The Bitola Bandits

On February 15th we had two fellow believes from Bitola come and play at the coffeehouse. Karen (who is in charge of music) made a lot of flyers and passed them around town. We of course had the usuals, but we were also able to attracts others as well. We try to do things like this often to help give people more opportunities to learn about the coffeehouse and give us more opportunities to meet new people.
Here is Alex and Petar playing:

Jump in the Lake Day

We were able to celebrate possibly the biggest day in Ohrid on Saturday. January 19th is when they celebrate John the Baptist. For the celebration, just about everyone in town makes their way to center and on the way to center they stop off and light some candles at church and pick up a cup of warm Rakija (60% alcoholic homemade drink). When you get to center you get unlimited refills of rakija and wait for the "throwing" to begin. At about 10:30 a high priest makes his way on to a boat and begins a John the Baptist liturgy. The climax is when he blesses a wooden cross and throws into the lake to a crowd of young and old waiting to receive the blessing of being the one who catches the cross. After the cross hits the water, the lake becomes blessed for the day. The person who catches the cross gets a TV and a large sum of money. For the rest of the day, the cross-catcher and his friends go door to door, shop to shop, coffeehouse to coffeehouse collecting money from the people. Needless to say, he makes a good amount of money that day ... no wonder he thinks he is blessed!!.


(Below is an action shot of the priest throwing the cross. The cross is in front of the lady in the pink jacket on top.)


Then after all the excitement dies down, people spend the rest of the day jumping in the blessed lake which is supposed to help them health the rest of the year. And you can also go to center to get blown on by this man below. He told me that is was "blessed smoke" and is was for health...just like jumping in the lake. Needless to say, I got blown because I was close, but he actually had a small line forming. It was sad.

The sad part was that people where buying these jars to store the lake's blessed water and they would use in the future. I asked two people what it was good for and just like the lake and the smoke, having it was good for "health."

Grand Opening of Ima Vreme

As you know, for a long time we have had a coffeehouse that we have been using as a center and hub of evangelism since last April. We realized very quickly that it would be great tool, but there is no way that Mandy and I could do our job and work at the coffeehouse. That is when we filled out a Journeymen request and that is when K and M came to work with us. They came at the end of October and until last week, they were in full-time language class. All of that language is now going to be put into practice as they start working 6 days at the coffeehouse. Last Friday we had our grand opening and it was a success. We had a group of college students (7) from the church in Skopje come down to help pass out flyers and play some music for us. We also had another missionary and good friend from another town come with his friends to help support us in the opening. We had a packed house as you can tell from the picture.

Unfortunately the flash really blows the lighting out of the water, because that half of the coffeehouse was lit by candles. Anyway, the coffeehouse really came out fantastic and God is going to use it greatly. Also, it was huge help to have some people who actually speak the language to get their hands dirty as well. Here is a picture of the group as they were singing and in the other picture you can see the rest of them dispersed among the crowd.

It is going to be a slow start, but we, as well as vistors, think it will pick-up as time goes on and word spread. Continue to pray for the coffeehouse, the girls, and that God would use it for His glory!!

Winter Wonderland

These pictures are from our trip to Vevchani, a nearby village, on New Years. There was tons of snow, and it kept coming down. This southern girl was happy she had a yankee to drive her back home. :0)

Brian and Kate climbed the hill. Our stroller rocks!

Some random Macedonians kids who were sledding and wanted us to take their pictures.

Kate sleeping on our beautiful walk in the winter wonderland. Warm and Cozy.

Merry Christmas!!!

And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth. John 1:14

We wish you all a very Merry Christmas as we celebrate together the birth of our Savior.

Convicting Broadcast

This is a message aimed at all the Christians who read our blog. I will be the first one to say that relational evangelism is most effective method for teaching people about God, the Bible, and the truth of salvation; I am not against door-to-door, but it is not something that I practice. I do believe that everyone needs a chance to hear the gospel and since we cannot meet everyone in the workplace, going door-to-door or spending a couple afternoons in the park handing out water and tracts might be the only way to reach some people. I personally have seen people realize they are separated from God and trust in Christ's work on the cross doing both door-to-door and afternoons in the park. I think one of the reason that I shy away from door-to-door is because it is offensive and often times we get rejected ... and who likes being offensive or rejected? However, I must remember that for all the rejections and offended people, there are those who invite us in. The reason I am telling you this is because I recently heard something on YouTube which showed me that the impersonal and sometime harsh approach of handing out a tract, is sometimes the thing that makes people think. I have realized that I need to balance out my relational with some simple tract distribution. (If you are reading this and don't know what a tract is, here is an example). So I am starting to keep a tract in my pocket for the store owners or people that I will probably only see once or very rarely because who knows if anyone else will take the time to be their friend and share the gospel. The tract has the contact information of the coffeehouse if anyone is interested in talking more. So if you have 8 minutes and 48 seconds, listen to this broadcast by a British pastor on YouTube.

