Transitioning Back

So, I’ve been back for a little over 2 weeks now. It’s crazy. It’s weird. I can’t believe that I just spent 3 months overseas, ended up in 7 different countries on 2 different continents, and now I’m back. I thought it would be good to write about how the transition back has been, and officially wrap up my blog posts for the summer. (I still hate saying “I have a blog.” But it has been a good outlet for me to externally process while keeping people updated on my summer.)
Back on August 5th, I flew from Morocco to Madrid, from Madrid to New York, and New York to Boston. My mom was able to meet me at the airport and she was able to visit for a couple of days before heading back to California to get back to work. And after those two days, I pretty much had to immediately jump straight into training for my RA job. As of today, my training is finished, and classes start tomorrow.
It’s been very interesting trying to adjust to being back in the US, adjust to my role as a leader on campus, adjust to the responsibility as a returning RA, and adjust to the pace of life here. In Germany, my days, no matter how crazy things may have been, typically followed the same general outline. Wake up, spend time with Jesus, go to a team meeting and worship Jesus, then go out and do whatever Jesus asks me to do that day. Now that I’m back on campus and working hard to prepare myself and my building for this year, it’s so different. I don’t have that time with Jesus built into my daily schedule, and I have to wake up early and fight for time throughout the day to spend with Him. The job I have here is in some ways very similar, but in most ways very different. I’ve barely been in the country 2 weeks and got over jet lag just 5 days ago, but I’ve been running extremely hard throughout training. So because of this, my time to process and ability to adjust has been limited.
But, as usual, God is good! He’s been helping me with the transition and has spoken a few things that have really helped. I’m back, and I have an entirely new outlook on things, and the way that I live my life is going to be different than last year. Not that I lived my life poorly before, but now I’ve spent a summer on what some would call a spiritual high, that for me has become my normal, and this normal is going to be a launching point for going even deeper in my relationship with Jesus. So because of this and all that happened this summer, I asked Jesus, “So, how have I changed?” He was quick to correct this language- He said, “You haven’t changed, you’ve been amplified. I’ve taken these things that were already in you and increased and amplified them.” Wow… I’m not changed, I’m amplified.
Another thing that Jesus spoke was that everything that happened in Germany, all the crazy things I saw- the healings, the salvations, the depth in relationships- it all was a direct result of simple obedience. And that’s all I have to do back here- be obedient. If He wants me to pray for healing for someone, I’ll do it. If He wants me to share an encouraging word with someone, I’ll do that. If he wants me to walk the long way to class, I will. I’ve learned that even if I don’t necessarily see the fruits of my obedience in front of me, every small step of obedience is an act of spiritual warfare that brings the Kingdom of God forward. Man, the magnitude of that is so great, but it is so simple to do. Be obedient.
And that’s how I’ll be continuing to live my life here.
Thank you all for supporting me this summer and praying for me. It’s been an adventure, and I know that the adventure continues as I go with Jesus back here to Gordon.
Thanks guys,
Bae

Leaving Germany

Wow… As I write this, I’m sitting on a bus going to Brussels, Belgium, where I will be meeting my ride to Morocco. James (one of my teammates) and I will be taking the next few days to drive to Morocco to get a car from our base back to the person who loaned it. It’s crazy- I can’t believe that I’m leaving Germany. In 4 days, I’ll be on a plane flying back to Boston and seeing Mama Bae.

What am I supposed to feel? After an experience like this, it’s going to be a while before I can fully decompress everything. 

Note: Everything you read after this is probably going to be a large word-vomit of processing.

Yesterday (7/31), we attended our final church service at the church that we partnered with. It was an amazing combination of thank yous from us to them, them to us, and exhortation to each other. At the very beginning of the summer, Jesus gave me this picture of me on our last Sunday, talking to the church. And, it happened. Classic Jesus. A few of us got to share unique testimonies about what God did during the summer, and I was able to share a testimony about our partnership with the church. I shared with them how God had put them on my heart before I even left, and how from the beginning I had wanted to work with their youth. I shared a few encouragements for them, and then shared with them a picture that The Lord had given me for them. And it was amazing! I shared with them how they are being led through revival, and that Jesus will use them to lead revival amongst churches and refugees. After church, several people thanked me for the work that I did with their youth and with their church, but one man’s thank you really stuck out. He said, “I don’t have the English vocabulary to fully say how I feel, but I want to tell you that I can hear when you talk and see in your eyes and your face that you truly do love our church, and you truly love our youth.” I’m so thankful that I was able to love these people well. And so thankful for how God used me within this church.

