"Remain in Me"

"I am the vine and you are the branches."

The home we live in has grapevines on the property and it is interesting to watch them grow. When we arrived in January, all we saw were the woody vines, but when spring arrived, the leaves and branches started growing everywhere.  Not long after that we started seeing tiny green grapes growing.  This reminds us of the words of Jesus in John 15:4-5: "Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.  I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing."
We truly can do nothing without Jesus.  Our language and culture skills are minimal, but God is working anyway.  We praise God for the signs of spiritual growth we see in the church and we look forward to much more fruit in the future.
News update:  Last week we received our permanent Romanian license plates and car registration and should have Romanian car insurance later this week.  Praise God!  Thanks to a lot of help from our Romanian friends, we are finally done with official paperwork!
Very early Sunday morning we leave for the US to attend a missionary summit and Open Bible National Convention followed by a few days with our family.  Please pray for safe travel and for God to accomplish in and through us all he has planned.
We will let you know how the grapes taste when they are fully grown.