News From Munich

We arrived in the Bavarian capital of Munich. Bavaria you're probably wondering, where on earth is that? I though you were going to Munich, in Germany. Well you assumed correctly. Munich is in the German state of Bavaria. We'd received a number of words about coming here for part of our outreach and so its really exciting to actually be here.

To bring you up to date with what's been happening, we arrived on Thursday, which was an extremely long day. One of the other staff didn't have the money to travel with us to Munich and was planning to travel with us to the airport, in faith that her money would come in. However someone heard she needed the money so covered her flight and whatever else needed covering (which had prevented her from coming). She got the last seat on the flight with us to Munich!

We arrived in Munich and caught the train to the church where we were going to spend the first two nights. For those of you who didn't know, we went to Brentford with nowhere to stay in Germany and whilst we were there the school leader was able to get somewhere to sleep for the first two nights, then the day before we flew to Munich we heard we had somewhere to stay for the rest of the two weeks in Munich. We actually only spent one night at the first place before we travelled over to the second place.

It hasn't been super chaotic but we've still been busy, we've explored the city, and spent some time interceding for Munich from the Olympia-berg, which is a mountain that stands in the Olympic Park where the 1972 Olympic Games were held and from where the Israeli team had been abducted from. Both the photos were taken here.

We've also been taking part in a number of different services with the church we're staying in. We also were able to go to the church that Jonny (the school leader) used to go to when he lived here.

More photos and news coming soon. Please check my photo journal (click here) out or find me on Instagram (click here) however, if I don't know you I won't allow you to follow me on Instagram.

Photographs: the first is Olympic Park, and the second photo of the four guys, Tim (USA), Jonathan (also known as Jonny; the school leader from Germany), Hector (Australia) and Jonathan (USA)

All In One

I don't know where to start. I'm sitting on the floor of the girls room but given the hour, I'm the only one still awake. I guess it's down to a few reasons. Tomorrow we're travelling to our next location (the second one) and we're going to be flying. You're probably reading this and thinking "hang on a minute, second outreach location? What did I miss?" Don't worry, it's kinda my fault I haven't posted here recently. I've been super busy with team things and in the free times I've had I've been doing other things. I'm going to do my best to update you with a brief rundown of what's happened since I last wrote..

Little over a week ago the DTS* lecture came to an end and we began to pack, book tickets and raise support. Then last Thursday (is it a week already?) we walked out the door at Dartmouth Road for the last time in two months. We caught the London Overground to Clapham Junction before travelling to Brentford. We've spent the last week working with a church here in Brentford. We helped with all their Easter services as well some other things. It's been a lot of fun and we've had the incredible opportunity to get to know one another to a new level. We've continued the habit we had in Willesden, to eat all our meals together as a team. One thing that we've started doing since we've been here is sharing with everyone what the best ... And the worst part of our day was. A few times we couldn't do that and ended up sharing at breakfast the next day. We've had some great testimonies from our time here but it's been great hearing what everyone's personal highlights and discouragements have been.

For example, two days ago, we'd been asked to go round and hand leaflets out for the church and even though a lot of us weren't super keen to do it, we still went. For me, ended up being one of the highlights of my time here. Yes, door to door can be challenging, especially when people shut the door on you the moment they see you standing there holding a leaflet or flyer (they don't even let you say anything, because they think you're gonna try to sell them some useless gadget that they don't really need or to take another survey). However, there were some people who were extremely interested. Tim (the DTS student I was with) and I would then pray over the houses we'd given a leaflet to or slipped one through the postbox flap.

Then yesterday we went round to a nearby Assisited Living Unit, an olderly home in other words to help with the Wednesday Service (pictured on the right). It was really quite challenging for me, because it reminded me of my paternal grandmother (the only grandparent still living). She's in a Christian home for the elderly, in the Netherlands and being at the home today hit me quite hard as it brought back memories of the visits I paid to my grandmother when I was last there, after my DTS* two years ago. I really hope I see her again...

You're probably reading this and wondering where we're jetting off to tomorrow and the answer is Munich, Germany. We're spending the next few weeks over our outreach in Munich. More information will follow as things progress. I know you probably want to know more details about what's happening in regards to the finer details but I'm going to have to ask you to trust me to let you know in due course. I also post the other locations as we get closer to travelling there. It's incredible how flexible I've learnt to be, it's crazy how ingrained the Dutch culture of needing to know all the details was. It's scary but extremely exciting having to trust the Lord to open the right doors, like with accommodation in Munich. We came to Bedford having no idea where we were going to stay in Munich, but now, we do!! It's exciting how the Lord has opened the doors to allow us to go! We knew that we were supposed to go to Germany, and the Lord has made a way!

*DTS- Discipleship Training School

Pictures: the first is of the girls, Alisa (Germany), Sun Young (S. Kor.ea), Sarah (Denmark), Victoria and Tina (both USA). Tina's one of the other staff members.
The second photo's of the worship service notice. For a photo of some of the guys click here. I'd have added more photos but my phone browser is playing up and the blogger app on my phone is rubbish. I'll try and post more as the outreach progresses, so stay posted!