ends always bring new biginings..

This semester is over now. Time went so fast and it is weired because my life right now is just one semester after another; and one more is over.
It´s has been a good semester, maybe different but good for me. God taught me a lot; I feel I grew closer towards him. I had great times with friends and wonderful people; good and edifying conversation and off course I had fun!!
I´ve been blessed by all that and I still can´t believe how I God´s hand is so obviously in the past few weeks and month.
God is good, he always was and he forever will be.. the past semesters, right now and in the coming semester!!
But next semester will be different.. I am coming back, but not as a student, I will be on staff. I am excited about that and still amazed how God opened the door. I will move in a "normal" apartment and will live with Tanja together.
Everything will be different and it already feels different, but I know that God will be faithful and that he will bring me through the new begining.

So, now it is time to end right here; semester is over and I am thankful for everything; also the hardships- everything was God´s plan and he was in it. "Thank you for that!!"

Here some pictures of this semester!

Surrender (Devotion)

Every semester God taught me something special; but every time it had something to do with just coming closer to the Lord, know him better and let him be my everything. I had different verses which brought me through every semester and everything I had to go through that time.
My second semester was a lot about that he is my everything; and that all I need is he and his love; I learned this semester a lot about that I just will find my fulfillment in him and if I wait on him and in nothing or nobody else. And he asked me this semester what am I able to give and he brought me to this point where I could say, Lord everything belongs to you!

Than my long summer break came and I thought after such a good semester where I learned so many things this would be a hard time, this summer God would teach me to stay strong even without this incredible environment.
Even if I had to move a lot from one place to another during the summer or had not really a lot to do; he blessed me so much, beyond all my expectations. And he kept moving on to teach me about surrender; surrender everything to him. I read different books which really helped me to understand what that means.

Of course I already gave him my life, everything but he kept asking for little things in my life and than I read this example and I thought that fits perfectly what it is about:

We think giving our all to the Lord is like taking a 1000 euro bill and laying it on the table „here is my life, Lord. I´m giving it all“
But the reality for most of us is that he sends us to the bank and has us cash in the 1000 for quarters. We through life putting out 25 cents here and 50 cents there.
Loving roommates which are driving me crazy; listen to people I don´t want to; forgive people who didn´t deserve it and serve without expecting anything back.
Usually giving our life to Christ isn´t glorious. It´s done in all those little acts of love, 25 cents at a time. And sometimes he would ask for a bigger portion a bigger amount maybe 50 bugs or more. The big decisions in our life, the future spouse, the next step.. what ever; but it seems to cost more.

This example totally reflected where I was at. I wanted to give everything at all and never have to do something with it. Like saying: “Lord my life is yours.. just do what you want but don´t ask me for all this little things... But he taught me that is not what he is thinking of. He wants all, yes, but often that means peace by peace; decision by decision, moment by moment, day by day.
This is a decision I have to make every day, every moment. I´ve never thought about like that, I thought to him my life belongs- I am fine; he can do what ever he wants. But that really needs more, it needs the absolute surrender.

And after this summer I understood, maybe still not fully, but a little bit more what that means. He still is asking me to trust and surrender in things which seems to be the hardest of the world.
He always uses those situation where we have to be totally dependent on him; to bring us more in to the perfect shape.. that we are more like Jesus. And often I think; Lord can´t you use another situation, I would be much better if you would not try to mould me in this or that situation. But either I surrender or I don´t.

luke 14,25-27 there he says: If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sister, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

Jesus called all of his listeners here to follow and told them that they have to take their cross upon them- it was not a weekend invitation for vacation.

To call him Lord means to say yes to his will, His word and his ways. We cannot call him lord and then proceed to run our own lives. If we think we can have a relationship with God by retaining control over our lives and somehow trying to fit Jesus in with everything else, we are deceived and still at war with God.

God doesn´t just want to be the number one in our life, he doesn´t want to be the top of our life pyramid, he wants to be the centre; the centre of everything.
The centre of our future, all our decisions, in all our relationships in our deeds; he wants to determined our ways, our future spouse, our next step after bible college; everything. But also the centre of the presents, right now; what or who is the centre of your thoughts?

Is the relationship with Christ the centre of our existence?

God´s call to lay down our lives on the altar of sacrifice means that we give him all that we are. Like it is written in Galatians 2, 20: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

So it is not me who lives in me, not if I really surrender. This verse makes no sense if I still hold on to things; if I still hold areas back in my life.

Our natural tendency is to hold on tightly, to try to protect and preserve whatever we think we can´t live without. We are afraid that if we surrender everything to God our health, our material possessions, our family, our reputation, our career plans, all our rights, our future. We have visions of God stripping us of the things we most need or enjoy, or perhaps sending us out to serve him in the most inhospitable place on the planet.

The fact remains that when we sign the blank contract of surrender, there are no guarantees about where God will lead us or how difficult our journey will be. But to surrender, to be a living sacrifice will involve all my time; all my possessions; my rights, my reputation, my desires, my future, everything that concerns my, all of myself and all my love and that I will not ask any questions.

That´s pretty hard, it sounds like I couldn´t do it, I wouldn´t be able to give everything to him. But what ever our fears, whatever the unknowns or the challenges in our life might be, God has promised to provide for us to share his pleasure with us to protect us, and to give us his enduring presence.
And yet we know the character of the One in whom we´ve placed our trust. And we know that Gods promises more that offset any risks or dangers or challenges that he may allow into our lives.

