Trust his Guidance

One of the things that our long-term Romania team was praying about was finding a house. We had been renting a big Air B&B that suited our needs when members of the Ukraine relief group came through town, but with our numbers slowly thinning we wanted to find something better size-wise and financially for our team. 

About a week after Garrett and I moved here, we started the search with our other long-termer Carina and the help of our friend Cristi. Cristi had found a couple places for us to tour, so he set up appointments. But around this time, our neighbors at the Air B&B were causing problems with our landlord. Garrett spent time with him, and he felt like the Holy Spirit was saying it wasn’t time to move.

We decided to visit the houses anyway, but neither of them suited our needs. One was too small, the other too old and with steep stairs that would be difficult as I got bigger. So we listened to the Holy Spirit and asked Cristi to pause his search for us. We spent three weeks praying, focusing on our team and building more friendships in the community.

Then Cristi pulled Garrett aside at church and showed him a place he thought would work well. A week later we went to visit it and absolutely fell in love. It was a four-bedroom house with a garden, a huge yard, a nice kitchen and even an electric fireplace, all things that our team had said we would love. And to top it off, it was one of the realtors who showed us another house and remembered us, excited to try and find something better. 

The place was perfect, and the timing even more so. We just had funds free up locally that we were looking to transfer to a bank account, and God provided our landlords to accept those funds as our down-payment. Garrett and I also had just received a donation that covered the rest of our rent for that month, and we were able to start moving in after just two days.

And finally, we were blessed with amazing landlords. The couple whose house we are renting are so kind and sweet, and accommodating. The first night we met them, we were passing around our phones to show each other pictures of our family dogs. The husband was an orthodox priest who served as a military chaplain and has worked with people of all different religious backgrounds, which made him sympathetic to why we are here.

In listening to the Holy Spirit, everything converged at the proper time. And we have already had multiple people visit the house and say they feel calm and at peace here, that God blessed us and there’s no other home in Cluj like it. We are excited to host gatherings, parties, barbecues and more with what God has given us.