Liebe Supporters,
It has already been a month and a half here in Berlin, and I am learning a ton! Here is an update of everything that has been going on this past month…it’s a lot again.
New Roommate
My roommate Robby and I just got a new mitbewohner (roommate) named Pascal who is from Berlin. He is a new believer who is hungry for Truth and more relationship with God. We have gotten to encourage and guide him a bit despite the language barrier, and he has been inspiring us with his eager and child-like faith. I have been vicariously experiencing a bit of renewed excitement and energy for knowing and speaking with God more through talking with him every day. His life is completely flipped around now, and he has gotten to be a great witness to his former friends and classmates who see the change. I thank God for this great relationship that He has blessed us with!
Serve the City
There is a great organization here in Berlin called “Serve the City,” where volunteers can sign up for service projects throughout the city such as Homeless shelters, Elderly Homes, non-profits, etc. We met with the main leader of this last week and talked about ways that we might be able to help out with the organization. We served with them last month at a library and are serving this weekend helping paint an apartment building.
Church
We have been visiting local Churches in the city for the past few weeks and have found many great Gemeinschaften (“communities”). We went to a very welcoming Free Baptist Church that was started over 110 years ago, and met this guy who used to do German Christian rap. We also went to two Berlin Projekt churches, a group of churches formed here in part by Tim Keller’s Redeemer Church. There is a branch of Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church here in Berlin that we attended a couple times, and we have been invited this weekend along with other pastors and church workers to meet with Rick Warren to talk about what God is doing in Berlin. I’m pretty excited!
Language
We are now in our second month of German classes, and things are going excellent! It just so happens that our new teacher is a Christian who worked with YWAM in Hawaii and Africa a few years ago (This is almost unheard of in Berlin to meet someone like this…coincidence??). I have been meeting with a conversation partner for a few weeks now and getting to practice a bit of German. I have been correcting his English and he has been very patient with my limited German. His parents are from the area near the mountain in turkey where Noah supposedly landed. We are connecting very well and have a lot of fun talking together sharing stories!
What I’m Learning
There has been so much that has happened over the last month where I can see God at work, i.e. relationships, our roommate, chance meetings, our German teacher, etc. These have continually been teaching and reminding me how much God is in control and is orchestrating everything. Thank you so much for all of your prayers, as I can see them being answered every day it seems!
I have had something similar to the flu twice now in the past three weeks, so getting into a routine has been a bit difficult. Last weekend was the 25th anniversary of the Berlin wall coming down and there was a big celebration with lit-up balloons along where the wall used to be. Although the physical wall is down, there are still a lot of mental walls up in the city. Pray that these would come down as well.
As I write this I am sitting in a café at a community co-work space. It has meeting rooms, desks, classes, and a woodshop for designers, artists, and people doing start-ups. It’s pretty cool! I am attending a talk on entrepreneurship next month at the US Embassy and have found some other gatherings as well.
Prayer requests
- That God would lead us to the right local church to become involved in
- That Relationships would continue to grow with classmates and others
- Pray for my team as we experience some homesickness
- Pray for my family, as my Grandmother just passed away this last weekend and I am wishing I could be there
- For further growth in language learning and in faith
- For more opportunities to build relationships and serve God
If you just read all of that, thank you, I know it was a bit long.
Mit herzlichen Grüßen,
Jeff