HeartCry missionary George Serban is a faithful minister of the gospel. While spiritually shepherding the faith family in Dragonesti Olt, Romania, he continues to be intentional in his outreach to the community. This month he shares of how he ministers to the needs of the poor while preaching the gospel:
The Lord Jesus said, “The poor you will always have with you” (Matthew 26:11). We met a family with many children and many needs. They need food, clothes, shoes and heat. We take these things for granted. They have no heat in their home, and it is very cold outside. They don’t have shoes or socks and they walk barefoot on the cold ground. We met only four of their children, but they have three more, who were playing outside. We talked to the parents. They are day laborers, but it’s hard to find work in this period. We pray for their physical and spiritual needs. May the Lord have mercy on them and on others who are in a similar situation!
During our lifetime, we have go through a continuous process of transformation. There are situations that don’t seem to change us or goals that we don’t necessarily want to pursue. But God knows best how we should be before Him and how we can be useful to the people around us. Do you want your life to be changed? God can change our lives so that we would be pleasant before him and useful to the people around us!
“Yet you, LORD, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand” (Isaiah 64:8).
Mission and Evangelism
December gives us the opportunity to take the gospel to children and adults. Everyone expects presents, but we try to explain that most beautiful gift from God to the entire world is the Lord Jesus Christ whom we can enjoy more and more with the passing of the time. This is a joy that stays in the life of the believer and you can share it with others as well. We tried to do this in December. We had an evangelistic event in Stoenesti. The gospel was preached and some people came to hear it. We don’t know what’s in their hearts, we don’t know their expectations or their priorities, but one thing we know for sure – that they need Jesus Christ because they are sinners. We preach the gospel to them because people can be saved only through the hearing of the gospel. Some of them try to solve the problem of their sin in other ways and they come with other solutions.
Some of them stick to a religion and to a set of rules, while others put their hopes in a human being, but the Lord said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). May the people understand this truth through the preaching of the gospel and through the Holy Spirit and come to believe in Jesus Christ!
We had an evangelistic event in the village of Berindei. We preached the gospel to the children and their parents. We pray that God would work in their hearts. We also pray for the Bold family. They are missionaries in this village where they would like to plant a church. Some of the people from this village are open to our visit, but we would like them to receive the Word that can change their lives. They have different needs, but we pray that they would understand that their greatest need is the need for God. God calls all people to come to him, poor or rich, big or small, as all have something in common – the sin, for which there is only one remedy: the Lord Jesus Christ.
We went caroling in Draganesti with a group of young people from our church. People welcomed us and listened to us and some of them even cried as we were singing. Others sent us text messages and told us how much it meant to them that we visited them. We pray that people in Draganesti would receive God’s Word in their hearts, so that his Church would grow for the glory of his name!