NOTE: For the life of me, I cannot figure out the title or the links that go with this broadcast. The guy speaking is clearly a Baptist and talks about Baptists, but the link is Catholic. Maybe you can figure it out.

A Fantastic Two Weeks

I was intending to write a post last week, but never got around to it, but I wanted everyone to know about the great two weeks we have had at the coffeehouse.
First of all, I was sitting in the coffeehouse with a few regulars and our neighbor came into greet everyone. Just before he left he looked at the new Christian books we just got in and I used the opportunity to strike up a spiritual conversation. He told me he had some questions about “our religion.” In discussing the difference between the Orthodox and “Protestants”, he said “You guys make Jesus the center and base of your religion, this is something we don’t have by us [the Orthodox]” He correctly quoted several previous gospel presentations we had and said that “you do everything through Him, and we … well, don’t.” After asking him if I could show him one verse I showed him John 14:6 to which he gave a hardy and deep thinking “Hmm.” I then turned to show him John 3:16. After reading John 3:16, he really didn’t say much, but he did say “that other one, John 14:6, better proves your point.” And I reminded him that Jesus said it and these are some of the verses we use to make Jesus the center and base of our faith. He looked at me deep in thought and said, “Well if it is in the Bible, and even Jesus said it, it must be true … hmm. I’ll come back and we can talk about it some more.” So a simple question and lots of prior evangelism allowed Vlatko to realized the Gospel on his own.
Second of all, we were able to have a believer from another town named Marin come and spend time at the coffeehouse. Until New Year, we are only open 3 nights a week and we have developed a pretty good crowd or regulars. All three nights Marin was there for at least 2 hours (2 nights he was there for 3 hours.) While he was there, we ended up having Bible Studies every night and our regulars were able to hear about what the Bible said from someone else besides myself. Not only that, they heard it from someone perfectly fluent in Macedonian :). He also told me that just about everyday he had told at least one shop owner about our coffeehouse and how to be saved and that he hoped some of them would come by. This was all very encouraging for us because it was good to have a Macedonian confirm to our friends what we have been teaching.
Praise God for how He is working in Ohrid and allowing us to participate in His work.

Thanksgiving Fun

Thursday evening was a a lot of fun. We had 12 people in all. We had a good time. Brian was able to share a little bit about what Thanksgiving is and he also shared some scripture about being thankful to the One who gives us all good gifts. We then went around the room and everyone told something they were thankful for. It was a good time.
Our turkey wasn't as pretty this year, but it tasted good.

Here is the whole crowd.

M and K with their new friend.

Kate's First Birthday Party

Last night we went to a birthday party for Pavlina, one of our first tutors. Her family has been with us since the beginning. Her mom was very excited to meet Kate.

Progress on the Coffee House

The coffee house is shaping up. Brian has put a ton of work into building shelves and a bar. And the journeymen helped him put up some pictures in there to make it look much better.



We have a lot more books and literature in there now, and a few more people have come by and shown interest. Continue to pray that this place will draw people in who will in turn hear the Gospel and come to know the Lord as their Savior.

A Good Month

The last month has been so good. Kate will be one month old tomorrow, and it is hard to remember what life was like without her. Oh yeah, I remember now--a full nights sleep. :0) In spite of the lack of sleep, we are loving being parents. Kate is eating and sleeping well. And she is so much fun to play with. Please continue to pray for her health and growth.

The journeymen, K and M, are doing great! Praise the Lord. They are plugging away at language and scoping out the coffee houses in town to get some ideas for our coffee house that they will be in charge of running at the start of the new year. Please continue to pray for their adjustment to the new culture.


Thank you so much for your intercessions on our behalf. Continue to lift up the people of Macedonia as a whole. Pray that God will move mightily through this land that many will know Him for His glory.

Mashala. Mashala.

