Leaving Phoenix, we headed north for a few days in Northern Arizona. Seeing Heather’s family was great. Not to mention they live in the mountains of Arizona. It was much cooler! Shown are Heather’s Aunt Ruth, Uncle Ernie, and cousin Dan, along with the kids.

On the way to the interstate, we were able to drive through the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest. It is awesome to see God’s handwork! It was exciting for the entire family to see petroglyphs left by Native Americans years ago. Well, maybe Joe was not as interested as the rest of the family.

Heading to Oklahoma where Matt’s family lives and our next service was, we traveled for two days. While the temperature continued to drop, the humidity began to rise. I’m sure if you live in Oklahoma, you wouldn’t be as affected by the heat and humidity. We were completely sapped of all energy, and fluid, by lunchtime. From lunch until dinner, we tried to stay in air conditioning as much as possible. After dinner it cools off enough to be outside, but you only stay outside until the bugs come out for the evening. Stay out too long and you are likely to be drug into the woods by the swarms of mosquitoes! Aaw, it is really not that bad.

Here is a photo of Matt’s Dad, his sisters, Sue and Sarah, along with our kids and nieces, Katie and Kassie.

From Oklahoma to Springfield, Missouri. We had a two week period in Missions classes. It was good to see friends and coworkers again, as well as get a chance to be refreshed a bit. We also learned more about the life of a missionary. Truth is, our life is in constant transition. It brings a completely new set of situations and circumstances to our life we have never experienced. After learning about the transitions of our life and what is a normal and natural reaction to it we better understand ourselves and our children. We used to think we were going crazy, now we realize we are normal! It was the first time that has ever been confirmed!

After more farewells, we headed to our next service in Florida. It was here we were able to see our first real ‘gator! We also had a chance to relax a little in between meetings with pastors. The heat and humidity was much worse in Florida, but it was much prettier than Oklahoma. Sorry, Dad, it’s true.

We visited a large lake with a good population of Gators. We were able to see this one close up and personal! Dad thinks the kids enjoyed George the Gator much more than Mom did!

Then we headed south to LA. It was on this leg that we saw God’s hand of blessing in a tangible way! It started on the “grapevine,” a stretch of Interstate 5 between Bakersfield and LA.

If you have traveled this stretch, you know it is mountainous and steep. We traveled through this area in 105 degree weather! We had to turn the air conditioner on and off based on the engine temperature. It was just HOT!

Arriving in LA, we hit traffic that was stop and go. It would quicken, allowing us to drive at speed, then slow to 10 or 15 mph. All of which is normal, all day, every day, in LA. The extremely hot weather started causing problems with the car.

By the time we were just two or three blocks from our destination, we had spongy brakes. Heather did not notice until Matt almost ran into a car at a light. We even saw a bit of smoke rising from the front wheel, at one point. As Matt unloaded the van, he noticed there were fluid streaks on the front hubcap, on the side where the smoke had been seen. These are bad signs.

The next morning, Matt took the wheel off and was amazed. There was no sign of a leak! Everything was in order. All the brake lines were dry and intact and the there were no damage to anything. We see this as God’s blessing!

We spent a few days visiting family in the LA area. It was wonderful to see this part of our family again. While we know this family takes life very seriously, it is clear they enjoy laughing and having fun with each other! It is always a joy to visit them. Here are a few photos timelessly marking the deep and meaningful time we had together!

The plan seems a bit ridiculous based on gas prices, elevated costs during sumer, and the insane amount of miles and hours in a car with three kids! Yet, this trip makes complete sense when you look at the reasons. We are missionaries who will be living in Germany for the next four years. There are family members who have never met some of our children, and we have family members who may go to be with tho Lord in the next four years. We have friends we have not seen in YEARS! There are churches that support us as missionaries and we want to build relationship with these churches and give a report of our ministry in Germany. We are involved in Spiritual work and prayer is the key to seeing God change the hearts of Germans. The more people who hear about our work in Germany, the more people God can use to open spiritual doors through prayer! The last reason for our trip is financial support. As we travel and meet with pastors and churches, we are praying God will speak to people and churches who will join us in monthly support.

