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Montenegro
Kosova
Macedonia
Albania
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April 1, 2008
Deborah and I celebrated the anniversary of our 18th year of marriage
yesterday. As usual for me at these moments I pause to think about the road we
have traveled in our sojourn here on earth. I was again reminded that life is
a progressive process of transitions. This reality is evidenced by the events
that have impacted our lives over the last month.
A dear friend, partner in our efforts here in Albania, and a great encourager
from the day we met her five years ago – Joy Courtney – went home to be with
the Lord on March 11. Her family continues to be in our prayers. I will always
remember the first time Deborah and I met Joy and her sister Oneida Brown
(also a dear friend and sister in Christ) at the train station in Wilmington,
Delaware. “Time is filled with swift transition.”
IBIA successfully completed our 2nd Term on Friday, March 21. The school is a
progressive process of four week terms followed by a one week break over two
years. We work with great intensity during that four week period. The growth
and transformation that God is working is not always immediately obvious, but
we do are blessed with an occasional glimpse of the positive progress.
Our “International Day” focus on the final day of the term was the
Philippines. We were intrigued by this nation of over 7,000 islands and
encouraged to see what God is doing in and with His church. The day was like a
family holiday gathering. We had six women and a baby in the kitchen most of
the day. I was closing up the term in the classroom with exams and summation
lectures. During our breaks the guys kept going into the kitchen to see and
smell these new foods. We appreciated Ruth Byrne (missionary in Fier with her
husband Steve) coming to organize, share and work to bring a taste of Filipino
food to the 17 of us that gathered for the feast.
This year IBIA is expanding our teaching ministry outside of the IBIA
classroom. In our attempt to “build bridges” with all the congregations in
Albania, we are offering opportunities for deeper Bible study. We are calling
this ministry, “Expanding the Kingdom Seminars.” The theme for the four
seminars this year is “Developing a Heart for God” (Studies from Matthew). On
Saturday, March 29 about 60 attended from three congregations: 1) the Adriatic
congregation in Durres; 2) the Durres congregation; and 3) the Tirana
congregation. We were blessed to be able to use the wonderful new facility of
the Durres congregation.
Our 3rd Term began on Monday, March 31. Four members of the Adams Boulevard
congregation in Bartlesville, Oklahoma have come to work with IBIA, teach some
WEI courses and visit with and encourage various workers here in Albania. IBIA
is benefiting from Art Henley (pulpit minister of Adams Boulevard) teaching
“Old Testament History - 2” and Larry Johnson (retired from Philips Petroleum)
teaching “Apologetics - 1” this term. Also Alfred Zike from the Adriatic
congregation is teaching “Greek - 1” this term.
We are grateful to those of you who have recently committed to partnering with
us on a monthly basis – specifically towards our translator. Those funds are
greatly needed and appreciated. The operating budget of IBIA is very tight and
your financial partnership is truly a blessing from God. When you are prepared
to begin sending those funds, you can send them:
c/o IBIA
Adams Boulevard church of Christ
3700 SE Adams Boulevard
Bartlesville, OK 74006
We are encouraged by your faith in God, your love for God’s Kingdom and your
involvement with us as we seek to glorify God through our efforts with IBIA.
To His glory,
Steve Stamatis
Stamatis Status – March 09, 2008
IBIA has ended the second week of our second term. The students have now
completed one term and experienced their much desired first break. As always
everyone has to make adjustments. There are new people, new environment, new
daily schedule, new living situation, new responsibilities, etc. These guys
are developing a good camaraderie.
Deborah and I usually arrive at the school in the mornings about 30 minutes
before our period of devotion. As we walk past the kitchen we enjoy seeing the
guys all seated at the kitchen table praying before they dig into their
breakfast routine of bread, butter and jelly.
For the first two weeks of the first term a very small part of Durres was
without power from 6 to 8 hours every day. The IBIA facility was part of that
unfortunate minority. Once the power problem was remedied (we never found out
why we did not have it) we began experiencing a shortage of water. For three
straight days, we had no water. Wow, what a problem for a residential
facility. On the fourth day we began to receive about 15 minutes of water in
the evenings. This water shortage lasted for about two weeks.
