Planting the Seeds in Galati

1Co 3:6 I planted the seed, Apollos watered the plant, but it was God who made the plant grow.
1Co 3:7 The one who plants and the one who waters really do not matter. It is God who matters, because he makes the plant grow.


Last evening Randy and I along with the team from Cameron, Lanny, Whitney and Andrew; in addition to some of our local National team members hit the streets of Galati. We were armed with our Bibles, Romanian Bibles and an abundance of gospel tracts to distribute. We divided into 3 teams and each went in different directions. At 6:30 in the evening there were many people out strolling the sidewalks.

My team consisted of myself, Lanny and Maria who is from the Betesda Girl's Home. Maria is new to our group, but very interested and eager to share the gospel. Lanny struck out like the lead dog pulling a sled across the deep frozen Alaskan snow, on the look out for just "the person" God would have us approach. Along the trail, we smiled, greeted and handed out gospel tracts to everyone who would accept them.

As we continued our trek, we were abruptly refused by two women sitting in the shade of a building who quickly informed us they were Orthodox! We thanked them kindly and wished them a nice evening. A little further down the sidewalk we found a man picking up ripened apricots from the ground. I approached him and spoke to him using my limited Romanian language, it was enough to get the conversation started. Maria assisted Lanny as he used the scriptures to Share Jesus Without Fear with this gentleman, whose name was Ioan (John). John, like most Orthodox, doesn't know where he will go when he dies. His Father and Mother were Orthodox, so he is Orthodox. I explained to him my parents were both Baptists, and he understood me. I told John that just because both my parents were Baptists did not guarantee me eternal life in Heaven, I had to repent and have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ to receive eternal life.

We made little headway with this gentleman, however we left a very informative tract in his hand and thanked him for his patience and time. Our time and effort spent with John was not wasted even though we did not see any sign of repentance. The seed was planted. It is up to God to make it grow. We must not grow weary or become discouraged when people don't always respond as we want them to. Our responsibility is to be OBEDIENT, go plant the seeds and then watch God make them grow.