Jesus is risen indeed!

Thanks for your prayers! We had an amazing Seder celebration commemorating the Passover that Jesus celebrated with his friends on the day before he was crucified.

About 55 people were there (with serving help from students!). It lasted from 6:00 to 10:00pm!

New believers, old believers and not-quite-yet believers sat around 5 tables eating the traditional vegetables and a lamb roast. The meal prepartation was led and supervised by one of the student helpers, Jonas. Although Jonas is now on the university, he did a two year training as a cook at one of the finest retaurants in Berlin (he still earns money on the side that way). He sees his work as a help to “Haus Nazareth” and we certainly do too.

Yesterday (Easter Saturday) we had a short “Easter meditation” to prepare for today, Easter Sunday.

Abraham in the Suon

Our thoughts centered on the calling and faith of Abraham… how he obeyed God to leave his homeland and go on a completely wild adventure with the Lord… and how he looked forward to his great son who would redeem mankind. A wood carving of Abraham holding out his arms in prayer provided the center piece of our meditation; when the evening sun caught the framework of the window the light cast a perfect cross behind him!

In a BBC article today, Mark Mardell writes:

The voices I hear on the streets [in Europe]…
mourn the fact that there is no leader with a map, a compass and a purpose, who can offer some hope that there is a way out of the swamp…
It chills me a little. ‘No more heroes any more’ I think to myself.
The shadow of the 30s, bullies in big boots with simplistic solutions, hangs heavily over Europe’s economic woes. History surely isn’t about to repeat itself?
Yet in nearly all our countries there is a vacancy for someone who understands people’s pain even if he or she cannot make it go away, and for someone who appears to have a clear plan that has a chance of working.
As far as I am concerned, those in need of equine support or with a love of uniforms need not apply.

Please pray for this continent!

I missed church today… but have a good explanation: a wonderful cellist and special friend of Haus Nazareth (he organized the benefit concert of young musicians) gave Matthias and Sieglinde tickets to a concert of the Waseda Symphony Orchestra (Tokyo) at the Berlin “Philharmonie”. The hour and a half performance was amazing, especially the concluding rhythm piece by the Japanese composer Maki Ishii.

But the 45 minute piece by Richard Strauss “Ein Heldenleben” (A Hero’s Life) made the deepest impression on me… Not really knowing the work, as I listened to the music (which is, to put it mildly, “over the top”) I could not help wondering to myself: “Who in the world did Strauss write this to honor?” As I read the program at the interval, all became clear: Strauss wrote it about himself, the heroic artist standing against the criticism of smaller spirits.

Quite a contrast to J. S. Bach (a work of whom was also played after the pause). Bach was a passionate follower of Jesus, who often wrote in at the end of his compositions SDG “sola deo gloria”: “Glory be to God alone!”

Quite a choice for us humans, too: who’s your hero?

More mundane but no less exciting news: Tomorrow the work begins on the heating in the basement. God has provided just enough funds to move the next step on the journey! Hopefully (and prayerfully!) we anticipate the children’s services offices moving into the basement by May. This, in turn, will free up the “Garden House” for ministry (the church of the Nazarene is renting it for their services; they are special folk and we look forward to them being with us for while yet!).

Thanks for your continued prayers and support!

I’ve been in New York this week… I was able to get a flight roundtrip from Berlin for 300 Euros.

Since Daniel (our son-in-law) was here to read a paper, it seemed like a good opportunity to reconnect with friends and possible “Haus Nazareth” contacts here… and pick up a replacement for my dying laptop (RIP).

There are so many connections between Berlin and New York, especially in the arts and creative worlds. One NY gallery owner said: “Half of the artists I know are either in Berlin or want to be!”

I’m currently staying with our good friends, Roy and Laura De Young at their home out in New Jersey. You can see the skyline of Manhatten from their back porch! (But it is bitter cold in the eastern U.S.; I’m looking forward to getting back to Berlin to warm up!)