If you are not familiar with Albania, there is not a 24 hour free flowing
source of water for the municipality. Depending on the city or town water is
sent out 2 or 3 times a day. Each house has a tank or “deposit” in which the
water is collected for use until the next time the water is sent out. The
house or apartment must have a pump that moves the water up and into the tank.
In Durres there is water only sent once a day. So 15 minutes a night was not
even beginning to fill the buildings tanks. We could not determine what the
problem was, so IBIA purchased our own 1000 liter tank and a pump in which we
would take the water coming into our apartment and store the excess for if and
when the water stopped coming.
What a firestorm this unleashed with all the neighbors. They demanded that
this was not fair. We could not store extra water if they could not. They
demanded that either we get rid of our extra tank or else buy everyone in the
building their own private tank. Needless to say, we were not going to do
that. Eventually with the cool heads and Christ like character of Alfred Dimce
and Kristofor Findiku, we were able to calm the neighbors down and assured
them that we were not stealing their water.
Fortunately now, we have both power and water. It is amazing how we can so
easily take for granted all the small blessings.
We have started a new tradition at IBIA. On the last week of each term we
focus on one nation during our time of devotion to God. We familiarize
ourselves with the demographic data, the number of congregations of the
churches of Christ and the number of Christians. Our international focus
culminates at lunch on the Friday of the last week. Our lunch is composed of
food from that nation. Our first International Day nation was Italy. Our cook,
Rita, made the best lasagna. We are looking forward to this next International
Day meal in two weeks. Ruth Byrne will be helping us enjoy the food of the
Philippines.
We have such a great support system of people both in the United States and
here in Albania. We are blessed with your continued financial partnership with
us. It is a blessing to have two of our graduates giving so much of their time
and advice to these new students. There are many here that continue to
encourage us in what we are trying to accomplish.
It is vital that we remember why we are here. Our purpose is to train servants
of God that will be able to glorify Him through their life and their service
of the Word. Our prayer is that all of this will be able to be used by God to
expand His Kingdom. By His grace we are in Christ, but there is a world full
of lost people. We want to equip prepared workers to bring in the harvest of
souls that God is working in the world to bring about.
To His glory,
Steve Stamatis
December 18, 2007
Every day God proves that He is our rock of refuge; our rock of salvation;
our firm rock of truth we are building our lives on. Every day we have
evidence that God is our Ebenezer – our stone of help.
Our journey over these last two years has taken us through some unexpected
twists and turns. We have encountered the expected and unexpected. But, our El
Shaddai has been true to His promise to never leave us or forsake us. We have
benefited from the wise counsel of godly leaders. We have had moments of fear
and doubt, but God has used His servants to rescue us. We have seen examples
of sacrificial giving and serving. We have felt moments of despair and
distress but God has used voices of reason and His Word to restore the fire in
our hearts.
We are eternally indebted to those of you who daily put it all on your altar
to God. Today I exclaim, as Samuel did after God granted him a victory when
defeat seemed certain, “Thus far the Lord has helped us.” There is no doubt
that God is our Ebenezer.
Three young men
successfully completed the academic and attitude requirements of the
International Bible Institute of Albania: Eduart Hoxha; Altin Koçi; and,
Bledar Valca. Bledi began working in a finance department of the government in
August and completed the final ten courses with guided independent study using
my course notes and S.I.B.I. DVD’s. He is involved with the Tirane
congregation. Edi will now work full time with Alfred Zike at the Adriatic
congregation in the beach area of Durres . Altin will begin working with IBIA
as our translator. This will be a transition situation while he makes plans
and preparations to plant another congregation in or around the Durres area.
We held the graduation ceremony in a wonderful glass walled enclosure on a
veranda of the President’s Hotel. Though it was cold outside the environment
inside was filled with the warmth of love, excitement, and high expectations.
We were excited that Vasile Iuhos of Oradea , Romania was our keynote speaker
challenging the graduates to be Timothy and find their Timothy. This was a
great blending of the past (Alfred Zike, Alfred Dimce and Vasile Iuhos all
graduated from the Athens International Bible Institute in 2002 while I was a
teacher there); the present (with our three 2007 graduates); and, the future
with two of our four students who will begin in January in attendance (Ari and
Amarro).
