Our latest Prayer Update

Back to Bucharest!

In answer to many prayers over the last year we are delighted to announce that we all have tickets and passports in hand to return to Romania August 25th!  We are in the midst of packing, last-minute experiences for the kids, and preparing to say good goodbyes.  While the wait has felt long at times, looking back we are amazed by the many opportunities the Lord gave us in the last year for growth, training, partnership development, and family.

Summer Update
God worked in a wonderful way over the summer as we met with individuals and churches to share the ministry God has given us.  We spent the last two months in Michigan and were overwhelmed by the kindness and generosity of our church family there.  We had the privilege of sharing with the kids at the South Church VBS in June where we spent 5 days sharing about Romania, why we should all care about missions, how someone becomes a missionary, and how we are encouraging Romanians to become missionaries.   It is our prayer that some of the 300 children we spoke to will one day become missionaries themselves.

September Birthday

Next month Bucharest celebrates its 555th anniversary! We love our city and desire to see God’s Kingdom bringing transformation to the 3 million residents. Here’s how you can be involved! Together with our city team we’re asking God to raise up 555 people to pray for Bucharest each day of September. We know that the foundation of revival is prayer, and are convinced our prayers will bring hope and new life to this needy city. 

Our team’s goal of 555 intercessors is ambitious and will require a lot of help. We are eager for you to pray with us and ask you to invite others to pray.

If you will be one of the 555, please send a quick reply to let us know and you’ll receive our calendar with prayer points for each day of the month.

Jeremiah 29:7a “Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you”

Bucharest's new 555 monument in Piata Victoriei.

Spring Update

In the interest of keeping in sequence, if not up-to-date, here is the prayer update we sent out this June...
In our last update we mentioned the rapid decline in the health of Joshua's father. On the morning of May 12th Raymond Dunckel met his Savior in heaven. We are so thankful he is no longer in pain and discomfort, that Joshua was able to say his goodbyes, and that we were in the States when it happened. We had already reserved housing to spend June and July in Michigan, which is another example of God's perfect timing this year. This enables us to be near Joshua's mother as she begins the next season of her life.

 When we left Bucharest last summer the ReachGlobal team was launching a refuge for trafficked women in Bucharest. When we joined the ReachGlobal team this year we were excited for the opportunity for Kara to become involved in this ministry upon our return. Since we have been in the U. S. the shelter has grown in its impact and scope. Last month its director was recognized by the U. S. government for its work in combating human trafficking! In the words of our team leader...

 "Each year the US government chooses 10 heroes worldwide to recognize for their accomplishments in the battle against human trafficking. This year Monica Boseff, our director at Open Door Shelter was chosen! Joe Biden was in Bucharest last week and gave Moni the award. She insisted on receiving it in the name of all our staff at the clinic. She had the opportunity to spend an hour with Jill Biden and introduce her to three of the young ladies living at the shelter. Everyone was in tears as they talked of their past and God's amazing work in their lives. Later at the ceremony, Moni explained that these young women are the true heroes, fighting to overcome the trauma of their past to reintegrate as healthy members of Romanian society. We are thrilled to see signs of blossoming spirituality in the life of our beneficiaries." 

 Coming up... 

 We have settled into the South Church mission house in Lansing for the next several weeks. We'll be working on partnership development with churches and individuals. Please be in prayer for a few key meetings with churches this month as we recruit new ministry partners. In the middle of the month Joshua will be heading back to Minnesota for a week of training in "Multiplying Churches Globally." This is the last training session on the schedule before we leave for Romania. When this is completed we have only to wait on God to provide the funding we need to return. We are currently at 83% of our monthly support requirement. It is exciting to be getting closer to the finish line, passing milestones along the way back to Romania. Anders sat still for his first passport photo last week and soon will officially have the cutest passport in the family.

 June launches the VBS season and we are honored to be the Vacation Bible School missionaries for South Church. We'll have opportunities each day to share with the children why missions is important and how they can pray for Romania. Since we are living next door, it will be both fun and convenient. Thank you for your prayers for our family and our ministry. This has been a year in which we have seen God at work more clearly than ever before, and this is a result of united prayer on our behalf.

 Grace & Peace,
Joshua & Kara Dunckel (and Noemi, Isobel & Anders, too!)

Working and Waiting

If the Lord Jehovah makes us wait, let us do so with our whole hearts; for blessed are all they that wait for Him.  He is worth waiting for. - Charles Spurgeon In this season of transition we are often asked when we are returning to Romania.  The answer is: as soon as possible!  We are keenly aware of people, places, and opportunities we are missing.  Some of our schedule for this year is dictated by training we need to complete before we return to Romania.  The biggest hurdle to our return is the financial support required before we will receive clearance to head back to Bucharest.  This season requires us both to work and to wait, which sounds much simpler than it actually is.  However, in the working and waiting we are seeing God's hand at work in fresh ways. God is using our empty apartment... A young unmarried couple started attending our teammates' Bible study when they were convicted through their exploration of God's Word.  When they decided to stop living together one of them needed a new place to live.  Enter our apartment... We have an apartment in Bucharest where our books, clothes, wedding pictures, books, toys, and more books are stored in a bedroom, awaiting our return.  It is a two minute walk from the workplace of the young woman from Bible study.  This spring she moved in to our place to room with our new ReachGlobal teammate.  We are so thankful to have our apartment become a step of obedience to God for this young couple. Isobel in front of our apartment building God is caring for our family... When we are in Romania the thing that sometimes tugs, sometimes yanks our hearts towards home is family.  Since our return to the US we have witnessed the steady decline in the health of Joshua's father.  He is in the hospital as I write and his situation changes daily. While, many days, we wish we were able to be back in Romania already, we are so thankful to be able to be with Joshua's family for this time.  In this season of waiting on God, it is encouraging to see some of the purpose in His timing Joshua's father turning 85 last summer God is working in our absence... Meanwhile, in Romania, exciting things are taking place.  Our team is fighting human trafficking with a safe house for trafficked women.  Because of the impact of the first house, as well as Romanian laws about housing minors, a second safe house for younger victims of trafficking is being planned. Bucharest is a bustling metropolis where you can find a mix of languages and cultures.  The most diverse area of the city is a market called Dragonul Rosu {Red Dragon}.  A prayer group has begun meeting weekly to pray for the spread of the Gospel among the community there.  When Muslim friends stop by to join in, the meeting becomes a Bible study.  We look forward to meeting and praying with them at our return. Grace & Peace, Joshua & Kara Dunckel (and Noemi, Isobel & Anders, too!)

Moving Forward

Last year was a year of big changes for our family.  Anders' birth in September was one of the best changes you can get.  However, this year we are also enjoying another great change.  We are now officially missionaries serving with ReachGlobal instead of One Challenge.  We have good friends on the One Challenge team in Bucharest and look forward to seeing them when we return to Bucharest. However, as far as ministry fit is concerned, ReachGlobal is where we see God's place for us.  There are many benefits to this transition, and we'll list the biggest ones for you. 1. Ministry Focus.  With OC our ministry was headed more and more in the direction of MK (missionary kid) education.  While we are so very thankful for the staff at the Christian school and the ministry they have had to our children, we know the reason we came to Romania was not to work in the school, but to mobilize Romanian missionaries. 2. Healthy ministry.  ReachGlobal is committed to "healthy people living in healthy teams equipping healthy leaders in order to multiply healthy churches."  We have seen this playing out in their team culture on the field and already have seen its benefits for us personally.  The enemy does not want missionaries to survive, thrive, or be effective, so we need to be intentional about taking steps to be healthy and keep our ministry healthy.  It does not just happen. 3. Seasoned colleagues.  Our new team leaders are a couple who have been mentoring us over the last couple years.  They have been working in Romania for nearly 20 years and possess a wealth of experience and wisdom which we value highly. A few facts about ReachGlobal... ReachGlobal is the missions arm of the EFCA (Evangelical Free Church of America).  They have been sending missionaries for about a hundred years. Some key points of their ministry philosophy (which we are so excited about!) can be found here http://go.efca.org/resources/document/reachglobal-sandbox-overview Their ministry vision is to to impact 100 million people with the gospel over ten years. ReachGlobal's ministry strategy is "Develop. Empower. Release."  This fits in well with missions mobilization as we develop Romanian believers who are interested in missions, empower with the tools needed for ministry, and release them into cross-cultural ministry.  We also want to develop a missions vision within the Romanian church, empower it to greater involvement in the Great Commission, and release it to do these things in a distinctly Romanian way. With a new organization comes a new budget.  We are required to be at 100% of our monthly support before returning to Romania.  The next few months will be filled with personal and professional development as well as ministry partnership development.  Please pray with us for God to prepare churches and individuals to financially partner with us in this ministry.  We are praying that God would allow us to return to Romania this July. We have already seen Him moving in wonderful ways. Grace & Peace, Joshua & Kara Dunckel (and Noemi, Isobel & Anders, too!)

Aaaaand, we're back! On the blog, that is.

Let's pretend we haven't neglected this space for the past two years, dust it off, and get a fresh start.  I'll start by posting our most recent prayer updates and plan to keep it current from there.

Spring Break!

One of our favorite parts of being involved at the Bucharest Christian Academy is seeing the various ministries other families at the school are doing.  Last weekend we kicked off our spring break with a visit to Camp Living Waters, which is run by some friends from school.  In the summer it is full of orphanage children getting fresh air, sunshine, a chance to swim in the creek, LOTS of love, Bible stories, games, good food ... the list goes on.  We went to join a group of students at the camp to help cut lumber for the BCA school playground, but the girls and I didn't do much but enjoy God's creation and the great group of people we were with.  Later this spring  we plan to go back and work on some of the buildings before summer camps begin.  One look at the pictures of kids at the camp and you would want to help out, too.

Protests

So, every night for almost a week I have ignored my desire to pick up a camera and take the metro a few stops to the site of the protests going on downtown.  Joshua (otherwise known as "the voice of reason") informed me that this was not a good idea.  Anti-austerity protests have become the quintessential European experience lately and I just wanted to see what one is like.  On the other hand, on Saturday a small minority used the protests as an excuse to indulge in vandalism and rock throwing and so, right now, Piata Universitatii may not be the safest place in the city.

A quick read of a news article will fill you in on the basic facts.  The popular minister of health disagreed with the president over health care reforms and then resigned.  Protests ensued.  The next day Basescu (the president) abandoned the reforms because the medical community opposed them.  Still, protests grew and spread to cities throughout Romania.  Today, day five of the protests, the minister of health has been reappointed.  He was willing to withdraw his resignation because the legislation he opposed had been scrapped.  Now people are still protesting, but they are protesting year-old austerity measures, age-old government corruption, and any other pent-up frustrations they have.  The conflict that sparked the protests has been resolved, but the flood of discontent it unleashed has not yet abated.

It's so good to rest in the truth that God is in control and He is good.  Because no government can give people what they want.  All our politicians are just as flawed and sinful as us.

On speaking a foreign language in a foreign land...

So today the girls and I visited the nursery at church for the first time in a while.  We were all excited to see our friends there and the kids I worked with in the last couple years have grown up so quickly.  I remember when Monica was learning to crawl and now she is walking around and talking in a grown-up little voice.  I sat down to color with her ("but not in black because it's UGLY").  When I turned to tell Isobel something (in English) she gave me a frank stare and asked, "Why do you talk so badly?"  As if English was just very poorly pronounced Romanian and I need to work on that ... asap. 

December Prayer Letter

One of the oft repeated phrases in our house is “You don’t need more stuff, you need more contentment.”  Joshua and I pull it out after toy commercials or walking past toy store windows or pretty much any contact with toys that do not belong to our children.  Some day the girls will surprise us and use it on us when we’re walking past an Apple Store.  In this season bookended by Thanksgiving and Christmas we have a welcome reminder to stop and contemplate what we have been given. 

home/hōm/  (noun) The place where one lives permanently, esp. as a member of a family or household.

We have called so many places home in the last year due to our travels in the US.  We were overwhelmed by the hospitality offered us.  But at the end of our trip we looked forward into walking into our own front door and sleeping in our own beds. 

On the short walk between the bus stop and church there is an abandoned market square, with crumbling cement stalls losing the battle with the weeds.  As we walked into the cold wind this Sunday I watched some children duck out of one of the stalls, run to another and knock on the scrap wood covering the doorway.  There are families living in those buildings, without insulation, heat, or plumbing.  I am thankful for an apartment with a door that locks and windows the wind can’t penetrate, radiators giving off heat, pipes running with water.  We are richly blessed, and deeply responsible.  When I pointed the makeshift homes out to Noemi she instantly tried to think of ways to help.

We are thankful Jesus left the unimaginable luxury of His home in heaven and came to earth where he had “no place to lay his head.” (Luke 9:58) We are looking forward to our forever home in heaven with him, and praying that the families living in the market stalls today will join us there, living in the joy of God’s presence.

hope/hōp/ (noun) 1archaic : trust, reliance

2a : desire accompanied by expectation of or belief in fulfillment; also : expectation of fulfillment or success

b : someone or something on which hopes are centered

The train’s headlights were shining on the walls of the tunnel as it headed around the corner to pull into the station.  A woman slid off the platform, onto the tracks and walked into the tunnel.  The people nearby instantly reacted with frantic shouts, arms waving.  Somehow the train stopped in time and she was rescued, for the moment.  Joshua and Noemi witnessed this episode from farther down the platform.  A few days earlier one of Joshua’s students was late to class in the morning because of a similar event on her train.  We imagine the financial climate here has something to do with these incidents, but there could be any number of explanations.  When it comes down to it, the despair of life without Christ must be overwhelming. 

We are thankful for the hope He gives us. Jesus not only gives us hope, He IS our hope.  Merry Christmas from the Dunckel Family!  Thank you for partnering with us in sharing this hope!

Only in Romania...

... would a great-grandmother stop my children on the sidewalk on the way to school, reach into her bag with a shaking hand to give them each a candy, give them a kiss on the tops of their heads, and I call it an average, everyday walk to school. 

Orthodoxy

So today I was waiting for the bus with Isobel when a woman asked me for directions.  And as happens so frequently here we started chatting.  When I told her that we are in Romania as missionaries with the Baptist church she gave me her insider's perspective on Romanian Orthodoxy. " Romanians are very, very Orthodox.  We are deeply religious, going to church almost daily," she told me. "That is why God has allowed us to be so poor, because we have faith and we have hope."

October Prayer Letter

We have been back in Romania for almost two weeks as we write this letter (a month before you read this).   School has started for Noemi (1^st grade) and Joshua (teaching US Government).   Stepping off the airplane in Bucharest was rather like diving into a pool on a summer day.  We were instantly immersed in Romanian language, and unlike our arrival two and a half years earlier, we had the tools to manage.  We were so thankful for our language skills as we dealt with lost luggage (now found), kitchen repairs, and reconnecting with our neighbors.  That said, the more we learn, the more we realize we have to learn.  

Before our visit to the US Joshua had made remarkable progress in learning Romanian yet fell short of our team’s language requirements.  Joshua also felt that something wasn’t clicking in the language process for him.  The lessons, homework and practice didn’t produce the progress he wanted.  Kara began researching learning disabilities and by God’s grace we found helpful information.

One of our goals for our time in the US this year was to have Joshua evaluated for a condition called Auditory Processing Disorder.  It is a learning disability that affects the brain’s ability to decode sounds.  So, in a crowded room at a party, a person with APD struggles to pick out the sounds of the person next to them even though they are speaking loudly enough to be heard over the din.  Or in a normal conversation using everyday language a person with APD will be decoding the conversation two words slower than it is progressing, and miss the end of the sentence.  Some people with APD hear random words in a sentence as nonsense words or mumbles.   Approximately 20% of adults have APD and males are two times more likely to be affected.  

When the evaluation confirmed that, yes, Joshua did have Auditory Processing Disorder we began looking at solutions.  It is not “curable” but we found tutoring with proven results in improving processing.  This tutoring was expensive, but once again we saw God’s goodness, this time through His people.  Our church in Minnesota covered the entire cost of evaluation and training.  We returned to Romania equipped with our two years of language lessons as well as processing tools for APD.  We are looking forward to seeing what God will do this term.  

• Please pray for Joshua as he strives to meet an ambitious language goal by December. 
• Pray also for his continued efforts to encourage young Christians to fulfill their role in the Great Commission.  We are certain God has brought us here to do His work and are privileged to be a part of it here in Romania.

September Prayer Letter

As we write this … We are packing up and beginning the process of saying our goodbyes in the US for another two years. The next few weeks will be like a 1600 mile farewell tour as we drive to visit families and churches one last time.  As we near the end of our first home assignment we are excited to get back to Bucharest and all that is waiting for us there.  Our time in the US was refreshing, encouraging and humbling as we saw the kindness so many of you offered us on our visit. As our hearts overflow with thankfulness to God for providing all our needs, we want to thank you as well, and let you know you have been a blessing.  We were richly blessed by so many people who offered us housing on our travels, enjoying their company even more than the comfort of their homes.  Those who offered vehicles were invaluable, filling an unavoidable and seemingly insurmountable need.

Thank you to our churches for welcoming us home after two years away.  We walked in your doors and felt instantly at home.  Meeting so many people who actually read our prayer letters and pray for us humbled us, and infused us with a fresh sense of the responsibility we’ve been given. 

We are thankful for the small groups and prayer groups that took the time to learn about our ministry.  Especially precious to us is our small group in Minnesota who let us crash their meetings even though they knew we were only around for a short while.  Being enveloped in Christian community made us even more at home than being surrounded by Target, Starbucks, Taco Bell and English speakers.

As you read this… Several weeks will have passed.  We will be settling into our routine in Bucharest.  Joshua will be spending time in language study, involved in our team’s ministries, mentoring missions-minded youth and teaching Government/Economics at the MK high school.  Kara will be juggling homeschooling with school runs for Noemi’s part-time attendance at the MK school.  Isobel will be working on pre-school at home with mom and learning Romanian as fast as she can. 

Thank you for your prayers!

The Dunckels