We have many people joining us in prayer that God will keep us safe on our travels, give us great gas mileage, that we will have wonderful memory building times with our kids, and that God will use His people to meet our needs before we can head back to the mission field. Please join with us in Prayer!

We spent six days with Heather’s family in Poulsbo, WA. It was a relaxed catch-up time for us. It made the transition back into American life smoother. We celebrated Christmas and Matt’s birthday, both a bit late. This meant we did a little shopping, getting out into the malls and shopping centers. It was slightly overwhelming if we did not know what to buy. As long as we had a list, it went smoothly. There are MANY more purchase options here in the US as compared to options in Germany.

We filled out the rest of February with missions services, district meetings, traveling, getting settled in our new home.

We are staying with friends, the Jordan family, outside Silverton, OR. Our home, ah, their home, is a large home, giving ample room for our five and their four to live comfortably.

The month of March was spent traveling, meeting with pastors, and having missions services in churches. It was also spent catching up with friends around Silverton and in ministry circles. Each time we would go to the store or pick up mail at the post office, we would run into someone we knew. It sure made it fun to be home!

March gave us a great surprise! A teen from our church in Germany, who is in Arkansas as an exchange student, came to visit us for spring break. We had ten days to share the best of all that Oregon has to offer. I do not think we stopped being on the run the entire time.

We shot rifles, shotguns, and pistols, which is not abnormal for Oregon folks. Maria learned to ski, we visited the Pacific Ocean, as well as, Seattle, WA. She joined us for a big family dinner with friends. We visited the Silver Falls State Park. For a large part of one day, Heather took her shopping for a prom dress. We think she had a great time.

April was a month full of meetings, but also included a bit of rest. We realized that we had hit the ground running right from the start and had not really taken time to rest, ourselves or our family. We needed time to relax, both physically and mentally. Looking back on our first few months, we underestimated the effects of moving back to the US, with all the differences, stresses, and changes. A little rest is always good!

We feel that we have packed a lot of things into a small amount of time. Unfortunately, it is the life we live. Our hearts are in Germany, but our history is here in the US. Our place of ministry is in Germany, but our families, our experience, and our friends are here. We will always be split between two countries.

One major surprise for us was our lack of knowledge about the contracts we had for our telephone, internet, and cell phones. According to our contracts, they could only be cancelled three months in advance, in writing! It was too late in the ball game for that to happen. Long story made short: Our phone was turned off the day we signed off on our apartment, our internet was turned off three weeks early, and we must pay for our monthly cell phone contract through August 2008 (even though we are out of country and without a German bank account!).

Packing was a longer process then we envisioned, as usual with a move. We had kept our boxes from our move TO Germany, so that was easy. We brought many items with us to Germany that we used during our first term, making room for the extras accumulated while there.

One major hurdle was where all of our household would be stored. Once WHERE was determined, we needed only to decide HOW MUCH SPACE was needed. With many thanks to Women’s Ministries of Oregon, we were able to buy many needed items for our life in Germany. We had a refrigerator, stove top, oven, dishwasher, washer, dryer, two large wardrobes, and a complete kitchen full of cabinets (including the sink) that we needed to store. This would take lots of space.

Packing was the easy part. It is normal to find in a German apartment rental contract that a renter must return an apartment in the condition it was originally moved into. This meant, we had to paint our entire apartment white. We had painted four rooms, yes, the four largest rooms, with a splash of color. The walls in these rooms would need white paint. This was an understood for us. Yet, we realized that the rooms and ceilings we originally left white were a much different, darker shade of white. In essence, we had to repaint our entire apartment, walls and ceilings. It was accomplished ONLY through the help of many friends at church.

Our exit inspection took about 3 minutes. This is a miracle based on what COULD have happened. Why all the fuss about our painting and leaving our apartment, you ask? Our deposit was 1,800 Euro, a little more than $2,800 We were very intent on getting it all back, which is not always a given in Germany. The good news is that we received it all back! Well, everything besides the replacement bathroom sink we needed because we broke the original while packing!
We lived in a rental vacation apartment for one week while we had everything packed, or in the process of being packed. It was our home until the day we left for the airport. We were a block from the kid’s school and two blocks from our old apartment. A perfect location!