We were grateful for the fifty-seven people that came to celebrate the hard
work and persistence of these three men. We had eight congregations
represented by those that attended. It was made even more special because the
parents of the graduates were able to share the moment with us. None of them
is yet in Christ, but we pray this event will open the door to opportunities
to share the good news with them. After the ceremony we had a meal at a nearby
restaurant for the students, their parents, and the faculty and staff of IBIA.
“Thus far the Lord has helped us.”
We are now making the transition to continue to move forward. We thank each of
you who have consistently supported us over the past two years. We hope and
pray you continue to see this effort as beneficial to the expansion and
building up of the Kingdom. We are planning to expand our efforts in Albania
and beyond. We are already making plans for our Second Annual Preachers’ and
Wives’ Retreat. At the request of several congregations in the nation, we are
making an effort to serve them by means of regional seminars and age specific
events. We will inform you as these plans are developed.
We have four additional financial needs:
1. Our translator, Antoneta Findiku, is moving to a new position of secretary
so we will need additional funds for our translator. Two of our students will
need a translator. If you have an interest in helping us fund or find sources
of funding for this need please contact me.
2. We have lost $500 of our monthly support for the school. It is very
important for us to replace these funds.
3. We have need of some one time funding. We have been putting off purchasing
a generator/inverter. With the ongoing and in fact worsening power outages, it
will be very important for us to have this so that the classroom can function
during the five hours without power.
4. We have found a good facility for the school. The monthly price is low, but
we will need to purchase some air conditioning units that provide both heat
and cooling. We need two to begin with. We can purchase a few more later as we
are in the place long enough to accurately determine our specific needs.
If you have an interest in assisting us with some of these needs, I will
supply you with the specifics as you contact me.
We pray God’s blessings on each of you. Look how far God has brought us! Let’s
continue to pray that together we will follow Him as He works His purposes
among us, around us, with us and sometimes even in spite of us.
To His glory,
Steve and Deborah Stamatis
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November 24, 2007
We hope you had as enjoyable a Thanksgiving holiday as we did. My wonder
working wife was able to hunt down recipes and ingredients to produce a feast
for us on Thanksgiving Day. We enjoyed the Southern traditions of turkey,
cornbread dressing, giblet gravy, yeast rolls, green and fruit salads, and
wonderful pecan and pumpkin pies. We had a full table with eight of us
feasting, laughing and enjoying each others company in a relaxed atmosphere of
thanksgiving. The six Albanians that joined us had never tasted our unique
blending of foods.
At the end of our meal we went around the table and each person shared the one
thing they were most thankful for. As I was listening to the others and
simultaneously thinking of what one thing I would share I had a difficult time
narrowing it down to the “one” thing. That moment around the table prompted me
later to revisit my list of things to be thankful to God for. I would like to
share some of those with you.
We constantly thank God for each of you who continue to support us personally
and the ongoing operating expenses of the school. We have lost $500 per month
of the $2,200 we have been receiving for the school. We would appreciate any
names of individuals or congregations that you might know of that would be
interested in partnering with us in a financial way.
We are thankful for the three young men who have committed to begin IBIA in
January. We are still in various stages of conversation with four other young
men that we will continue to work with in the recruiting process.
We are thankful for the three young men that will graduate on December 15. We
have been working on invitations, certificates and the program for the day. We
have invited Vasile Iuhos of Oradea, Romania to come to our graduation and
give the challenge to the graduates. Vasile was one of the students I taught
during my time in the school in Athens, Greece. Since graduating from AIBI he
has been working full time back in his hometown of Oradea.
We have made the decision to move the
school to the city of Durres. Two of our three committed students to begin in
January are from Durres. We believe that our relocating to Durres will
provide more opportunities for students in the future. We are thankful that we
have found and signed the contracts for great facilities for our home and for
IBIA’s residence and classroom.
Though we have lost some personal support and the school has lost 22% of its
monthly support and because the value of the dollar has dropped about 20%
against the Albanian currency (Leke), we trust that God will provide
additional financial partners to enable us to continue our work with IBIA.
