Our second Romanian Pentecostal conference.

I've been quite sick for the past two weeks, and while I don't know what caused it, I do know what made it worse.  If you have the flu, don't go to that annual conference with your church.  Even though I was prayed over much there, resting at home and recovering would have been the better option.

I mostly wanted to go to this conference for two reasons: last year when we went it was decided that we could apply for our residence permits though our denomination, and second, we enjoyed the time getting to know our brothers and sisters better outside of Betel.  We had no idea what the rest of the time would be like--if it would be a lot of preaching, a lot of praying, a lot of singing, or a lot of all three, like services at Betel.  But it would be interesting to meet other folks from other churches around the country.

I began feeling flu-like the night before we left, but in the morning I felt a lot better, so I decided to go along and see how everything went.  I ended up sleeping most of the way, waking up to eat, gaze at the countryside, and to listen to our church's prayer warrior ask, "Are we there yet?"  He was watching an older movie about Moses and playing worship music on his phone for most of the trip.

Once we arrived and put our things in our rooms, the official conference began.  Most of it was led by a guy named Ben who grew up in the Netherlands, then moved to Canada, and received the call to do overseas missions about 20 years ago.  He and his wife Maryanne travel in Eastern Europe and Northern Africa, ministering to churches and pastors, giving biblical training and church-planting classes.  Ben says that the most effective way to make disciples is through church planting.  He had given his church planting seminar at this conference last year, which we hadn't stayed long enough to hear, but we were really intrigued by him.

After dinner, the "foreigners from Lupeni" presented our work with Betel and with New Horizons, and thanked the church for supporting us in our residence permits.  A few of the junior leaders from the IMPACT club at Betel told the gathering that IMPACT had changed their lives and taught them a lot about working hard.  That was about all I could take, so I went upstairs and tried to fall asleep, but unfortunately, all of us guys from Betel were in the same room and everyone had a different schedule that night (not to mention some good snore muscles).  I don't think I fell totally asleep until 2am.

The next morning, I had a ton of trouble even opening my eyes.  I had had a fever and developed a pretty strong cough.  Kelly came in with some bread and jam and well-wishes from the kitchen ladies.  After eating I felt a lot better and came down for most of the day.  Ben was slowly working his way through 1 Peter, talking about discipleship, and asking if we, as church leaders, had made strong, mature disciples in our churches.  His main point was that disciples who love God and desire God will spread the gospel, whether they do it in churches or out, which was kind of weird since he said church planting is the best form of making disciples.  But it makes sense.

I didn't go to the evening session, but realized that I didn't want to have another night like last night, so I decided to just spend time with people and get tired.  So we talked for a while and joked around with our people from Betel, and then Vali, one of our church leaders, asked if any of us wanted to to pray with the guys he had been talking to all evening.  I said, yeah, why not?  We prayed for a while like normal (normal being everyone prays out loud at once and keeps praying until the leaders finish). Then, they all prayed for me, and the pastor from this other church laid his hands on my head and chest.  He prayed that my sins would be forgiven, that my sickness would depart, and especially that the generational sin in my life would be erased.  There were distinct moments when I felt no need to cough at all, and after he finished, my fever left and didn't come back.

After he was finished praying, he said, "I want to ask you a question.  Before you were saved, what sort of music did you listen to?"

"Rock, mostly."

"I knew it.  Did you ever listen to heavy metal?"

"No, some of my friends listened to the really heavy stuff, but I didn't."

"Okay, were you ever involved in any activities of the occult or satanic rituals?"

"No, no, definitely not."

"Okay. And now that you're saved, do you listen to Christian rock?"

"Yeah, for sure."

"Hmm.  Let me tell you the problem with Christian rock.  Even if you take text from the Bible, you can't just put it over satanic music and call it good.  It still affects you for bad."

"Really?"

"Oh yeah.  Can I pray for you again?"

"Uhh....well....."  Keep in mind, I'm trying to figure out a way to explain myself in Romanian while still trying not to cough too much.

"You don't want me to pray for you?"

"Well, see, the thing is, I don't think that Christian rock is satanic at all.  If it is, that means that a ton of us Christians from the US are really wrong about what's okay to listen to and what's not." This coming from me who went to Calvin College where we listened to Mumford and Sons in chapel services and picked out the gospel parts together.  "Christian rock is a big part of my walk with God.  When I listen to this stuff, I'm closer to God.  When I go to concerts, it's a lot like a worship service. Our old church even played music that's pretty close to rock, so this stuff is the music that I praise God with."

"Okay, so you don't want me to pray for you."

"Not for this, no."

"Okay, no problem.  That's okay.  No problem."

"Thanks."

"I hope I didn't offend you."

 "No, no, this means that you care about me."

"Okay."

One of the guys from Betel then told a story about some Dutch Pentecostals who he saw playing Christian rock, and really praising God.  Vali mentioned that many African Christians use their drums to praise God, and dance exuberantly while doing so (you don't dance if you're a Romanian Pentecostal).  I felt very cared for by my church in my difference.

The next day as we were leaving, Vali asked me if I had felt awkward last night about the whole rock conversation, and I told him no.  I had expected to have to talk about it sooner, but Betel has a drumset and electric guitar, so we understand each other on that front.

So even though my cough is still going strong and I'm pretty tired, I had a really good time with my brothers and sisters from Betel at this conference.  I feel like we understand each other better, something I'm always hoping for.  God pulling together His church of all nations and peoples has its quirks, but a lot of joy.