God had given us favor with everyone in our circle of contacts to make this transition happen smoothly. It was many long days, and nights, of work, yet God paved the road for us. His Hand was always there!

We celebrated Christmas and New Year’s in Croatia with Missionaries there. We crammed into the home of Christopher & Renee Wade, joined by another Missionary family from Italy, Kurtis & Amy Denton. It snowed almost every night we were there, making every morning new and beautiful. The beautiful snow was soon trampled over by the numerous kids and puppies. The Wade’s dog, Roxy, had 9 puppies that were 8 weeks old by the time of our visit. Many of the kids headed to the city square to sell Christmas puppies. We were surprised to see Gretchen and Kelsey Wade in a local paper one morning!

With the three families equaling 18 people, meals were a bit crazy, but always fun! We also had a great Christmas service with a fourth American family joining us, followed by a huge meal! It was the last time we would see these friends for an extended time.

Also in December, we visited one of the other Pentecostal churches in our region. Of all the pastors, this was one pastor whom I thought would be least interested in working together with us. The church he pastors was planted after East and West Germany unified in 1990. God called he and his family to come to Germany from Finland. At the end of the service, he invited me to share who we are and what God is laying on our hearts for the future with the Pentecostal churches in our region. The People seemed very receptive to us. After the service, he was talking to one of his board members and myself. He told the board member that he and the church will benefit greatly from the ministry God is calling Heather & I to. I was very surprised! God is working through all the roadblocks that might get in the way of His work in Germany!

Please pray for the unity of the pastors and churches in Northeast Germany.

November was a month spent mainly nursing the sick. There was a flu-like virus that was passed generously around our church, the kid’s school, and our house. It came around more than once! We had planned on visiting different churches in our region, but instead we spend lots of time on the couch or in bed.

December was a month of planning. There are many details involved with packing up a life, and we were in charge of getting them all planned and in order. We also spent Christmas and New Year’s on vacation with the Wade family, Missionaries in Croatia.

Returning to Rostock at the beginning of January was a struggle. Before us lay an entire life that needed to be organized, wrapped, packed, and brought to an end, all with the glimmer of hope that we will return and unpack it all. We moved from our apartment to a small two room, furnished apartment as we finished the last details of packing. It was also a month of frustration as we did not understand the “red tape” that needed to be run through when closing contracts in another country. We are still paying for our cell phones in Germany, as we could not get out of the contract!

February 2nd we flew home to America! Wow, was it ever nice to see Ol’ Glory flying most everywhere! We spent six days with Heather’s Mom & Dad’s home in Poulsbo, WA. We hit the ground running by starting missions services the following Sunday. Matt spent the next few weeks on a District Connection Tour. It was many miles and meetings, but time well spent seeing pastors all around our state! It took us three weeks to unpack and get settled in our new home in Silverton, OR.

March was a month of adjustments. While it sounds basic to mention, and perhaps silly, we were no longer used to living in America. It took time to adjust to a new home, American people, schools, a new lifestyle as itinerating missionaries, a new daily routine, an overwhelming and endless supply of goods at the stores, and the list goes on. There were times we had to simply step back and breath a bit.

April was a bit more settled for us. We were more relaxed with our lifestyle. Visiting churches began to be a bit easier. To be honest, traveling to a new city, church, and environment week after week is not as glamorous as it sounds! We were able to attend our district convention, called The Summit. It is great to connect with many friends and pastors from across our state.

Ah yes, May! Matt has been on the road, as usual, visiting pastors. Heather has been involved at Nick and Gretchen’s school. The kid’s have been more comfortable with traveling each week. We continue serving churches the best we can, sharing about our work in and our heart for Germany, but also challenging churches to join us in being LIGHT in the darkness, regardless of where it is found, around the globe, across the state, or across the street.

