{"id":955,"date":"2023-06-25T18:32:42","date_gmt":"2023-06-25T23:32:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/?p=955"},"modified":"2023-07-02T19:10:44","modified_gmt":"2023-07-03T00:10:44","slug":"week-one-getting-to-know-congregation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/?p=955","title":{"rendered":"Week one: Getting to know congregation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hello there to everyone reading my blog!<\/p>\n

Let me introduce myself. My name is Jana Marek and I am 20 years old. I am a second-year student at the Faculty of Economics in Belgrade, Serbia.\u00a0 I was born in Serbia, in a town called Pan\u010devo and baptized in a Slovak Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession (SEAVC) and my congregation is in Vojlovica, Pan\u010devo (there are quite a lot of Slovaks living in Serbia \u2013 we have our churches, our elementary schools, high schools\u2026)<\/p>\n

I work as a Sunday School teacher in our congregation and I actively work with children of all ages and lead weekly youth gatherings. Besides that, I am fully active in the congregation when it comes to organization and helping out with weekly activities.<\/p>\n

In Pan\u010devo I live with my parents, Jaroslav and Renata. I have two brothers, Martin and Mihal. Also, my grandfather Jano lives with us. This is my first time in the USA and first time in this program of Slovak Zion Synod. My host congregation is Grace Lutheran Church, Toledo, Ohio. \u00a0I am looking forward experiencing new things and learning so much about other culture.<\/p>\n

Well, that\u2019s it about me for now. (feel free to ask if you want to know more)<\/p>\n

So, let my adventure begin.<\/p>\n

I need to mention that, I\u2019ve never traveled by plane, so it was really nice experience. At first I was scared, but then everything went smoothly. I flew to Amsterdam and then from Amsterdam to Detroit. At the airport, pastor Brenda and Ron were waiting for me.<\/p>\n

When I got settled, we went to the church where we celebrated my arrival. I had the opportunity to meet the members of the church council and church leaders. Everyone was very kind and said something about themselves and it was enjoyable. We had pizza, so pizza and new friends; nice way to finish the day. Also, I had chance to be part of Grace Full Friends. That is once-a-month gathering being Jesus\u2019 people together. It is a nice ministry where you can share the love of Christ and also help adults who are developmentally disabled.<\/p>\n

I attended worship on Wednesday evening and I took part in Bible study. We had nice discussion about book \u201cHalf truths\u201d, A\"\"<\/a>dam Hamilton.<\/p>\n

I am staying at the house of Grace Peterson. She is very kind and lovely lady. She took me to the famous river of this city, Maumee river, and showed me the many parks that are located around the river. We also visited the Providence Metropark and she told me about the beautiful historical events that are connected to this park.<\/p>\n

I had opportunity to ride on the Sandpiper (a boat intended for sightseeing). It was great idea because I was able to see more cultural monuments and hear about them.<\/p>\n

What really caught my eye was Interfaith Blood drive. This is the first organization that brought together and united diverse community. It has a diverse board, representing different races and ethnicities. Their slogan is \u201cUnity through acceptance\u201d and their mission is to unite people of all faiths, races and ethnicity by saving lives through blood donations. On Saturday they had blood drive and next year it will be their 35th<\/sup> anniversary in Toledo. Everything takes place in Grace Lutheran Church. Wonderful way to help people.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Service on Sunday was contemporary service, so it was amazing experience for me because there were drums, guitars and that is something that we do not have in my church community in Vojlovica. Pastor Brenda introduced me to people in church, thus I told them something about me. I\u2019ve showed kids where Serbia is on the globe. They were really excited.<\/p>\n

This week was generally about getting to know people, the activities that take place in this church community. I can\u00a0say that at first glance there are a lot of differences between my congregation and theirs.<\/p>\n

Overall, we are all brothers and sisters in Christ regardless of where we live, how we look, how we behave, dress etc.<\/p>\n

Word of God! Word of life! Thanks be to God!<\/p>\n

Thank you\u00a0for reading my post. My schedule for next week is very interesting, so stay tuned! Have a blessed week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hello there to everyone reading my blog! Let me introduce myself. My name is Jana Marek and I am 20 years old. I am a second-year student at the Faculty of Economics in Belgrade, Serbia.\u00a0 I was born in Serbia, in a town called Pan\u010devo and baptized in a Slovak Evangelical Church of the Augsburg […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":145,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-americantime","et_post_format-et-post-format-gallery","et-doesnt-have-format-content"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/145"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=955"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1001,"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/955\/revisions\/1001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/slovakzionsynod.org\/sip\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}