As Ash Wednesday (the beginning of Lent) comes up this next week, I wanted to share with you a “prayer” by T.S. Eliot in his poem (appropriately titled) “Ash Wednesday”:

“Teach us to care and not to care
Teach us to sit still.”

Pascal wrote that most of the problems in the world come from people not being able to enjoy sitting still in their own home…

Part of growing together as a fellowship in Haus Nazareth is discovering and losing one’s illusions about oneself and others.  Jean Vanier, the founder and leader of the “L’Arche” community describes this process:

“Communities need tensions if they are to grow and deepen… (these tensions) often mark the necessary step towards a greater unity as well, by revealing flaws which demand re-evaluation, reorganization and a greater humility… Every tension, every crisis can become a source of new life if we approach it wisely, or it can bring death and division…

There is nothing more prejudicial to community life than to mask tensions and pretend they do not exist, or to hide them behind a polite façade and flee from reality and dialogue.  A tension or difficulty can signal the approach of a new grace of God.” (Community and Growth).

We are all learning that we’re not perfect!  (Now, why doesn’t that surprise you?)  Please pray for us all: that, as a team and individually, we will move into the challenge of transparency and realism on this journey God has called us on: to touch this city and beyond with the Good News of God’s love in Christ, life by life!

I want to share with you a very special note from a woman grad student from South America who met the Lord while in Berlin staying at Haus Nazareth:

Dear Friends,
I really want to thank you for all the support and friendship that I received in Haus Nazareth. I am really glad I lived with you these four months.
It seemed to be a coincidence; however, I know God led me there to experience life in a Christian Community. It was really great.
As most of you know, I was facing a hard moment in my life when I arrived in Germany. I am sure it would have been horrible without your help and friendship.
In the end, I was happy to be in Berlin, and definitely I will miss you a lot.
Have a great New Year. I hope God blesses all of you and gives you what your hearts want and need…

Notes like this are a special encouragement… and part of the fruit of your prayers and friendship!

Thank you!

Hope you’ve had a wonderful Christmas-tide and a super start to the new year!
Report on Pre-Christmas: The “Festival of Light” went wonderfully! We had about 50 people in the Garden House (former kindergarten building) as we explained the Jewish festival of Chanukka and its connection to Jesus’ claim to be “the Light of the world”. Some deeply personal conversations with several “not-yet” believers resulted. Please pray that God’s Spirit will use the love and friendship these folk sensed together with the content of the message and questions discussed to move them closer to Jesus!
Three days later, we traveled to the western part of Germany to celebrate Christmas with Daniel’s parents (Erich and Doris) and family and to speak at the home church of his mother in the Westerwald (”Western-forest”).
It was a wonderful time: these are the folk who sent a team of professional tradesmen from the congregation to lay paving stones for the back area patio here in Haus Nazareth. They are warm, transparent people who have a deep desire to do things for God’s Kingdom.
I preached on the three sermons of the Apostle Paul in Acts 13-17… focusing in particular on the reason why Paul gave so much background information to the non-Jewish audiences to whom he spoke.
This is an important topic for people working in a post-Christian environment like Berlin, with only 1.5% church attendance. The simple reason is: the story of Jesus and His life and sacrifice for us is only truly understandable if you have what the film industry calls the “backstory” of the reality of cosmic evil, creation, the fall of the human race into enmity with God and the divine initiative He took to reclaim and redeem His lost creation.

Clark visiting with some of the tradesmen and their wives after the service

More good news: Our boxes from the U.S. arrived today! Since my back is also doing quite a bit better, we were able to get them up the front stairs into the building!

