Adventures in Wildeshausen

Cornelia called me on Friday and invited me to a cookout. Interestingly, the cookout was at Cornelia's sister's house in Wildeshausen. Considering I had not met Cornelia's husband, let alone her sister, I thought it really said something about her trust of me for her to invite me to come along.

I debated whether or not to accept the invitation, though, because today is the first Sunday of the month and therefore the day for us to go to Braunschweig and worship with the congregation there. I sought advice from Elsa, and her opinion was that the work here in Bremen needs to come before the work in Braunschweig, and while I help with the work in Braunschweig, my meeting with Cornelia is part of my work in Bremen. Based on that and the fact that a chance to meet Cornelia's family might open other doors, I decided to attend the cookout.

Cornelia and her husband, Heinrich, picked me up after services at church this morning, and we made the 40 minute trip to Wildeshausen, a small town southwest of Bremen. Angelika (Cornelia's sister) and her family were very nice. As it turns out, they love animals, and Angelika has her own business raising and selling guinea pigs and rabbits. Let's just say I learned a lot about guinea pigs today! They also have 2 dogs, 2 cats, and 2 horses.

The food was wonderful, and I can now say I've experienced a "German barbeque." I believe I tried 3 different kinds of meat and numerous salads. And as is customary when Germans invite people for a meal, we sat around talking for a couple hours and then they brought out tea and coffee and 2 kinds of cake. I think I said 3 or 4 times that I was full, but they would still put something else on my plate for me to try.

I'm glad I decided to go to the cookout. Angelika invited me to come to her house again sometime, and Heinrich said that I should go to a soccer game with him and Cornelia in the fall. And...not one person brought up U.S. politics! :-) Overall, it was a great opportunity for me to establish contact with the family and to get to know them a bit. I feel like God has really blessed me with this opportunity, and I pray that it might be the beginning of a long relationship with them. I pray also that I might be a positive influence for the Lord for all of them.

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In other news, I just noticed that the exchange rate has gone up to 1.3736 (that is the worth in dollars of 1 Euro). That breaks the record of 1.368 that was set about a week ago. When I came in October, 1 Euro was worth about $1.25, and while 12 cents between then and now doesn't seem like that much of a difference, it really adds up quickly when you exchange hundreds or thousands of dollars at once, which is usually what the Abercrombies and I do. Please pray that the exchange rate goes down so that we will still be able to get the number of Euros we need to pay our bills.

May God bless you in all you are doing. Have a good start to the week! Gott mit Dir!