Breaking new ground

The past twenty-four hours have been an exciting and joyful time for many people here in Romania. Today was the official opening and dedication of the Tsigmadru Nazarene Center, which means the "Tsgimadru church" is official! WOOT. It's been a long three years in many ways, yet short in others. It was four years ago that a group of teens sent from Pearce were priveleged to see the land where the church would be built. All that was there at that time were stakes in the ground. This was only the beginning of Pearce's ministry in Tsigmadru, which conincided with the new beginnings of the church. There have been several teams from Pearce in between then and now and the progress has been followed (and helped along!) year by year, but it is now that the final "product" stands. The church looks absolutely beautiful, it's long-time brick facade...now a beautiful smooth and creamy color. Inside is no different. The wooden floors are laid, sanded, and stained. The walls and trim painted. The balastrada up, stained, and functional. The computer room actually has computers in it! Same for the sewing room, it actually has sewing machines (and very little excess stuff) in it! The daycare room is as clear as I've ever seen it, it's walls freshly painted. So much work has gone into this church. So many people have put their heart into this church and today it showed. God's presence among us was so tangible it's hard to explain and the joy was almost too much to take in. Surely God has blessed this church, these people, and the work that they do and plan to do. It was a very cool thing to witness and be a part of, I wish you all could have been there with us.
Towards the end of our stay at the opening, we got to enjoy a meal of sarmale. Sarmale is steamed (pickled?) cabbage leaves stuffed with a mixture of rice, onion, meat (of some sort), and...who knows. It's a traditional Romanian meal and this was by far the best sarmale I've had yet! A fost delicios (It was delicious).
I was too excited to tell you about today to mention the fact that I spent the night out in Tsigmadru at the church last night. It was a teen sleepover thing because some teens from Bucharest and Sighisoara came and joined the teens from Tsigmadru for their evening club (and for the events of today). It was a lot of fun. We played games for the majority of the night, but it was topped off with a Russian movie (Romanian subtitles). I think I understood about 3/4 of it. It was actually pretty funny to watch without complete understanding, makes things a little more interesting. =]
So yet again we've had another incredible weekend and God has blessed us with being a part of something much anticipated and way bigger than ourselves (praise God). Again, I wish you all could have been there to see just how God is moving in this place. It truly is a miracle sometimes.