We continue to make plans as if God
will provide for our needs. We realize we need to be back in the States
during our winter break trying to raise the funds. But, it is hard to justify
paying the ridiculously expensive price of the airline tickets to the States
for fund raising. We are asking for your assistance to spread the word of our
needs.
If you would like more specific information about our financial needs, please
contact us and we will give you more details.
We are thankful for the opportunity to serve in God’s Kingdom. It is our
constant prayer and desire for our every effort to bring God glory. We are
thankful for Christ’s church. We are thankful for each one of you that is
using your various God given capabilities to partner with us in training these
young men to be more effective tools in God’s hands in expanding His eternal
kingdom.
With gratitude and affection,
Steve Stamatis
October 22, 2007
The days are getting shorter, the temperatures are staying lower and the daily
rains continue to cleanse the city air of its accumulation of street dirt,
cement dust and emission fumes. The change of the seasons awakens us from the
stupor of our daily routines. Sometimes we become so oblivious in our
cloistered environment of the classroom that we lose all sense of the passing
of time.
We are in our second week of this term. This term will be three weeks instead
of the normal four. We gratefully made adjustments in order to benefit from
Chris Swinford – Dean of SIBI’s International Division – being able to be with
us for two weeks. It has been a blessing for the students to be exposed to his
teaching of “Church Planting” and “Revelation.” Next week the students will
study “Scheme of Redemption” by Ed Wharton on DVD.
Since we arrived in Albania I have been asking the Albanian preachers what the
greatest way for us to serve them would be until we were able to provide
trained men to come work with them. Based on their responses I determined that
IBIA would have a retreat for preachers and their wives. This past Friday
night and Saturday we held the first annual IBIA Preachers’ and Wives’ Retreat
at the King Park Resort on Mount Dajti. IBIA was able to offer the retreat at
no charge to those that attended. The rooms were comfortable and the three
meals we shared were delicious. Chris shared three lessons with us entitled:
“God’s Mission”, “Paul’s Mission” and “My Mission”. There were 23 that
attended the retreat representing 8 of the 15 congregations in Albania. We
pray that next year we can extend the invitation to some of the congregations
in surrounding nations.
We now have three (3) young men that have committed themselves to begin IBIA
as the new class that begins in January of 2008. Daniel will come from Romania
and our two other students are from Durres, Albania - they are “Eri” and “Amarro”.
There are two other potential students we continue to work with. We ask that
you continue to pray that God will work in the hearts of those that have
committed to come and those that are still considering.
Though we live in a world of constant and continuing change, we find peace and
security in our eternal and unchanging God. We are also grateful for your
steadfast and continuing partnership with us even though we are aware of the
life storms that many of you are enduring on a daily basis. Your persistence
is always a blessing and encouraging model of how we need to reflect the
character of the Christ day by day no matter what. As we like to emphasize in
the school, we will continue to serve God “whatever happens”.
To His glory,
Steve Stamatis
September 2007
We ended classes after the first week of July and returned to the States
for reporting, fund raising and visiting friends and family. Less than a week
after we returned to the U.S. we traveled to San Angelo, Texas to have a
surprise birthday party for my aunt, Linda “Bunny” Parker. We then traveled to
Lubbock, Texas on the next day to host a surprise 50th wedding anniversary
celebration for my parents – Jim and Nell Stamatis. That was such a special
weekend. We again thank all of you that worked so hard to enable it to go so
smoothly. While we were in Lubbock we had a chance to meet with Doug Reeves
and Chris Swinford at Sunset International Bible Institute about the school,
IBIA, in Albania.
Throughout the summer we were able to visit with many of our supporters but
unfortunately not with all of them. We were also able to make quite a few
presentations of what we are doing for the Kingdom here in Albania. Our time
in the States went by too quickly and we arrived back in Albania in a
whirlwind of activity.
Steve Byrne taught a week seminar beginning on September 3 on Ethics that by
all accounts went very well. Our first four week term began on September 10. I
began teaching two courses, “Letters of John” and “Wisdom Literature” while
Alfred Dimce is teaching “Church History”. In conjunction with the Church
History course the school is taking trips around Albania to see first hand
some of the archaeological sites dealing with religious history in Albania (Illyricum).
