Hey!

So it’s been a week since I have been back and Germany, and what a good week too! The sun has been shining every day, the grass is becoming a gorgeous green, the trees are budding and the flowers are growing; it is so beautiful. The Castle has been so full of life as well this past week with three different schools living and studying here at the moment. The September MOTA just graduated this past Thursday, so a lot of them are actually leaving and on their way home. There is also a MOBILE DTS school that travelled all over Europe and is now spending their last two weeks here in Herrnhut; they will be graduating this coming Thursday. Then our school, the January MOTA, recently returned from mini-outreach and will be on our way to Ethiopia in two weeks! Everything here is so busy and exciting and happy and alive. It is so good to experience God’s goodness on so many levels, including learning lessons from mini-outreach, all throughout worship and lecture this week, the people that I have met and have gotten to know, and even through the weather.

I learned some major things through mini-outreach, and encountered many challenges, but overall I found it to be a really good two weeks. The last weekend our team spent in a town called Česky Tešin, which is on the very Eastern side, right on the border to Poland. We helped out with a missons conference there and spent some quality time with the youth and young people of the local church there. it was a really blessed ending to our two weeks spend in the Czech Republic. On our drive home on Sunday we stopped in a Polish city called Wroclaw, which was an incredibly beautiful place. It is not too well known of a city, and that is a shame, because it’s architecture, culture and leisure is comparable to a lot of popular cities.
Something that really struck me during those two weeks was that the way I react to situations is different than the way other people react. I need to learn to be more flexible, not in the sense of dealing with a schedule or lack thereof, but instead being more flexible with people around me and how they are reacting and going through things.

So our mini-outreach is over, and the entire week after that is gone already as well. The time to go to Africa is approaching quickly, and my excitement is growing! I am of course scared of some things that I will face there, and the twelve weeks spent there will not be without its challenges, but I know that God is willing and able to take care of me and my whole team. These last few weeks of lecture are really crucial in our preparation for what God has in store for us in Ethiopia, and I think that we are finally really getting to know each other on deeper levels within the team and are really doing our best to dedicate our hearts to God so that we are able to serve him to the best of our ability.

Our speaker for this past week was very intense and very thought-provoking. His name is David Guava and he is a really spirited man. He has encouraged me a lot with his teachings on the Holy Spirit and he is speaking again next week so I am looking forward to what he has to say about evangelism.

I will be sure to post again what is going on within the next few weeks. Prayers for preparation of my heart as well as the hearts in my whole team would be really appreciated. And also, prayers for financial needs as well would be great; I want to thank those who have supported me again for helping me pay for this amazing trip. I would not be able to be here with such freedom if I was not supported so much by the people back home (aka: you!), so thank you so much. I say that from the bottom of my heart.

I pray you are all well and that the weather where you are has been a beautiful blessing for you too! May God continue to bless you and may you be open to what he has for you each and every day.

Love always,

Fina

Hey all! This is just a quick update to let you know how I am doing! Being in the Czech Republic for the past week and a half has been great! I have seen a lot, heard a lot, learned a lot, and grown a lot. I am tired, but that is only because I am  up way too late. But tomorrow we are driving for about six hours, so maybe I will catch a nap in the van. 


Last Sunday, my minioutreach team and I left Herrnhut and drove a few hours to the Western side of Czech Republic, where we spent five days in a town called Chomotov. While we were there, we stayed at a church and just hung out with a bunch of youth from that church community as well as youth who didn't go to church. We went to a zoopark, learned how to make beads out of glass, did a lot of sightseeeing, played some games, and just hung out with each other. In the evenings we had group discussion times where our team prepared something to share, such as testimonies, stories from the Bible, songs, etc. and then we spent time in discussion with people that came from the community. We were all challenged in different ways, and God was always there with us. Many people were touched by him in that week and it was amazing to see the impact that God can have through people who are striving to serve him. 
The time came for us to leave and head on to Prague, so we said our goodbyes to our new friends, then drove to Prague, the capital of Czech Republic, on Friday morning. We spent an entire week there, helping out with a missions conference, going to church and spending time enjoying the city, doing prayer walks, encouraging the believers here in Prague, going to English clubs and hanging out with Czech students and speaking English and sharing God with them. It has been a really good week! 
The week in Prague is already over, and tomorrow, on Friday, we head to a town on the Eastern end of Czech Republic, our final destination. We will be hopefully be spending time with the youth group from the church there and then on Saturday we will be helping out with another missions conference. Then Sunday will be here so soon and we will make our way back to Germany by going through Poland. 

This outreach has been really good for me. It taught me things only hands-on experience could, and it prepared me for big outreach coming up in ways I did not even realize I needed preparation for. But God is constantly working in my heart to make me more like him, and as I work alongside of him, I pray that I can be the best influence as I can to all those around me. 

So this has been brief, but I am tired. I need to get some sleep; rest assured that I will probably write more about this minioutreach soon enough! 
I hope all is well back home. I miss it deeply, but I am truly enjoying being in Europe. 

