Barnabas Bridge Tuesday August 19 2014

Sunday evenings in Tg Mures are always interesting. The music and the praying is loud! (this is Gypsy style! – combine it with Pentecostal and you will find it impossible to sleep at this church service!) Maranatha church is full to capacity and there is great freedom and emotion when Doug preaches. One thing we note on every visit is the readiness of people to seek out prayer. There is not the same kind of reluctance/shyness/pride – or whatever – that seems to hold back many North Americans from admitting their need and crying out to God for help in their lives. Yes, their situations are more desperate, but still it seems to be an attitude difference. Experience this with us sometime and you will see what we mean.

In this photo we are praying for those who came forward after Doug finished preaching. Pastor Horvath of Maranatha Church in Cold Valley (left) is praying in Romanian, Doug is in the centre and praying in English, and Pastor Zsomber Horvath-Kovacs of another church (right) is praying in Hungarian – and those for whom prayer is being offered are Roma (Gypsy).

This is a city split pretty evenly between Romanian speaking and Hungarian speaking people – many are bilingual. There is also a significant Roma population. All of this makes for a unique challenge to Christian ministry. Some facts about Tg Mures: It sits on the banks of the Mures (or Maros) River. Targ in Romanian means ‘market’. Vasarhely in Hungarian means ‘market’. So the city is named Targu (older spelling is Tirgu) Mures in Romanian and Marosvasarhely in Hungarian. In this part of Transylvania is common to see signs in Hungarian and Romanian. So, “MARKET ON THE MURES”. The Sunday morning outdoor market covers many acres of ground, and is the largest we have ever seen! The first written records of this city go back to 1332, though the city is older than that. The population is about 150,000.