We have gone to Butrint where there is a church building and baptistery that
dates back to the 4th century A.D. We have gone to Durres where there is a
Roman amphitheater that dates back far enough that the first Christian martyr
from the area was killed for his faith in 98 A.D. There are also records from
historians of the Roman Empire that speak of the 80 Christian families in the
1st Century A.D. that lived in the Durres area. There are two other sites that
we are visiting this weekend and next weekend.
We actually now only have two guys taking the courses with us in the
classroom. During the summer Bledi Valca, one of our students who had been
preaching in Elbasan, faced some difficulties and decided to take a government
job that was offered to him during the summer break. His long term plan has
been to be self supporting as he works with the church in Albania. This
difficult situation combined with his long term plan added to the fact that
good jobs are very hard to find in Albania, he went ahead and took the job and
began working in the finance ministry of the government. He continues to take
the courses after work and on the weekends using our courses on DVD and the
videos we are making of a few of the courses taught in the school here in
Albania. He plans on completing IBIA’s curriculum at the same time as Eduart
and Altin.
We are working towards a graduation ceremony to be held on Saturday, December
15, 2007 around 2:00pm. We are thrilled that God has brought us this far. This
date seemed so far away back in January of 2006. These three men have worked
so very hard over these past two years. We do still have a couple of months
between us and our finish line for the school, but we definitely have an eager
expectation. We are looking forward to Chris Swinford’s arrival in mid-October
as he will teach “Church Planting” and “Revelation” for us during the two
weeks he will be able to be with us. Chris is the Dean of SIBI’s International
Division. We are grateful that he will be able to teach this group of
students.
We continue to recruit very hard. I have interviewed six people here in
Albania in the last few weeks and one has committed to beginning the school in
January 2008. I will be meeting with two more in the next few weeks. I have
already met multiple times with these two and hope that at least one of them
will agree to join us. We also have a young man from Cluj, Romania that has
committed to joining us for the class of January 2008. We were working with a
young man from Ghana (Africa) for several weeks but have for now ruled out
trying to bring students from Africa. Albania has no embassies on the
continent of Africa with the exception of Egypt. For anyone to try to come
they would have to get a transit visa for Rome or Egypt, pay for their airfare
to Rome or Egypt, make application and wait who knows how long and if they
receive the visa they could continue on to Albania. Since SIBI has a branch
school in Ghana I contacted the director of that school and he was going to
make contact with the young man and see if he really wanted to go to a Bible
school or if he wanted out of Africa. Those were the sentiments of the Ghanian
director of SIBI’s branch school.
Life continues on about the same here in Albania. I suppose we are fortunate
here in Tirane, the capital, that we only lose power for 4 hours every day. In
most of the cities throughout the nation their power outages are much longer.
But, we are blessed that we are never without the power of God. That is the
only reason we are able to continue in what we are doing with whatever level
of success only time will be able to measure.
We thank you for your interest and support of what we do. We pray that our
partnership may continue for God’s glory as we strive to expand and strengthen
His eternal Kingdom.
In Him,
Steve Stamatis
Winter and Spring of 2007
During January, soon after we began our second year, Sokol - one of our
students - made the decision that he needed to go back home to take care of
his parents. Sokol had struggled with that inner conflict from the day he came
to the school. That leaves us with three full time students - two of which
live in the school facilities. In the first two terms of this second year, I
taught “Sacrificial System”, “Developing Bible Class”, “Romans” and
“Discipleship”. I also taught “1 Corinthians”. I broke it up into two parts.
Up until mid-February, we struggled through the loss of power for 3 to 4 hours
each day. That was frustrating, but we were able to push through. Since the
beginning of March our problems with electric power have diminished
tremendously. We are so thankful for this blessing.
It was also a great blessing when Jack Birckholtz - accompanied by his wife
Brenda - came and taught two courses for the third term of this year. During
this month of April Jack taught, “Preaching from the Old Testament” and
“Ephesians and Colossians”. I taught “Isaiah” but since Jack took the brunt of
the teaching load for the month it enabled me to spend much more time and
energy on my goal of visiting all of the congregations in Albania. To this
point we have now visited 9 of the 15 congregations in this nation. We have
been in touch with the others and plan on visiting them in the next few weeks
before we return to the States in the first week of July. We have been
visiting each of the congregations with the hope of recruiting students for a
new class that would begin in January of 2008. Unfortunately, at this date, we
have had no one make the decision to be a student in the school. We will
continue to pray and work towards that end.