It is not always easy to surrender but it is for sure that there is no safer place than in his perfect will.

And after this summer I understood, maybe still not fully, but a little bit more what that means. He still is asking me to trust and surrender in things which seems to be the hardest of the world.

He always uses those situation where we have to be totally dependent on him; to bring us more in to the perfect shape.. that we are more like Jesus. And often I think; Lord can´t you use another situation, I would be much better if you would not try to mould me in this or that situation. But either I surrender or I don´t.

Luke 14,25-27 there he says: If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sister, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

Jesus called all of his listeners here to follow and told them that they have to take their cross upon them- it was not a weekend invitation for vacation.

To call him Lord means to say yes to his will, His word and his ways. We cannot call him lord and then proceed to run our own lives. If we think we can have a relationship with God by retaining control over our lives and somehow trying to fit Jesus in with everything else, we are deceived and still at war with God.

God doesn´t just want to be the number one in our life, he doesn´t want to be the top of our life pyramid, he wants to be the centre; the centre of everything.
The centre of our future, all our decisions, in all our relationships in our deeds; he wants to determined our ways, our future spouse, our next step after bible college; everything. But also the centre of the presents, right now; what or who is the centre of your thoughts?

Is the relationship with Christ the centre of our existence?

God is good!

This Outreach week was an incredible time where God totally helped me to understand more of him, his grace and mercy over us. He is mighty and he is strong, there is nothing he could do and in him we will accomplish his perfect plan.

We were a group of many different people and characters and I thought I would it be if we are all together for the whole week. It was suppose to be a prayer outreach and I wanted to pray a lot but at the same time I was afraid that it could also be hard to pray with this people. But it was so so so so good.

It started Saturday night, we met with people from the church we would do the whole Sunday service next day. And we had a great time but everybody was just tired. We had to little houses to stay in; one for the girls one for the guys. We meet in the guy’s house and the key of the girls house was IN the girls house and we recognized that by almost midnight. This gave us a reason to stop and pray. First I was mad; because it turned into a loooong prayer without an end; but than I gave up and God totally moved me, too. God didn´t open the door this night- not supernatural but still- and he gave us the picture that he has the key. He has everything under control and he can open and close doors where ever HE wants to.

This was the beginning of a challenging but really blessed week. We talked to people on the street, worshiped in the streets, could witness to some people. We met different Christian groups and every time there was this special unity among us. We could totally feel that we belong to the same family and that we have the same father; we worshiped and prayed for the different cities together. WE were encouraged by them and they said the same about us.
One day we worked the whole day in a front yard to make it nice looking for people who couldn´t do it. After that my hand hurt so bad, the rest of the day till we prayed for it. It wasn´t right after prayer and honestly I anyways just thought prayer wouldn't damage anything so let us do it but I didn´t really believe it would help either. But after I brushed my teeth I realized that I was using my hand totally normal again and that it wouldn´t hurt anymore. I was so surprised and sad at the same time that I didn´t expect God to answer our prayer. But he is just greater than we are and merciful and it doesn´t depend on us!!

There was another situation were I was so discouraged about and it really stopped me and brought me down. I prayed and asked God either to confirm me somehow or to just take everything away. And he did it totally different that I thought but he did it and again I was surprised about how he answers my prayer.

And through the whole time he kept saying me; not trough me or my strength but his strength and trough his spirit. And I really was week and the only thing I could do was trust on him and waiting on him and he proofed him one more time faithful!
Where ever our group stopped or was we prayed or worshiped the Lord; someone always came up with a song or we just made up new songs!



First I had a hard time to be back on the campus and just keep going on with “normal” life which isn´t really normal. But what I really want to expect and experience is, that God is the same God and that he is also trustworthy here in Siegen. Again I could totally tell that how important it is that he is my everything, my fulfillment.


"Schönster König" ( a wonderful song!)
Deine Fesseln, befreien mich.
Deine Wunden, heilen mich.
Der Zorn des Vaters lag auf dir;
die Gnade Gottes über mir

Schönster König, mit Dornen gekrönt,
so gerecht und rein trugst du meine Schuld;
der heilige Gott, starb meinen Tod.
Schönster Jesus, mein schönster Herr!!

OUTREACH

Tomorrow our outreach week starts and it is every semester very exiting. This semester I knew I am suppose to stay in Germany and one team is going to Wilhelmshaven and so I started praying about going with them. I got a peace and joy over it so I decided to attend this group.
And tomorrow the trip finally starts.. We leave by noon and have the whole Saturday to make us comfortable over there and go shopping so on.
This week have been very hard for me and I got a lot attacked; sadness, being encouraged and just general weakness. But the Lord told me over and over again, that this would be warfare and that I shall fight in his power and in his strengh! And I think all this weakness had happen and is still because the Lord really wants to teach me to depend on him. And I have to this following week because otherwise I don´t know how to handle all the confusion in me.. and there is a lot! Maybe I will be able to share a little bit more some day, but not right now. Who ever is reading this.. just pray to God; that he is all I have my eyes upon and get my strength from!

Wilhelmshaven is the city.. just pray for an effective week and that God really can use us!!