Dear friends,
In June the first church plant that we helped start in Cologne-Porz celebrated their 30-year anniversary! Our two successors along with their spouses were also present. We are so grateful for these couples who have continued to invest much in this church. It was such a joy to share in this celebration. As we watched a presentation of all that God has done in the last 30 years we were overwhelmed by the impact of the DNA (evangelism, discipleship, and church-planting) that we implanted back then, which has been and still is at the heart of this church. There are multiple people who have gone out from this church to become pastors of other churches or planted new churches – in Germany and other countries. Many have come to faith and been baptized, including a number of Iranian immigrants. To God be the glory!
Many of you have been praying for our friend Kalle, who has lung cancer. He reluctantly started chemotherapy. It was really rough on him, and he decided to stop after a third of the treatments. He is slowly recovering from the nasty side effects. He knows that he is in the Lord’s hands and is trusting Him with his life. We are still praying for healing but ultimately that the Lord would show His power in and through Kalle and be glorified.
Please continue praying for Emrahil, our Turkish brother who we baptized 6 years ago. He has had chronic back pain for months. He is reluctant to have the surgery doctors are recommending but he does receive shots to manage the pain. In addition, he has been extremely sad lately as the major earthquake in the spring destroyed so much in his hometown of Antalya - including the family home. Although most of his family was spared, and uncle and cousin were killed. A big bright spot in his life is that the German justice system has recently expunged his records of all his previous crimes, freeing the way for him to pursue various jobs that were out of the question with his earlier record. Praise the Lord with us for this and pray that God would now open up new possibilities for Emrahil.
I spent an hour or so recently getting to know Tom, an actor who stumbled upon my shop. We had a very interesting chat. He opened up to me about some things and I was able to share the Lord with him in small doses. We also talked about him doing an evening of readings here on the subject of grief. His mother, a devout catholic, committed suicide when he was 12. That traumatic experience left him not just with overwhelming grief, but also jaded in regard to church and God. Pray that the Lord would draw him to Himself. He has expressed interest in visiting our church.
Finally, please pray for the startup of the English conversation group in the Pastorenatelier on Sep. 10. As we serve the community by offering this, we also hope to make some new friends with whom we can gradually begin sharing the gospel.
Gratefully,
Jason and Sue