Towards the end of April we learned that the landlord of the facility the
school was using had rented the entire building to a business. He told us we
would have to vacate in May. So, we began the search for a new facility. After
a quick and thorough search, we decided to rent the first floor of the
building where Deborah and I are living. So, during our break week of April 30
to May 4, we moved the school to the first floor of Rruga (Road) Beqir Luga,
#4. We have been able to modify the space and have an extremely functional
school and comfortable living quarters for the students. The students and
Alfred Dimci were and continue to be great servants in this time of
transition.
This term is going well. I am teaching “Letters of Peter”, “Jeremiah” and
“Philippians”. We will begin our third week of the four week term on Monday.
The school has come a long way in 1 ˝ years. We will see what God determines
as the future unfolds. After this term is over we will have one more term and
a one week seminar on “Church History” that will be taught during the first
week of July by Beni Leka from Athens, Greece. The school will resume classes
in September with another one week seminar on “Ethics” that will be taught by
Steve Byrne - a missionary working in Fier. Then we will have three 4-week
terms and these three guys will receive their certificates of completion.
We are continually amazed at how God continues to work in us and through us.
We are also constantly grateful for how each of you has stood by our side as
our precious brothers and sisters and fellow workers in this part of God’s
Kingdom.
For His glory,
Steve Stamatis
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December 06, 2006
I realize this newsletter has been overdue for more than a month. For those of
you that are partnered with us in this endeavor, I apologize. As you very well
know, there are seasons in a person’s life where you are hit time after time
after time - without any reprieve to catch your breath or back off for an
objective view. In the midst of the “assault” it is sometimes all you can do
to simply put one step in front of the other each day. I have been putting off
writing this newsletter thinking the barrage would have to end soon. I did not
want to write from a defensive “get by” mentality.
I want to thank you for your continued interest and partnership with us in our
efforts to develop this bible training school in Albania. We give God thanks
every day for your faith in Him and your willingness to share yourselves with
us in so many ways - prayers, emails, support, etc. In spite of the unceasing
waves that have threatened to knock us over in the past couple of months, we
are deeply encouraged by the growth that God has been producing in the
students of IBIA. Many concepts are beginning to click for them. They are
beginning to recognize the tools we have given them and they are realizing
that they actually know how to use them - even though at a minimal level.
Our recent classroom discussions and their recent research papers reveal a
mature and deep sense of the spiritual rhythm and themes of Scripture. We are
getting unsolicited comments from Christians around the nation that they are
seeing a noticeable difference in the men’s demeanor, attitudes, actions,
perspectives and preaching skill and content.
This has been an important blessing to us as we have been hit in so many other
ways. I use the term hit because two days ago I was hit by a car. Let me
clarify. My right leg, in mid-stride, was hit by a car that was breaking every
possible traffic rule at this specific intersection. The injury is nothing
severe. My leg is fine except for a bump, bruise and some scraped skin.
As I was telling Deborah what had happened, it sort of clicked for both of us
that this was one additional minor hit in what has become a continuous string.
We share our struggles because we depend on your prayers for strength and
courage.
1. My brother’s wife, Amy Stamatis - Diagnosed with a rare disease and
struggling with depression as a result. On top of that she suffered a tragic
accident that caused severe spinal damage - potential lower body paralysis.
She is currently suffering pneumonia from damaged lungs that were both
punctured from broken ribs.
2. Unfortunately, we will postpone starting a new group of students until
January of 2008. There are several reasons. Some individuals that were
suggested to us as prospective students proved to be very unqualified. Also,
there are various groups within Albania whose attitudes towards the school
range from being strongly not with us, to being opposed to us. The
issues existed long before we arrived, but we suffer as many innocent
Christians do from the consequences of pride, lack of forgiveness and a
domineering spirit.
From the beginning, we knew that if IBIA were going to succeed we would need
to have an active recruiting participation from each of the congregations in
Albania. Sadly, that has not yet been realized.
