Were sorry for the lack of communication the past month or so! About a week and a half ago we finished up our Summer of Service outreach here in Berlin! We had about 80 participants come through our doors here and together we spent the time blitzing the city of Berlin with the gospel! There were many nationalities represented in our SOS outreach - there was a group from Sweden, a group from the south of Germany as well as individuals from Brazil, Switzerland, Germany, America and many other places! It's always a beautiful thing to see different people from different locations, cultures and backgrounds come together in unity for the same purpose! We had different teachings and times of worship for our participants back at our YWAM campus, but the rest of the time we were out in the city doing open air evangelism and ministry! We had dancing, and shared dramas, there was preaching and testimonies. We went in groups and sang worship songs on the S-Bahn trains and were able to talk with people, share about Jesus and hand out bibles. We were also able to pray and intercede over the city and over the different "spheres of influence" here in Berlin! We also took a day and split up into 4 groups and went to the north, south, east and west of Berlin - singing praises to God and declaring His love for the people of Berlin! It was amazing! We also saw change and transformation in our participants that came - some of them gave their lives to the Lord for the very first time and we also were able to see one participant get water baptized toward the end of the outreach. God is so good!
This outreach for us personally was good yet challenging in some ways. There were many things happening back at home in the states that made it difficult for us to be away from our friends and families. We also started hitting a bit of culture shock during the craziness of the outreach, so as you can imagine we were missing home just a bit! The harsh reality of the hardness of the people here in Berlin also started sinking in much more. It's one thing to read statistics about Berlin being the "Atheist capital of Europe" and another to talk to person after person who say "God is dead" or "There is no God". Even children and pre-teens looking you dead serious in the face saying "There is no God - it's OK if your a Christian and you need that to feel better about yourself, but really there is no God" was mind bogging. The younger generation is being taught as FACT that God does not exist. We're finding our hearts breaking for the people here all the more, it's becoming more personal and our desire to see Berlin turn back to the Lord is growing in us greatly!
Please continue to pray for us and our amazing YWAM team here working in the city! It is such a blessing to serve!! We love and miss you all!!!
Mark and Kassidy
Below are some pictures from our SOS outreach!!! Enjoy!!