While the common mistakes occur quite frequently, they do not often merit mention in this form. Here is yet another German mistake of mine that does merit mention.

I had given a birthday card to a friend of ours from church. In the best German I could muster, I wrote the following sentence in German: I wish you a year full of God’s overflowing blessing! The words and grammatic structure came so easy, and it looked so good when I had finished writing, but I was so wrong.

I had made the assumption that “flüssig” meant flowing because “Fluss” means river. This was my first mistake. My second mistake came on the heels of the first. I assumed that throwing the word “over” at the beginning of “flow” would create the word “overflow.” In German, I came up with the word “überflüssig.” Again, all of this was to wish him God’s overflowing blessings.

As our family visited his home a few weeks later, he clarified that I did not really mean what I had written, but he knew what I was trying to say. Being a bit slow, I asked him what had I written. He bluntly explained that what probably I meant to say was “überfliessend“, the correct word for overflow. The word that I had used meant “unnecessary.” My sentence translated in English was, “I wish you a year full of God’s unnecessary blessings!” The saddest news came with the realization that I have written many cards with this false sentence in birthday cards, his was not the first or the last!

I thank God we can communicate in German. Unfortunately, we have a long way to go to be fluent!

Since Matt was away with the van, Heather put Gretchen on the back of her bike in Joe’s bicycle seat and rode her across town to the University emergency clinic. Heather was very grateful that this experience came after two years of exposure to the language. The clinic system has many buildings and the names for the different clinics are not included in basic German language instruction. It was more than a little confusing. The wait time, however, was much shorter than expected and the verdict was a broken arm. Gretchen received her first cast that went from her shoulder down to her hand. Fortunately, it was her left arm and she is right handed. Later in the week after we visited a children’s surgeon, she was able to have a shorter cast that covered only her forearm and half the hand. Her final cast was one we could take off nightly to wash her arm and put cream on it. The hard part of the cast was held onto her arm with a removable ace bandage. After three weeks with the cast, her arm had healed. She has just a few more days of release from PE and then all is back to normal.

We praise God that the pain was minimal and that her arm healed so quickly. Here are a few pictures of her showing off her cast.

Matt found himself as a interim pastor of a church plant. Please look at the context: 5 months in a new culture, unable to communicate in the language, and having no idea how the church operated weekly or functioned day to day. This is the layer of frosting, and we spread it liberally! After 20 months as interim pastors we were planning for the pastor, Sharon Reeves’ return. We began to think and pray specifically about what the next step would be.

In June, Matt shared his heart with his national church district leader, Glenn Kobarg. Matt had seen the needs of the local pastors, and the struggle to grow healthy churches in this region. After sharing, Glenn invited him to attend a national BFP (German A/G) meeting focusing on East German churches and how to move toward healthy, growing churches in the region. Matt prayed that God would reveal the next step in missions during this meeting.

During the meetings in July, Glenn said he envisioned Matt working alongside of him in developing this district into a region. That means, strengthening the existing churches and planting new ones. This is exactly what Matt had envisioned, and God opened all the doors to make it possible. By the end of the meeting, Matt was asked to return as a member of the group.God is so good!

Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, our region in northeast Germany, is 2 million people strong. There are currently four existing churches. Of those four, only one is a self-supporting church, the other three are still considered church plants. There is also a new church plant that began in October 2007 with a home group of 5. It currently has 15. There are two other large home groups that have not yet developed into churches. God is also stirring the hearts of church planters to come to our region, which means, new churches will be developing. It does sound good, yet we must clarify, the largest church is only 75 people strong.

The pastors, leaders, and church workers all need training, support and encouragement. This is our new focus! God has made it clear in His Word that He wants strong, healthy, growing churches to shine His Light to a needy and dying world. This new focus is a bit new for all of us, but greatly needed! We are writing the job description as we do the job!

Please pray that God continues to open these doors in ministry. Secondly, that the hearts of Pastors, as well as, Church Leaders and Workers, are open to the ministry that God is calling us to. And lastly, that God will use Matt to affect growth in pastors and churches so we will see God move in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.