3. The adjunct faculty and staff continue to be hit with health and family
crises.
-
Alfred Zike had
surgery in late September
-
Our translator,
Antoneta, has suffered the death of her sister’s husband in September and her
mother died yesterday.
-
Alfred Dimci
suffered the loss of a cousin to a tragic accident a few days ago
-
Our cook, Teuta,
suffered the loss of a family member in September
4. My health is a side issue until it threatens to hinder the continuity of
the school. I have had to continue to teach through the flu, a persistent back
issue and now my “fender bender” shin.
5. We realize that the frustrations of living in a very different culture will
always pop up. But, one more hit that at times threatens to be our undoing is
the continual, but arbitrary power outages in Tirana. This hit affects every
facet of our life in Albania.
At any moment of any day you can be in the middle of something in the bathroom
and then pop - you are in darkness. If the power goes out at specific times of
the day it threatens our ability to have water. It could come when the chicken
is only half cooked.
We are honestly striving to practice James’ admonition to “consider it all
joy” when we face all our trials.
We love and appreciate each of you. I would like to encourage you to consider
attending the annual Albanian/Romanian Workshop. This year it will be hosted
by our sponsoring congregation in Bartlesville, OK. It will be January 12 -
13, 2007. The theme is, “Growing the Kingdom.” You can email Bob Seat, the
mission committee chairman, for any additional information -
bseat@adamsblvd.org
Steve Stamatis
September 2006
We started and ended our time in the States this past summer with three-day
driving journeys - first from New York to Arkansas and then the reverse on our
way out of the country. We flew out of New York’s JFK airport on Thursday the
31st of August. The night before, on Wednesday the 30th of August, we were
blessed to be able to share some time with some of the Christians at the
Waterbury congregation in Waterbury, CT. It was an encouraging opportunity to
share with them some thoughts about World Missions.
The two 24 hour driving journeys were good periods of transition. Our time in
the States was a good blend of IBIA pursuits and some time to spend with
family and restore our energy and focus. Our routines developed a good rhythm
which helped us to have a sense of accomplishment and ease on several levels.
While we were in the States we were able to achieve some of our goals because
of the generosity and sacrifice of many of you. We now have four additional
notebook computers that we will be bringing back as we are able. We had plans
for them to be brought over by some Christians from Bartlesville, OK but due
to intensified terrorism alerts on some airlines those plans did not work out.
Many of you also verified that you would continue to partner with us
financially and we are grateful for that. Some of you have also generously
contributed towards some of our financial needs such as our travel fund and
work fund. The Bartlesville, OK congregation also purchased and brought to
Albania for us all of Sunset’s current studio DVD courses with the
accompanying CD with the syllabi of all the courses. This will be a great
resource for our visiting teachers and for the school to supplement the
teaching if we are not able to recruit enough visiting instructors. Also,
thanks to some of you IBIA now has a TV and DVD player (that plays both
European and U.S. zone DVD’s) to be used with the SIBI DVD courses.
We returned to Albania on September 1. During that last week of August the
IBIA students were required to participate in a planned outreach of the
congregation in Durres. The Durres congregation had been working all summer to
evaluate the receptivity of the people in a different part of the city than
where they now meet as they consider beginning another congregation in Durres.
Art Henley, the pulpit minister of the Adams Boulevard congregation in
Bartlesville, OK, conducted a gospel meeting for that week. Our students were
there to assist in any way that was needed. On Monday, September 4, IBIA began
with a week long seminar, “Biblical Theology of Missions.” Art Henley was the
instructor. Bob Seat, the chairman of their mission committee was also with
Art and it was good that they both had a chance to spend time with the
students.
We are beginning to find a good cadence and rhythm to our daily schedule as we
have now completed two weeks of our first term. We will have three 4-week
terms from September until the middle of December. This term I am teaching,
“The gospel of Mark”, “Apologetics 2” and “Evangelistic Methods”. There is a
new missionary couple (Steve and Ruth Byrnes) in Fier, about a two hour drive
from Tirane. Steve has asked if our students could preach occasionally for the
congregation in Fier. So, three of the students will rotate preaching there on
the first Sunday of every month. This will be another great opportunity for
the students to receive encouragement, advice and some good spiritual
mentoring from a well experienced and spiritually mature man. Steve has a
certificate from the White’s Ferry Road School of Preaching and has been a
missionary in the Philippines and has preached the last eleven years in
Alaska. One of our students already preaches every weekend for the
congregation in Elbasan - about 1 ˝ hours from Tirane.