This Saturday (December 20th), we’ll be celebrating a “Festival of Light” at Haus Nazareth. It is the beginning of Chanukkah, the Jewish celebration of the cleansing of the temple about 150 years before Christ and the evening of the 4th Sunday in Advent. We’re looking forward to having about 60-70 guests in the “garden house” (former kindergarten) in the back. We’ll be considering Jesus’ claim, “I am the Light of the World!” Please pray for an atmosphere of real spiritual openness and the working of God’s Spirit.
My back is not well yet. It has been a little over 4 weeks and I still have some pain and swelling, as well as pain in the sciatic nerve running down my left leg. It is very frustrating and I’d deeply appreciate your prayers that this will heal. We’re scheduled to travel to west Germany next week, where we’ll celebrate Christmas with Daniel’s family and I’m scheduled to speak in a church in the “Westerwald” on December 26th. Thanks in advance for your prayers!
Finally, a news item you wouldn’t probably expect: Berlin has a real problem with wild boars! The city has wonderful green areas and city forest… but that’s opened up the way for the boars to move in REALLY close. (We haven’t had any at Haus Nazareth… yet…). Thought you might enjoy reading about them in a Wall Street Journal article. There’s even some pictures… anybody interested in a Christmas ham?

The past two weeks have been VERY intense, topped by celebrating Thanksgiving last Saturday with about 40 European friends at the home of an American couple who work with Campus Crusade. We were able to help by baking 4 of the small turkeys in the student ovens and making a fruit salad. (Thanksgiving, of course, isn’t a holiday here; so we usually have to organize something either the weekend before or the weekend afterward! It’s a great opportunity to talk with Europeans about living for the Gospel. We’ll also be celebrating again this coming weekend!)

We had some deep conversations with different folk–a student from Uganda who is doing genetic research at the university in Potsdam, a couple from Belgium who want to reach their nation for Christ and a married couple who do professional translation work in the medical and legal fields.

- Thanks for your prayers for us and the Haus Nazareth team. Our times of prayer and planning with Matthias and Sieglinde (the physician and his wife who are our partners in the project), as well as with Michael, a German university professor whom we met through Bob Caldwell have been breaking new ground.

We have two big prayer requests:

- There is an annual meeting of “Philosophia Europa” this coming Sunday; would you please pray that all the key people will be able to come and that God will continue to bring just the right men and women together as part of the future leadership team.

- I’ve managed to do major injury to a muscle in my lower back and leg; it’s been pretty much constant pain (sciatica, partial paralysis, etc.) in one form or another for almost two weeks. Please pray that the irritation will subside and I can get back to full capacity in the next couple of days. I would really like to take off some weight, too!

November 9th is a fateful day in German history: on November 9th, 1918, following the conclusion of the “Great War”, the ill-fated Weimar Republic was born; on November 9th, 1923, Adolf Hitler tried to carry out his putsch in Munich - in spite of its failure, it ominously catapulted him to national prominence; on November 9th, 1938, the Nazi SA and SS stormtroopers ransacked and destroyed Jewish homes, businesses and synagogues in a violent pogrom - the prelude to the Nazi’s “final solution” that would end the lives of 6,000,000 Jewish people in the gas chambers of the death camps and the execution trenches on the military front. Finally, on November 9th, 1989, the Berlin wall fell and the East-German communist regime ended up on the trash pile of history.
Last Saturday evening, there was a commemoration of the tragic events of 1938 here at Haus Nazareth. It was part of a memorial march that began at the site where the local synagogue had been and ended in a service at the Baptist church.

Memorial service on the steps of Haus Nazareth

From the steps of the Haus, a saxophone player wailed out a “Kletzmer” melody mourning the loss of the Jewish villages in Eastern Europe and a speaker reviewed briefly the life and death of one of the former residents, a blind Jewish poet.
Appropriately, talking about the Shoah is serious business here in Germany. Nothing touching the subject is taken lightly. I remember a discussion by a panel of “experts” following the showing of the American mini-series “Holocaust” on German T.V. in the late 1970s. On the final evening, the group was discussing, “How can we prevent something like this ever happening again?” One of them, Marcel Reich-Ranicki, is the most influential literary critic in post-war Germany and himself Jewish. After several minutes of discussion, he slammed his hand on the table and said: “I’ll tell you how you can prevent this every happening again! You Christians need to take your religion more seriously. If Christians had taken their religion seriously, the Holocaust would never have happened!” Amen.