Thank you for your prayers and thoughts and support; they are very much appreciated. Take care. :)
Love always,
Fina

P.S. This is a shout-out to my father (I sincerely hope he does read this): Happy 50-something birthday on March 17! :) Haha I miss ya Pa; hope you have a great day and are enjoying your time off work! 

Hello family and friends!

Before I share about this past week, I want to fast forward to Friday and what happened on that day. We, as a school, were in our lecture room, anxiously waiting for our leaders to share with us the location of our outreach. We had been anticipating this information all week long; it was a suspenseful time. The leaders of our school did not tell us straight up where we would be going; instead they sent us on a journey so that we could find our destination. We were put into pairs and given instructions to walk to different spots on the base and pray about different things, such as the nation we were going to and the people we would meet and the people who would be on our team. As my partner and friend, Pia, and I were walking through the forest we prayed earnestly to God about all these things. Eventually we came to the rest of the group, where they were already waiting and had the knowledge I desperately wanted to know in their minds. I heard the words “Welcome to Team Ethiopia” and I literally jumped for joy. I was so excited to learn that we would be going to Ethiopia for our outreach, and that we would be going together as one group! God has been so faithful to me in this and I feel honoured that he is giving us the opportunity to travel to Africa do be able to share his love. I am seriously so excited! But first, before I run away with my excitement, I need to remember to focus on the now and to not let myself be distracted by anything; I must keep my eyes fixed upon God. So tomorrow I leave for the Czech Republic for two weeks for mini-outreach and am excited for this trip. I find myself being more anxious about this two week outreach in the neighbouring country rather than our twelve week outreach in the heat of Eastern Africa. Once the three different outreach teams get back from our separate locations, we have three more weeks of lecture phase in Germany and then will be on our way to outreach phase already! We leave April 7^th and will return June 30^th. Then we have a few more weeks in Germany and the graduation date for our DTS is on July 20^th. Wow! SO much happening! So much excitement and experience and expansion of myself. It is all wonderful and I am so thankful to God for placing me here and for all he has done and will do; he is so good to his children.

Anyways, on that good note and with much more excitement in my heart than last time I wrote, I will tell you about my week. I am less exhausted, which is nice; I was able to sleep in today and that was definitely nice! We had Rogerio, a man from Brazil who is completely dedicated to God and to this base here in Germany, as our speaker this week. He spoke on spiritual warfare, and I am again astounded by how much I can learn from one person. Rogerio taught me a lot about more than just spiritual warfare, and he is an incredible encouragement and inspiration to me. I wish I could tell you all that I have learned but then you would have to read for days. I will try to just give you a few main points that really stuck out to me:

The biggest defense to the attacks of the devil is to be fully obedient to God in all that we do. We must not be ignorant of how the devil works, or else he will be able to fool us with less effort. We have to know that spiritual warfare is real and that it is on-going, but we have the victor of this war on our side, so as long as we stay connected to him, we will be alright.

God is always for us and has what is best for us. God values us not because of what we do, but because of who we are. When our identity is in him, we are connected to him. When we are connected to him, we can have a relationship with him. When we have a relationship with God, we are able to know what he is saying and be obedient to him and therefore stand strong against the ploys of the devil. I am learning more and more about who I am in God, and it is so exciting and lovely to learn of how he knows me. God is also challenging me to learn more of who he is. For how can I have an identity in someone I don’t even know? I need and want to learn to trust that God is who he says he is, just like Moses did. With that, comes spending more time with him in prayer and silence. Reading his Word is crucial as well, for the Bible is his words to us. The well of Scripture within me is very dry, so I have been trying to fill it by reading the Bible more and more. This past week, I along with my Bible reading group, memorized all of James 1. It was a good challenge, yet memorization comes easily to me, so I was able to conquer it with enough work. For a bigger challenge, I may push myself to memorize the whole book of James. I will let you know how that goes. There is so much within James that we can learn from, and I know this applies to whole Bible. There is so much to know, and I feel a thirst within me to know it all. As I continue to push myself to spend more time with God and his Word, I pray the for the same hunger within each of you.

There is so much more that I have learned (and more I want to share with you!). At this point, while I know I have learned so much, I realize that I still have so far to go and so much more to learn. But this is not scary nor discouraging, instead I am looking forward to all that God will teach me on this DTS and throughout the rest of my days that he blesses me with.

Prayers to keep myself from being distracted so that I do not miss out on what God has for me and prayers for focus and discipline are needed. I need to also just take one outreach at a time; I need to concentrate on what God has planned for me in Czech Republic, and then once I am back I can set my mind to Ethiopia. Please also pray for the people that my team as well as the rest of my school will meet in the Czech Republic, the Ukraine, and Germany. Prayers also for preparation of our hearts for mini-outreach and big outreach are appreciated!

If there is anything I can pray for any of you, please do not hesitate to let me know.

I miss home dearly, but I am loving being here. I am unsure of any consistent internet that I might have for the next two weeks, so I do not know if I will be able to update you while I am in the Czech Republic, but I will be sure to let you know of all my adventures with my team and with God when I get back to the Castle in Germany!

Take care, and may God bless.

Love always,

Fina