In the midst of the joys that this church has brought, I leave behind a lot of pain. Not my own pain, but pain that I’ve felt on behalf of refugees that I met. People I’ve prayed for. People who have such deep hurt, such deep emotional (and physical) scars, and people who have no more hope. People who wouldn’t ask for my help, because they knew that I couldn’t fix their circumstances no matter how badly I want to. Yet in this pain and hopelessness, I can proudly look back and see that I was able to bring peace and hope. I carried the presence of Jesus with me into each and every conversation, and although I was mostly helpless when it came to physically helping them, I was able to bring something far greater than a temporary problem fix. This was, at times, a difficult perspective to maintain. Do I truly believe that the Gospel is good enough for these people who have seen their brothers and sisters killed? Had their children taken prisoner? Wouldn’t it be better if I could process their papers for them, pull strings with the government, and reunite families? Or set prisoners free?

The Gospel is good enough. It’s more than good enough. I may not have been able to physically set people free, but spiritually I was able to partner with Jesus to see that happen. At the beginning of the trip, He gave me a verse- Isaiah 42:6-8. “I am the Lord; I have called you in righteousness; I will take you by the hand and keep you; I will give you as a covenant for the people, a light for the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness.” Sure, in Germany I wasn’t on the front lines where I’m pulling refugees off of boats, but I was on the front lines of a spiritual battle. A battle against the enemy trying to keep these people chained and bound to hopelessness. But we brought light. We brought hope. We brought joy. We brought peace. We brought Jesus. In the end, what could be more important? Eternities are at stake.

I shared the Gospel so many times over this trip… At the very beginning, I received training on how to share it in a way that fit the cultural context of Muslims. Through learning new words and new ways to explain the Gospel, I realized more and more how simple and beautiful it is. What Jesus has done for us is so simple. Sin requires death as a payment. And when we sinned, our hearts turned black. We were no longer pure. And we were separated from God. But He loved us so much and wanted to be with us that He sent Jesus to die for us. To be the final death as the ultimate payment. Yet, He himself lived a pure and perfect life. So death couldn’t tie Him down, and He rose from the grave! And now after His sacrifice for us, we are pure, and able to be with Him again. He took the punishment for our sins for us.

It’s so amazing.

So beautiful.

So simple.

July Update

So, I know it’s been a little while since I’ve posted an update- my apologies. This past month has been SO busy. I’ve been doing lots of outreach and follow-ups, as well as being with the youth group. Mostly more of the same. Some cool things have happened, though, this past month (how could there not be?). First, my roommate, Joe, visited. The timing of his visit was perfect, because I was absolutely exhausted and getting worn down, and he came and brought a breath of fresh air to me and all the friends he has here. Then, the day before he was supposed to fly back to America, he was asked to stay by the base leaders because he was such an asset. So, he skipped his flight home and made a Go Fund Me page and stayed on as an intern for the rest of the summer. Not long after that, The Harbor (my church in Boston) sent a short-term team out here, and that was another breath of fresh air. Alex, one of the short-term team members, is also going to be helping to lead the college ministry next year. Joe, Alex, and I were able to go out together and do outreach and see Jesus do amazing things. We are all so pumped to take this shared experience and bring it back to the leadership of the college-ministry.

One story from our outreach- we went out to do a solid 7-8 hour day of outreach. I’ve done a ton of outreach since I’ve been here, and this day was unlike any other. People would just come up to us and open the door nice and wide for us to share Jesus with them. For example, the first person we talked to just came up to us and starting talking to us about a tumor that he had and gave us the opportunity to pray with him. Then, we were sharing Jesus with a drug dealer who started talking to us. And after that, a woman came and asked if we had cocaine, and through that interaction we ended up back in her tattoo parlor praying for her. Jesus was breaking down wall after wall giving us the chance to share His love with anyone and everyone. Later on, there was a guy who had his whole arm wrapped up and in a sling. He told us that he had dislocated his shoulder. Naturally, we asked to pray for it. After we prayed, he told us that it DIDN’T HURT and that his shoulder felt hot!! So amazing… but also becoming (thankfully) a regular occurrence here at my base.