When a baby is born here, Macedonians come bearing gifts of chocolate and sometimes even money. Kate received her biggest group of visitors thus far on Sunday afternoon. They each held her, said “Mashala. Mashala,” and spit on her. Only the baba (grandma) really spit on her. The others just pretended to spit. “Why?” you ask. “Mashala” is from the time when Macedonians were under the Turkish rule. It literally means “blessings from Allah.” And they spit to ward off the “evil eye.” The people here are very superstitious, and so they do this to ensure the baby’s good health.


Slavica knitted Kate a little jacket and insisted that we put it on her while she was there. It is a little big, but cute. Slavica promises a hat and boots to match in the future.

It would be good for you to know that everyone we meet in town, people we know and people we don’t know, do this little ritual with her. Kate has been quite helpful in meeting new people. :0)

Granna and Poppa

Mom and dad arrived safely into Skopje last night. They are enjoying loving on their little grandaughter in spite of my dad fighting a severe kidney stone. He has been to two doctors thus far and may end up back in the doctor's office in the morning depending on how he is doing. Please pray that he will pass the stone so that we won't have to make a trip to Skopje tomorrow and so he can enjoy his time with his grandbaby.

Wedding Day

Marija and Aleksander, our friends that left for America in the spring, just got back and decided on their three weeks of leave from their job in the states they would get married. They are believers and so chose not to get married in the Orthodox church. Brian was asked to be their best man which is a really big job here. He came through with flying colors though. He gave a speech in Macedonian and led a traditional Macedonian dance (the oro, much like a Greek dance) in honor of the bride and groom. We are well on our way to becoming Macedonian. :0) The wedding was interesting and definitely a learning experience. We are so happy for the couple. Please pray for them as they prepare to leave for their job outside of the country again. They will be gone for another 6 months. Pray that they will grow in the Lord while they are gone and that they will grow in love for each other as well.

Journeymen

K (left) and M are our new teammates. We spent the day with the them today and had a great time. Please pray for them as they continue to try and get used to their new life here.

Exciting, Busy, Overwhelming

The past 10 days have been quite a whirlwind. We have had a baby (praise the Lord, she is healthy), gained two new teammates to help us here (praise the Lord again), returned from Skopje with our llittle one, and haven't stopped since. We are both exhausted, but I am sure we will stay tired for the next couple of years. :0) We are so grateful for all that the Lord has done in the past week and a half. His timing has worked out perfectly in all things.

Kate is doing wonderful. We are learning more and more about how awesome our Lord is through her. Our love for her just overflows and grows every moment. What an awesome privilege to know her and watch her grow. She now has her own blog: http://katejoy.blogspot.com The link is to the left so you can always access it from here. Check out her pictures, and let us know what you think.

And yes, we have two new teammates that arrived last week while we were in Skopje. K and M will be here for about two years to help us run the coffee house. We are so SOOOO very grateful for this. They couldn't have come at a better time, and we are thrilled to have them. Please pray for their adjustment to this new culture. Also, pray for their language studies.

Brian has been running nonstop all week, and when he has been home, he has been working on something. Please pray that he will find time to rest and relax.

My parents come in on Tuesday. Please pray for thier safe arrival.

Thanks for all your prayers, support and encouragement.

Kate Joy Davis

Well, we were planning on coming up to Skopje today for our last check-up and from here on out wait for Kate. Here arrival date was supposed be Oct. 22nd and we figured a week would be more than enough time to come up in advance. Well yesterday Mandy was starting to have consistent contractions so we thought it would be wise to come up just in case we needed to get to the hospital quickly (in Ohrid, we were 2 to 2.5 hours from the hospital). About half way to Skopje we thought it would be best if we dropped Cloud off by the Kirkpatricks and headed to the hospital to see if everything was okay. After we got to the hospital at about 9:00pm, they hooked Mandy up to a fetal monitor which showed that she was having real contractions. Then they told us it would be about 4-5 hours before she would be born. Well, at 1:25am on October 15th, Kate Joy Davis was born at 3360g (7 pounds 7 ounces) and 50cm (19.7 in). It all happened so fast and the doctor said it was textbook example pregnancy. Here are some pictures of her below.





And for everyone who has been trying to get in touch with us through email. Since Wednesday of last week we have not had internet due to changing our plan as well as Orthodox holidays. When we return from Skopje everything should be back to normal.

About 3 weeks and counting

We had another doctor's appointment yesterday and all is looking great. Her heartbeat is still good and strong and she is measuring at a normal size. We go Skopje in a week and a half to await her arrival there. Our due date is the 22nd. Please pray for a healthy end to the pregnancy and a healthy beginning to her life outisde the womb. Here are some more pregnancy pictures if you are interested...

