"I heard you can tell us about Jesus. Would you please visit us?"

 

 Toponica village is on the way to Dubovo, few kilometers behind Zitoradja.
It is situated some 20 kilometers from Prokuplje.  We have learned that
there are about 150-200 people who live there (some 69 families). People are
mostly Orthodox and pretty poor and Roma families in the village live beyond
poverty and mainly engaged in seasonal work. We don't know how they learned
about us, but they told us that they heard about us from some people. They
met Sasa and wanted to know more about our church. Sasa told me about them
and we visited that family.

When we visited them for the first time David, Arben and Sasa's wife
Lidija came along with us. We are especially glad that Lidija came because
we wanted her to be more active in visiting people, because we believe that
it means a lot for her spiritual growth and development. We believe that
we'll be able to motivate her for that, but we also need Sasa's support in
this.

As I have informed you earlier, Ljubisa (40) has opened his home for the
gospel. He is very educated man and in comparison with other Roma houses in
the village, his house is quite good. He lives with his wife, two sons,
daughter-in-law, his mother and two grandsons. They welcomed us in their
home with much gratitude. We told them who we are, what we believe and
preach. Sasa also shared his testimony. They were listening with much
attention , asked questions about Roma's tradition. We are very happy about
this first visit and much encouraged. Right then we set our next visit.

After ten days we visited them again and we were happily surprised.
Beside Ljubisa's family there was also another family whom Ljubisa invited
to join the meeting. That's a family of three, so during our second visit, 20-22 people attended, and there were 9 new people who came.  

For the first time we have experienced that a house group which is not yet
formed has been visited by so many people. We think that it might be because
it is very small village and there is not much going on there, people were
curious and wanted to see and hear what it is about. Whatever the reason we
were very excited about that.


David had opportunity to share how God worked in his life, how his heart
has been changed and that he is great testimony in his home and the place
where he lives.

Sasa also shared what we believe, why church, etc. It seems that they liked
everything they heard, but not much excited until we started to sing. We
could have seen the radiance on their faces during time of worship and we
were able to see that the Holy Spirit works in their hearts. After that and
a prayer they tried to explain their experience during time of worship. They
were especially touched with the prayer in their own language. They told us
that the prayer gave them assurance that we are "the right ones". They told
us to bring them CDs with songs in Roma language and material for Bible
study. We couldn't believe what we heard, because we thought that maybe it
is still too early for something like that, but God has taught us a
beautiful lesson.

Maybe it is too soon for conclusions, but we can see some faith in these
people's hearts. This small faith has a potential to grow and to become
faith which God wants all new born believers to have. I know that we are
responsible what will happen with this people and the village so we pray for
God's guidance and wisdom, especially when time comes when the whole village
will hear about us, their comments and reactions.

We want to visit them more often and every time to bring some young people
with us, to give them a chance to share God's Word with those people and to
grow in their faith in such a way.