Another highlight from the last few weeks is the youth group. I know I’ve mentioned it before, but it’s such a joy working with them. I took a couple of the guys that I disciple out to do outreach at the mall one day, and it was incredible seeing them eagerly pursue what Jesus asked of them. When we got to the mall, I had them ask Jesus if there was any person in particular that we were supposed to talk to, and they had very clear pictures of 3 different people for us to find. As we walked around the mall talking to and praying for people, I got to help coach them in how to approach conversations and praying for people. After we prayed for people at the mall, we went to meet the rest of our team where they were putting on a drama. We were there a little bit early, and the guys were saying that they wanted to see people get healed. Then, we saw a guy with a knee brace who was limping. They ran after the guy, and asked to pray for him. And after they prayed, he was healed!! I’m seriously so proud of these guys and how they’ve grown and the faith that they have that Jesus will show up.

This stuff is absolutely amazing. As we are here trying to start a church-planting movement amongst the refugees, Jesus is showing up in so many ways and we are seeing so many miracles.  Muslim refugees are coming to know Jesus, and a movement is beginning. How lucky are we to be out here and able to be a part of this?

Acts 3:6

            This is one of the more heartbreaking stories that I have encountered so far while here in Germany. A few days ago, one of my teammates and I went to the mall to see if we could find any refugees to connect with. We asked God to help us find whoever it was that He wanted us to talk to, and we went looking. We saw this guy sitting at the bottom level by himself. We thought that he might be a good person to talk to, so we went down and sat by him and started talking to him. This entire conversation was mostly through Google Translate since he really only spoke Arabic.

            This man, probably in his mid-20s, has been in Germany for about six months. He fled Syria because the government there was seeking to kill him. We couldn’t quite figure out why, as that was lost in translation, but what we do know is that the government was serious about eliminating him. About 3 years ago, while sitting at lunch, the police came and started shooting at him and set off a bomb near him. Miraculously, he survived. However, he has shrapnel in 3 different places in his legs. After he survived this attack, the government came and took his wife and son prisoner. His son is now 3 years old, so that means that he was a mere infant when he was taken. Since then, this man has not seen or heard from his wife and son. He can only hope that they are alive. He has some family living in America, and so he would be able to get to the States if he wanted, but he feels that if he were to leave, it would be giving up on his wife and son. Germany is as far from Syria as he wants to be. But, he’s here pretty much without his family. His mother and brother were killed in Syria some years ago, and the only family he has is a cousin here.

            As he told us his story, we could see the pain in his eyes, and he was trying so hard not to cry. And so were we. It took all I had not to start bawling on the spot with this guy. Really, what do you say to that? How do you respond? There wasn’t much that we could offer him besides our ability to listen, and obviously, we wanted to pray for this guy. We eventually asked if he prays for his wife and son, and he said “yes, all the time.” We asked him if the 3 of us could pray together for them, and he was truly touched. He was so grateful and appreciative, and gladly agreed. However, as a Muslim, he had to wash his face, hands, and feet before he could pray. I offered him my water bottle so he could do so, and he went over to find a place to wash. There wasn’t really any space in the mall to do so, so he asked us to follow him. We walked a couple blocks through the city and he took us into his cousin’s apartment. He introduced us to his cousin and then went to the bathroom to wash up. He came out, pulled out his prayer mat and pillow, and began to pray in his Muslim way as we sat there. After this, he had us pray in our Christian way. We prayed for him, for his wife and son, and that Jesus would come in and redeem this situation some how in some way.

            Though he is not a Christian, the faith of this man really left an impression on me. We told him that there is grace for salvation and for redemption for his family, and he replied with “I know.” Despite the atrocities around him and the pain that he experiences daily without his family, he believes that God is good and he does not harbor any anger towards God.

            We hung out with these two men in the apartment for a few hours, and were able to show them a video in Arabic that put a lot of their Muslim beliefs into the context of Christianity and Jesus, and they were very intrigued. We could sense their openness, and they have agreed to do a Bible study with us through the Old Testament prophets and leading up to Jesus!

            In the midst of this man’s pain and suffering, I firmly believe that he will come to experience the redemption and peace that comes only from Jesus. Situations like this remind of Acts chapter 3. Peter and John were going to the temple, and there was a paralyzed man begging for money. Instead of giving him money, Peter instead says, “I have no silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk!” Sure, this guy isn’t getting physically healed (yet? J), but the situation is not dissimilar. There is so much that we wish that we could do for this man that we’re unable to, but we do have the name of Jesus and everything that’s associated with Him. And that’s important. My prayer is that he and his cousin come to know Jesus sometime in the near future.  

