The Sudbrock Scoop

Success!

We made it! We survived 141 days of living out of the car and cooler. We visited 10 states and 30 different churches. Now we have made it back home to Wittenberg, Germany. We took a week and rested and tried to get realigned with the sun on this side of the planet.

Samantha has started back to school and is enjoying the third grade in the German public school. Yesterday on the way to school, she said, "Mom, thank you for bringing me home. It is so exciting here!" The kids really are more at home here than anywhere else in the world.

When we left, the closets were full of summer dresses and short sleeved shirts. Though February in Germany is nothing compared to the blizzards in Iowa, it is still sweater weather, so we have spent a few days cleaning out closets and finding all the winter apparel that was needed. The kids have grown so much while we were traveling, especially Serenity.

Our church people welcomed us home with an 8 foot square banner and a song that they had written in our honor. What a tremendous blessing they were. After church, we enjoyed lunch from the grill and an afternoon of fellowship. We are excited to be back with them. Please pray for us as we seek God's will considering the future of our building.

We are eager to get things rolling again. The Iowa Pastor's Fellowship was generous enough to commit the money needed to fund the printing of full-colored introductory fliers for the church. Now, with a little more funding, we would like to put together welcome packets and get geared up to see a lot of visitors come through our doors this spring.

A generous supporter in MO donated a set of children's handbells to our ministry. I was able to introduce these to the kids on Sunday and they are all so excited. We will be planning our initial presentation for Palm Sunday. Please pray with us that God will give us wisdom in using this tool to reach the children in our neighborhood and their families.

The two youngest children, Serenity and Sadie, have lost some of their German, so we have enrolled them in preschool and kindergarten respectively starting the 3rd of March. Please pray with us that God will allow us to be a witness in the schools and that He would provide good Christian friends for our children. As you can imagine, being the only one in the whole school who believes in God, can be quite a strain on anyone, and especially on a child.

We appreciate you all so much. Now that we are sitting still again and have reliable Internet access, you should be hearing from me on a regular basis again. I hope to write to you again soon.

Blessings!

Chelli

Furlough

Our 2007 ministry video is ready for viewing.

Please pray that our calender will fill up with new churches or churches that are in a position to increase our support.

New Pictures

Our new pictures arrived today. Not bad, I must say, but the price! These little 1.25 x 1.75 inch babies cost approx. $100. a piece. Ouch! But oh how precious. The price break down per unit is as follows:

1. Processing fee - $55.

2. Application fee - $30.

3. Security surcharge - $12.

4. Cheesy picture booth - $7.

The next step is to have some pricey and precious little stickers pasted in them, namely our visa permits. Please pray with us as we go in to apply for our visa renewals. We are praying that we will be granted permanant resident status this time around.

Life - Abundantly

This last month is a good example of that promise. Christ did not say a perfect life, He said life more abundantly. We have been through valleys and on peaks.

The weak dollar continues to wreak havoc on our finances, but God continues to bless our ministry. We are returning on furlough this fall. Please pray that God will give us the right contacts in order to raise the needed support.

On top of the usual social obstacle course that goes along with attending a public school in a second culture, we have recently had some overly inquisitive teachers asking some rather personal questions about our family life. Within a culture where Christianity is an oddity, our traditions and family culture can appear very peculiar. We are praying that the curiosity will lead to Christ. Please pray with us for God’s hand of protection over our family and our children.

At the same time, we were working on plans for our fall furlough which required some cooperation from the school. We planned to delay Serenity’s start into the first grade here by a year while schooling her in English during furlough. At first, the school system challenged our plans. If this had gone wrong it could have impacted our ministry in ways that I don't want to think about. But God gave wisdom and solution through a face-to-face contact with the superintendent of the primary schools in Sachsen Anhalt. At this point, all appears to be ironed out.

My Father, A.B. Sudbrock, was diagnosed with prostate cancer, but through the prayers of many the cancer is limited to the prostrate and it is treatable.

During a Thursday night Bible study, we received the phone call that Chelli’s grandmother had passed away.

Later that evening as snow fell on our sleepy little town, I slid into the car of the one neighbor that I have never been able to befriend. Still waiting to see what God's plan will bring. The bill to repair his car is $ 421.

At our annual fellowship meeting, Serenity fell up stairs and cut herself at the point where the nose meets the upper lip. It took three stitches and several of papa’s nerves. You just feel so helpless. I was fine until the doctor mentioned the pain she was in with the nerve that runs through that area. It was too much. I felt that sick weakness come over me. Keith Gandy had taken the time to show me the way to the hospital. The doctor then mentioned that I should lie down. Keith said I looked like a banana.

As soon as I felt the wooziness subside we moved Serenity into the hall to wait for the medicine to take effect. Soon Serenity was completely happy reaching out to touch objects hanging in the air that only she could see. She began to laugh and state that her nose didn’t hurt any more, but tickled.

The doctor said the medication would block all memory of the event from the time she took it until it wore off. She doesn’t remember the pain of the needle injecting the local anesthetic or papa’s tears at her crying. She has her first three stitches and a war story to boot.

By the way, we made it back to the church in plenty of time and God gave us an effective fellowship meeting.

Now for the mountain top, we had 12 visitors on Easter Sunday at our church Wittenberg. All of the new believers that we have written about during the past several months were also in attendance. It was a good day.

Thank you for your prayers. As you can see, they are needed on a daily basis.

Searching for the lost,

Paul Sudbrock

Honestly forging forward

For years we have struggled to develop a relationship with our neighbor, Andreas. No matter how we attempted to be friendly, his answer to almost every attempt at greeting was met with a grunt of acknowledgement at best.

Thursday night I went to pick up Chelli from the area college where she teaches English to seniors. It had snowed all day long, but the streets were still drivable. Upon our return, and as I was maneuvering the parking lot our car began to slide and I automatically hit the brakes to no avail. Sure enough, I slide into Andreas' car. My first thought was, "Oh no, anyone but Andreas."

Ironically I was working on my message for Sunday and one verse had been standing out.

John 12:27 ¶ Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour.

In one way this verse spoke volumes that God has a plan that sometimes isn't a bed of roses. Knowing that God has a plan doesn't always give immediate and complete peace. Christ even bore this out in His statement that His soul was troubled.

On the other side Christ, our leader, gives us encouragement to stay the course that God has planned. No matter the cost!

Andreas' car had a few scratches and a little, almost non-detectable crease in the bumper. It was at night and most were in bed or on the way. The human thing to do would have been to walk away and pretend that nothing had happened. But then what about God's plan? Nothing comes into a Christian's life without God's design.

I couldn't bring myself to wake my already unfriendly neighbor to tell him that I had scratched his one year old pride and joy VW. I decided to take care of it in the morning. I woke up at 5 to assess the actual damage. Normally, Andreas is quite noisy and slow in his preparation to take his son to school. Not so on this Friday. