The ministry I am doing right now, the way I understand it, has two different directions, the first one is the community (the group) and the second is the personal direction. I invest my resources in specific activities such as counseling or personal meetings that I have with the youth. I want to share a few things about what I do together with the youth and also about the blessing we all have here.

As I was saying last time, God made it possible for Igor (one of my disciples) to go away for a while to a Muslim country, even though he had only been a Christian for two months. He went to stay with his mother (she works there) for awhile. His leaving somehow interrupted the process of discipleship. But, on the other hand, God has His own ways. We are praying for him and we have a great joy when he can call and talk. Even though they're short calls, we are thankful to God that we can still keep in touch.

With Igor being away, new opportunities to serve came up. There are many people who have been attending our church for awhile who are attracted by something more than our meetings, probably by the Holy Spirit, Who can work on a profound level in their lives. Many students come to our Thursday meeting who were either invited by someone or they just heard about us.

Rodica , a student, has been attending our meetings for awhile and we are happy that she accepted Christ a long time ago. My main focus has been not only to see people come but to make sure I get to know them better so I can help them more efficiently. On this basis, I started to counsel her with regard to a relationship issue. It may sound a little weird, but lately, I have faced many similar situations, young people flirting and wasting their time on the internet, which can be risky since they connect with total strangers. Though it may sound pretty harsh, I think that this "game" can be fatal both for a relationship and spiritual life as well. I was happy when some of them came to me and said "what do you think matters to me". I always try to back up any situation with the Word. Even though the Bible doesn't say anything about the internet, there are still many helpful principles that can apply to this situation.

Victor is a young man that I have been helping lately. I got in touch with him through his sister who attended the kids club. He is pretty interested in table tennis so I invited him to play with me down at the church. According to my approach, while we're playing we're also building up the relationship. And we don't only get to know each other, but there are also opportunities for me to share the gospel with him.

Cristi is a teenager I get together with on a weekly basis. I do that in order to help him with his English, but my purpose is mainly to help him grow in his faith and be there for him so that he can be a disciple. I am happy when I hear that his parents say that our meeting is beneficial for Cristi's character and behavior, not only for his English.

I have the desire to help as many people as I can. But they all have specific needs and interests and I think they need help according to that. They need help so that they can take little steps in their faith. On the other hand, I admit that I see the importance of group meetings. This is my challenge for this year. Young people are always on the look out for something new and if the church cannot come up with something, they can easily go somewhere else and it may not be a spiritual place with their colleagues and friends. The meetings we have on Thursdays with the
youth (college and high school students) seem to be an attraction for them. Even the people who no longer came on a regular basis or who had quit coming, come to these meetings. This is the case of Dumitru who comes to every youth meeting and has even started coming more often to the church.

At a bigger event, last night (February 25), we had a worship and prayer night. We had more than 40 young people come. Some of them were from other villages. We didn't;t know what was on their hearts but we wanted to challenge them to be holy. Both the songs and the prayers aimed at that topic. I was happy to hear some them saying, "I worshipped God tonight".

When I deliver a message on Sundays, I also try to challenge people to live a holy life and I encourage them to fight sin. The two sermons I had during the last three weeks challenged me personally, especially when preparing for them, to want to be more holy. I think that has been seen in my ministry too.

As a youth pastor for the southern area, I have both responsibilities and blessings. It is a service that requires more of my time. I am no longer responsible for my church only, but for the whole southern area. We already have had three meetings with the youth leaders during the last two months. Our last one was on February 20 when we developed a working strategy and tried to understand how we could practically plan and help the ministry as a whole. We talked about the events we were going to have, but we also had a time of fellowship and discussions about specific situations in the youth ministry.