The Leaky Sprinkler

On a search for a baby stroller the only one that was affordable and to our liking was a floor model. Since it was on the floor it had its reasonable share of dust. Naturally one day I took it out on the back porch to clean it off. While cleaning it, I noticed a very strange acoustical occurrence which happened every time I leaned over to clean the front of the stroller. I could hear something in my neighbors yard that sounded like a leaking hose or sprinkler but that is strange considering that sprinkler systems don't yet exist in Macedonia and I didn't see any hose. However, without fail, I would hear it every time I would lean over to clean the front. Anyway, as I was wrapping up I turned around and found the leaking hose 12 inches from my face!



Needless to say I took an opportunity to exercise my camera and got this picture. On this picture, due to the wide angle of the lens, I was about 6 inches from him. Mandy and the neighbors practically ran inside and only Cloud was there for support. This snake was about a 2.5 feet long.



And to bestow the appropriate honor to my side-kick, Cloud, here he was watching my back...but at the same time chillin'. He is striking a pose here and saying "Was' up" to all of you who read our blog




P.S. I have about 5 posts that I need to make, but for about 2 months I have been having nonstop problems with Windows. One day, I got 8 blue screens of death in 12 minutes (Mandy will testify). Every time I do anything but open Firefox it crashes. (It already crashed once will writing this post). I don't know the solution to the problem other than to set aside a lot of time to do my work!

Update on Baby

We went to the doctor yesterday, and all is looking great! Her heart rate is about 150 BPM which is really good, and she is measuring at about 4.5 lbs. She is beautiful from what we could see of her. Looks like she may have her mother's shy gene; she always hides her face when we try and get a picture of her. :0) We are just about ready for her arrival. Brian has been insulating the windows and doors in the apartment we live in, and he has also gotten the heaters ready to go for the first real cold day. And I have been sterilizing pacifiers and bottles and washing toys and baby clothes.

We will go to Skopje to await her ariival around October 15th. Please continue to pray for her growth and a safe and healthy delivery. Its almost here!!!!

Brian is Awesome!!!!

So we have been readying ourselves for the arrival of the Lil' Davis (about 6 weeks to go). Brian has been incredible!!! He has...

painted the baby's room,

put a crib together,

moved in new furniture and...

bought me a very VERY special prize!

For my "thanks for having our baby" prize he bought me a dryer! It was a huge surprise!!! I know a dryer doesn't sound that spectacular, but clothes can take days to dry in the winter, plus hanging them all out is very time consuming. So I am super excited! I never even asked for one because I figured the majority of Macedonians don't have one, and it wasn't in our budget. Well, lo and behold, Brian the money manager found room for it in the budget. I am psyched. I even shed a few tears (which isn't that weird these days).
Life before the dryer...

Getting ready to give this baby a spin.

Short Vacation

Last weekend we took a short vacation to Sofia, Bulgaria. We went with some of our friends who live in country with us. It was super fun, and much needed. Sofia is not that impressive of a city, but for us, it was spectacular with good up-to-date movie theaters (we saw three movies in 2 days), Pizza Hut (ate there once, Meat Lover's ummmm!!!), KFC (ate there twice), and a Dunkin Donuts (oh yes, sugar highs all around). It was a blast.

Brian had an enjoyable time navigating around the city with his co-pilot, Jeff. And Amy and I had a good time looking in shoe stores and having girl talk! Take a look at Jeff and Amy's webiste for pictures of the trip:
http://jeffandamywilliams.blogspot.com

Also check out the prayer slideshow that Amy put together. Its great. She included pictures from all over Macedonia to encourage prayer. It is their first post right now. Check it out!

Ooooo!!!!! Ahhhhhhh!!!!

This is the sound of women at a baby shower. Last Friday night, some American friends of mine got together to throw me a baby shower. It was great!!! I was so excited!!!! The food was very tasty. We had pigs in the blanket (very appropriate, don't you think?), cookies cut out in cute shapes, chips and dip and a very delicious Betty Crocker cake mix cake with canned frosting. Umm! Umm! Umm! It just doesn't get any better. It was so nice not only to have a shower but to have tasty American treats to go along, every pregnant woman's dream. I got lots of cute stuff and enjoyed time speaking English and fellowshipping with some women who speak my heart language.

Pregnancy Progress

Thought you might want to see some pregnancy photos:

Breath of Fresh Air

Ahhh! The heat wave is over, and I have actually been chilly the last few evenings. I am not complaining though. The breeze is back and it is lovely out!!! Whahoo!!!