In 2018 when I first felt called to Romania I was sure that God wanted me here to work with kids in the orphanage system and those who have recently aged out, now I did not know that 3 years later I would be living in Romania, serving with Stepping Forward, and married to a Romanian man.

I met my husband in 2019 on my second mission trip to Romania. I spent 8 weeks at Camp Living Water and let’s just say the pastor and the intern were the talk of the summer! (Kidding there was too much work to be done to talk.) We fell in love serving together and at the end of the summer before I went back to America to fund raise, we began a relationship. After almost 10 months of being apart because of COVID, God found a way to get me to Romania to serve with Stepping Forward for a year as an intern. 2 Months later I was engaged (This is the short version, the long version is epic and just about as cheesy as a Hallmark flick.) I spent the year of 2021 working with aged out orphans in Bucharest, constructing and preparing at Camp, working 5 weeks of summer camp, and planning a wedding. It was chaos, but a good chaos, and through it all our team came together in every way and I could not be more grateful!

Today, I continue to serve as an intern in Romania, after my missionary training in the spring of 2022 I will become a full time missionary with Stepping Forward Ministries! My Husband will continue to volunteer at Camp Living Water as the pastor and this year as the director as well. I wonder what my life will look like 3 years from now…maybe I will have mastered this language by then! (I hope!!) Who knows, but one thing I do know is that God is good, I get to serve with the man I love, in a ministry that I love, doing what I love, for the God who showed me what love is.

1 Chronicles 16:34 (ESV) Oh give thanks to the LORD, for He is good; for His steadfast love endures forever!

Dacey Măimăscu