            Please join me in prayer for these men!

            -Bae

Breaking the Ramadan Fast

A few nights ago, I had the incredible honor of breaking the Ramadan fast with a family. During the month of Ramadan, Muslims will fast from sunrise to sunset. Once the sun goes down, they will break their fast and eat. Breaking the fast is a pretty big deal each night, and they typically will prepare large, extravagant, and incredibly delicious meals! This particular family that we broke the fast with was Turkish and owned a Turkish restaurant in the city that I live in. They closed their restaurant for the night, only to open it back up for their family once the sun went down. Here’s the thing about their family- between aunts and uncles and nieces and nephews and cousins and grandparents, this family was about 40-50 people. All packed into this little restaurant.

We had met the host family on the street earlier in the day, and they had kindly invited us to break the fast with them in this special way. When we arrived, this place was absolutely packed, but they made sure people moved around so that the five of us could have seats. One of the children, who was about 14, came over and made sure that there was nothing that we would need to be more comfortable. They had all this food that they had prepared laid out buffet style, and wow was it good. All sorts of meats, rice, watermelon, and several foods that I can’t even pronounce the names of. This family was incredibly welcome and hospitable, constantly urging us to take more food and enjoy as much as we wanted.

The evening was spent eating and talking and laughing with this (LARGE) Turkish family. The restaurant was loud, crowded, and I couldn’t understand 4 out of the 5 languages being spoken. Yet, it at the same time felt like home. And that is because of the hospitality of this family. I was able to experience a lot about the culture that I had only heard about before- I’d heard that they prided themselves on hospitality and making people feel welcome, and this night I really experienced it. They welcomed us and made us feel like part of their family. Obviously, our job here in Germany is to work with refugees and share Jesus with them, and this family knew that. But, despite the clear difference in religion, they treated these random people that they met on the street like their own family. I think that that is amazing. And it provides a lot to think about. But check this out- this is a completely normal thing!! I have had team members invited to break the Ramadan fast with other Muslim families regularly, and so it’s not shocking in the slightest to me that I got invited. For me, this was another experience that has reformed and reshaped my own perspective.

God is moving and doing awesome things here in Germany. Both in the lives of the refugees, the locals, and my team.

Thank you for praying for us.

-Bae

Du süße Deutsche Kartoffel

Perhaps the most life-giving thing that I am involved in here in Germany is the youth group of the church that we are working with. The ages range from 13 to about 25, so it’s a super fun mix of people. I’ve clicked really well with them, and I’ve been able to spend time hanging out with them outside of church. KFC has sort of become our place, and we’ve spent hours there hanging out. We’ll walk in and they’ll say, “Welcome to America. Welcome home.” And during the week, I’ll get texts from different guys asking if I want to go swimming in the river, have a barbeque at their house and watch soccer (or futbol, as it’s properly called), or go out to the best ice-cream shop in the state. In the midst of the business of the refugee crisis, it’s amazing feeling cared for and knowing that I’ve been embraced as part of their church family.

The youth group meets on Friday nights, and tonight’s youth group (6/24) was a welcome party for a group of younger kids. The theme, unbeknownst to them, was Disney. They showed up and everybody was dressed up in some of the most legit Disney costumes you’ll ever see. We played games, had pizza and cake, and just had a blast welcoming these kids into the group. It reminded me so much of the youth group at my home church, Wellspring. Even the church itself has reminded me of Wellspring with the family in it that I've found. Anyways, at the end of tonight, we did karaoke and had a dance party, and it was SO fun. All these people in over-the-top Disney costumes jumping, dancing, laughing, it made me feel home. F.I.R.E. squad back at Wellspring- it was almost identical to so many of our nights in the summers, and it made me miss you all a ton.

Everyone in this group that I’ve met has been amazing, and they are all so hungry for what God has for them. I’m so thankful for the position that I’m in. I am able to do discipleship with a few of the younger guys, and we’ve begun meeting regularly to talk and grow. These dudes love Jesus and want to go deeper so bad. It’s inspirational. School gets out in about a week for them, and I can’t wait to be able to take them out on outreaches with us. I’m so lucky to be able to disciple them this summer and equip them as leaders going forward to continue making an impact in and around this church even after I’ve left.

This church has been an unexpected gold mine for me as I’m here. No matter how crazy or difficult a week may be, I always look forward to the Fridays and Sundays that I get to spend with my German church family.

Thanks for reading this little blurb about how much I love this church!

Much love,

Bae