The Apartment Search Continues...

Well, as many of you know we have been looking for a new apartment since we arrived back in Berlin almost 3 months ago. The search has been a row of one closed door after another. With a small budget, a need for space, and wanting to live in a good area... has become a pretty tall order. Just wanted to give you all a brief update on what we are praying for, so you could pray with us...

1. An apartment with a living room or a guest room. Most apartments so far that are in our price range are one room apartments. Not like you may think in America where one room means one bedroom and you have your living room area and kitchen... here it literally means one room and sometimes the kitchen is even in that one room. One of the biggest things we would love to be able to use our apartment for is housing guests that come to visit Berlin, or inviting people over during the course of a regular week... and that's a little challenging when they walk directly into your bedroom from the front door.

2. An apartment in the price range of 200-300 euros/month. That is usually the going price for apartments around here, however that does not include heat, electricity, and water.... which adds another 200 euros to the rent sometimes... so we are really asking for a lot when we give them our budget. With the dollar to euro current exchange rate we're not in a place where we can just barely have enough to pay rent... in the event that the dollar drops even more, we wouldn't be able to pay our rent... so we are trying to budget accordingly.

3. An apartment in the areas between Steglitz and Zehlendorf. Okay we don't expect your Berlin geography to be so great that you have any idea what this means, but that is our prayer. We want to live in an area that is close to the church but not right next to it (because it is not the best neighborhood) and we would like to be close to our team members (the Groenewolds, the Steins, and the Edlers) so this is really the best location for us... unfortunately it's in high demand so when apartments open up in this area we try to get in right away to check them out.

4. A provision for the security deposit. Most rentals here (well all that we've looked at) require a deposit that is the amount of 3 months rent... so for most apartments that means a 800-900 euro deposit (that's $1,200-$1,350)!

Thank you all for your prayers and thinking of us. We are fully confident that God has a plan for our housing here in Berlin, and that he has the perfect place waiting for us.

In Him,

Matt & Emily

Videos from the Concerts

"Here I am to Worship"... in Finnish

Joonas breaking it down on the drums

This Little Light of Mine

Visit from Helsinki Teens

We had an amazing time with the teens from Helsinki for 6 days. Their youth group and a few leaders came. For a lot of them it was their first "missions trip" and for some of them it was their first time leaving the country. We were just as excited as they were to get to take them around Berlin and into East Germany.

We spent 3 days with the group in Polssen, the same location where we had a concert with the Power Surge group. The group had a day of soul winning and practice on Thursday. It was awesome to see the family who owns this property just loving having their home filled with Christian young people. The family came to all the practices and were just so available to serve. This family has been praying for years for God to move in their village of Polssen, and now they had two concerts filled with the gospel and Christian music in two weeks.

The night of the concert was great. The teens did an amazing job, they had awesome stage presence and their music sounded amazing. These guys are seriously talented! A lot of them have parents that have graduated from the most prestigious music school in Finland, and now they have mastered 2-3 instruments on their own. We would laugh because someone would be great at the drums, and then find out that that is really their 3rd instrument, the teens would all jump around from bass to guitar to piano and played everything. The group complimented each other so well.

The second concert we had was in our church on Saturday night. Our hope was to fill the chapel with teens and God really answered our prayer because people were squeezing in the back and standing in the doorway. All of our teens here really did an awesome job and invited lots of friends and handed out flyers at their schools. We had a full house of teens and it was great for the band to perform for people their age. That night at the end Pastor Gary gave an alter call and a few people raised their hands to get saved.

"Our Calling" was the theme these past few days with the Finns. It was so encouraging for us to see how the Finnish teens gathered around the Word. Every time we were together as a group they would share the Word. We had lots of raps, morning sessions, evening sessions and they were all so happy to hear more. We talked about how our calling is in Spirit and in Truth. How we have to hold up the Spirit and the Truth as we walk through life. The temptation is to lift up one more then the other... to exalt Truth and live a life unto the law and doing, doing, doing... the other temptation is to exalt the Spirit, and live a life of emotionalism. We also had a beautiful message on grace on Sunday... Pastor Gary talked about how Abraham is the Father of our faith, but how any of us could be the Father of our faith... we will get to heaven and see that someone who you don't notice in a crowd as much could be the Father of our faith... because of grace, God's grace takes a nobody and makes them the Father of our faith who can move mountains.

