story re: SQL injection
Board game time
6:00 met with Berti and Zamir
Berti has a new job, he had been considering leaving his old job without even having a new one lined up, but he went to the church camp and prayed with Altin, and on the way back from the church camp he had two interviews lined up!
Zamir has been growing his business, he has 25 employees now and is getting a new office! The Lord has blessed them both.
I really enjoyed having a long coffee to catch up with them. I’m glad for them and praying that they will keep being involved in church, and being a light for others.
7:30 dinner at Era with Pal and Ueda. Just another great time together with friends. I love that I get to spend a lot of time with them on these trips.
Day 6
Friday Sept 24
8:30 AM went to Dajti with a fugon
Stopped at Natyra e Qete, where Pal and Ueda got married
Prayer time
Prayed over the project, specific names of kids that we had shared with or will share with
Prayed for Albania
Justice
Corruption
Social media usage among the youth
Prayed for America
Divided country w/ politics
Materialism
Church to be the Church
Celebrated Edi & Kela’s 10 year anniversary w/ a cake
Came down the mountain - I prayed that the brakes would hold!
Coffee with Mario, Klevisa, Alexa, and Allye
Allye talked with Klevisa and Alexa while I asked Mario some questions
On a scale of 1-10 he’s a 7, because he’s confused about some things. I asked him what he’s confused about.
Why would God make others suffer because of Adam and Eve
He’s patient towards us, not wanting that any should perish
Why are there so many different faiths
Read paul’s sermon at the Areopagus
Purpose was to get him to see that the answers to his questions are in the bible
Alesio came later with a friend and started asking questions too, both of them said they are a 0
Came late to the Texas Night meeting
Andrew started off with Frank Sinatra
Texas Trivia - the question about Sweetwater’s rattlesnake roundup got the most people
Q & A time - asked about Rodeo, we showed a video about mutton busting
Dancing started with two stepping for 3 songs, then “Copperhead road”, then “Footloose” (madison)
For Cotton-Eye Joe, we tried to teach one dance but they were already doing another one
I went for coffee afterwards with Samuel, Luka, and Elia. Edi joined after a bit.
I shared my testimony, they appreciated the change in my life from 10 years ago
I asked Sam to share how he became a believer
Last year was a dark time in his life, with lots of isolation. A pastor came all the way across Tirana, even during curfew, just to talk to him. That made a huge impression on him.
Luka said that last year he didn’t want to be a believer because he thought that meant he couldn’t have fun anymore. I shared that I am a “Christian Hedonist” like John Piper
Encouraging to get to invest in some young believers.
Andrew went for coffee with a young boy named Alessio. He accepted christ tonight! Andrew had been working with him all week
Met up for dinner with Berti and Adelina Berhami at Stephen Center. They treated us to dinner.
Good conversation with good friends
Sara, their daughter, took part in the re:gen camp this last weekend in Durres. Sara said that this is what we’ve been needing, since she experienced this many years ago in Dallas. Berti was studying at DTS at the time and the family were members of Watermark. Sara and Klea both went to WM youth ministry.
After dinner we took a nice walk through town and arrived safely at our hotel, and of course went directly to sleep.
Day 7
Saturday Sept 25
Met with Genti Tupa early
Had to change things up with the YP ministry, almost “starting from zero”. He’s looking to connect with the medical community now as he has a supporter who will come who is a doctor.
Talked about asking around our church if any lawyers would be interested in coming to Albania to make inroads with the legal community there.
Covid test time! Went to a testing site on the other side of the city
Anxiety that one or more tests would be positive. Us all being negative would be a miracle.
Allye said it best, “praying that God would help my attitude if we’re not all negative”.
Coffee time with Klei and Albi
Klei is a typical high school student, he didn’t say much in response to questions.
Just wants a family and a good job. We talked about having a bigger purpose for your life. He says he is a believer but hasn’t been very much involved in church. Albi is trying to get him to go to church in Yzberisht together with albi
Meeting time at 11am
There was a funny skit about a couple who goes to the movie theater. They have to sit on opposite sides of the row, and a jerk of a guy is in between them. The boyfriend passes gifts along to his girlfriend but they all end up being eaten or somehow messed up by the jerk. Meanwhile the other guy actually sitting next to the girl presents the gifts as though they are from him, and the girlfriend ends up leaving with the other guy!
Brian did an excellent job with the Gospel presentation!
Very clear explanation of the 4 laws
Left the final slide up for the duration of the meeting - “you must make a personal choice”. Sam said he appreciated that this slide remained up for the whole meeting
Lots of dancing! Our last chance to get in all the albanian dancing we want
Lunch afterwards with about a dozen students.
Allye talked to Nertila for a while, she’s a believer
I tried to engage Igli and his brother Bruno in conversation. I asked them what they want out of life - “money”. We talked about John D Rockefeller, who when asked how much more would satisfy him, said “only 1 more dollar”. I was trying to make the point that Igli will never be satisfied, but he seemed to like that phrase. Or at least it was “cool” to like that in front of his friends. I challenged him instead to seek Wisdom, and we read some from Proverbs about how wisdom is more valuable than gold and silver. Pray for him, he didn’t seem interested in taking that path.
Headed back to the office and piled into 3 cars to go out to Durres for the evening. This was our time of rest, relaxation with our Albanian friends, and evaluation of the project.
First, we toured the Roman amphitheater in Durres. It’s likely the 2nd largest ever built by Rome outside the Coliseum.
It’s thought that Titus was martyred here
Drove down to the beach and a nice outdoor seafood restaurant there. We walked the beach a bit and took some photos before heading in to eat.
Discussed the project, what went well, what we could do better.
The video was a hit, we’ll definitely have to make a better one next time. Maybe Jordan Thompson would be on board?
Doing a run-through of texas night and our gospel presentation would have helped.
Praise the Lord for negative covid tests! We all got the emails at dinner. It’s seriously a miracle that none of us caught it.
It was good to see both new students and returning students. It’s important to invest in the believers too.
After a long and enjoyable dinner, we said goodnight to Kaon and Danjela as they were returning separately with their kids. The rest of us packed up in the cars again and went to the hotel.
Since our flight out was at 4am, we decided to leave the hotel at 1 to go to the airport. Pal and Genti graciously stayed up to take us there. We chilled at the hotel until 11, hanging out and checking the score of the College Football games. I was watching A&M v Arkansas, while Brian was trying to follow Baylor vs Iowa State
That last night of time with our friends was hard but good. Good because we are just such good friends now. Hard because of the exhaustion, and wanting to be present to spend time with them. I already miss them.