I have been attempting to recruit new students to begin the school in January.
The Lord has blessed us with one commitment so far. His name is Skendar. He is
from Orikum which is a coastal city four hours south of Tirane. Skendar is in
his mid-50’s, married and the father of two daughters. One is married and the
other is a university student. They both live in Chicago. The Church in Orikum
meets on one floor of a four floor building that Skendar owns. He will soon
have a second floor completed for the use of the Church. Skendar has several
businesses, one of which is a “Western Union” station. He is retired from the
Albanian Navy. He was a submarine captain for 20 years. He has several
university degrees. One of his degrees enabled him to be what we would term a
preacher for the Communist Party dogma. Skendar and his wife thoroughly
discussed his coming to the school before he contacted me of his interest.
Skendar will live in the IBIA residence during the week while his wife stays
in Orikum and runs the businesses. He will commute each weekend to Orikum
where he will continue as a leader for that congregation. Our school schedule
will work well for him during the summer months where he will be off to work
another one of his businesses - a tourist shop.
I am continuing to work at recruiting new students for the January class. We
have several additional leads, but no definite commitments other than Skendar.
For the last couple of weeks there are men and boys walking through the
streets beating drums calling the Muslims to be getting prepared for Ramadan.
This incessant and not often rhythmic beating can be very annoying and
distracting as I try to think, study or teach. I continue to be amazed at how
legalistic this man made religion is. There is not one hint of grace in their
belief system. With the daily frequent prayers projected from the towers
scattered throughout the city and the never ending drum being beaten along
every street in the city, it screams that this religion is totally based on
externals. It survives only by extreme external behavior modification. What a
reminder of why we are here. There need to be well trained servants of Christ
and His Word that can hold up the Light in the midst of the Darkness.
Please pray for:
-
The strength and
growth of our current students
-
Additional
students that desire to be trained at IBIA
-
Additional
visiting instructors
-
An additional man
who would move here to work with
IBIA
-
Our spiritual and
physical health
-
Opportunities to
share our needs with other potential
partners
-
Living to the beat
of a different “drummer”,
Steve
Deborah’s Details
Life just keeps on getting better. Upon our arrival in Tirana in September,
Steve and I immediately noted that though we don’t feel 100% at home here, we
are not so overwhelmed by being here. I think the hardest part of our cultural
adjustment period is over.
Albania and Tirana continue to make improvements to the infrastructure that
makes everyone’s life easier. New highways were begun during the summer. Old
roads have been repaved. One of my favorite improvements is a new park being
built to replace what I have previously referred to as a “public toilet.” When
it is completed, Steve and I will walk through it every day on the way to
school.
Another addition I am excited about is a new supermarket (still not “super” by
American standards) about a mile from our house. This is too far for me to do
all my shopping there, but I go for several special things I can’t find
anywhere else. This market has fresh chicken breasts wrapped in Styrofoam and
cellophane! Having this available has made cooking and eating so much better
for us. This market also has better beef than I’ve seen anywhere else…and the
meat area appears to be sanitary!
Okay, this doesn’t fit with my theme, but I want to tell you: A couple of
blocks from our house, next to the outdoor produce market, there is a traffic
circle. In the center there is a circle of grass surrounded by a hedge. There
are three or four trees in the circle. One day I saw a sheep hanging up-side
down on the Mimosa tree. A man was skinning it, apparently for the family of
five that was standing there watching him. This scene is unusual, but not
really surprising. Most fresh meat is skinned in or in front of the butcher
shops. I’m guessing this guy was not a butcher, but just a guy with a sheep to
sell. Meanwhile, cars, buses, bicycles, pedestrians, and dogs continued on
around and through the circle as usual.
I covet your prayers personally for our safety, spiritual strength, health,
and peace of mind.
Looking toward heaven where no improvements are
needed, Deborah
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