We were so happy to have met all of the Finns and gotten to have known them for these 6 days. Now we are praying for an opportunity to visit them in Helsinki... especially since we promised we would!

Where we stayed in Polssen

Prayer with Pastor Gary before the concert

Emily & Ann Margret with the girls

Miia & Tekno, two awesome Bible College students in Helsinki

The Finns singing in Polssen

Matt & Jaako

Youth concert in our church... packed with teenagers!

Our teens from Berlin had a great time with the teens from Finland

The group doing some songs on the streets of downtown Berlin

Tomi and his sister Ester

Miia who visited in August came back with all her Finns!

Showing the Finns through the city somehow became the job of Emily & Ann Margret

Power Surge Concert Photos

Guests arriving for the concert in Pinnow

First concert night in Pinnow

Team from Berlin in Pinnow

Us in Polssen

The way to the concert in Polssen

Concert in Polssen- Andy, an Apologist, giving a salvation call after his message.

Crowd in Polssen

The Power Surge Band and us.

Awesomeness

We had two concerts these past two days in Pinnow and Polssen and it was awesome. The Power Surge band did a great job, lots of Germans came out to the concerts and we made some great contacts. Tonight in Polssen we had seven salvations and one German man even came up on stage to give a testimony that what we were saying was real... very unconventional and very not German like! Will post pictures and more of a detailed update later. Thank you for your prayers!

East German Outreaches

We have been going on many day trips into the East German villages. We are planning for two weeks of upcoming concerts. In one week we have a group called Power Surge coming with a group from Florida to do 4 days of concerts, trying to reach these unreached villages of Germany. We have come up to some serious opposition planning these concerts. This territory has been untouched by the name of God and the message of the gospel of Jesus for so long that to come in with force: evangelizing, inviting, getting to know people... has also come with some extreme opposition. Our prayer is that through these concerts, through these invitations, that some would be saved to Christ. That some might even be interested in something more. That some might go home and pray for a Bible Study in their village. That doors would be open that no man can shut. That the Lord would move so mightily in that area that people would fall to their knees and see that God is God. Please pray for these concerts. Please pray for all of the details. For the advertising, the set up, the equipment, the health and strength and safety of everyone involved, for great turn outs, for new contacts to be made, and for souls to be saved.

Our first concert starts next Sunday, so we will update you in a week and let you know how it goes! Thank you for your prayers!

The Uckermark borders Poland, it is about an hour and a half train ride out of Berlin

The building on the left is a barn where we will have one of our concerts in a week, it is in a small village called Pinnow

Outreach team to Pinnow

We came to do outreach and knock on doors but there was a festival in Pinnow that day and everyone was out in the center of the village, just waiting for us to invite them.

Little Update!

Hi guys, just a quick update from Berlin. We have been busy busy busy so it's usually at midnight right before falling into a deep sleep that I think "gotta update that blog!" We have a little update on our living situation, we are still looking for a place of our own but we are under a new provision. I'm sure many of you know Adrian Edler, but maybe you don't know his awesome wife Olessya. Well these two took us in about one week ago, and converted their huge living room into a small living place for us. We are loving it for the time being. We are still looking for our own apartment, but it's been a lot of closed doors, so it is just God that we are with Adrian and Olessya right now because we are having so much fun. We are also right in the middle of planning concerts for the month of October. We have 2 groups coming to Berlin to do concerts and we are planning them. We have a group from Florida called Power Surge that will do 4 nights of concerts in the unreached villages of Eastern Germany. Then the following week we have a group of teens from Finland coming doing 3 nights of concerts in the Berlin/East German area. Please pray for these concerts and all of the details from housing to filling the seats at the concerts!

We are so blessed right now with awesome team life. We have Ann Margaret here for 3 more months, Mindy is here planning her wedding to Stephan in one month, and of course the Groenewolds and Stephan. Here is the link to Ann Margaret's new blog: http://annmargaretroe.blogspot.com/

Lastly we are SO excited about the upcoming conference in November in England. We are so excited to get to visit the body there, and be a part of the conference in Oxford with Pastor Schaller!

Thank you all for your prayer and continued support! ~Matt & Emily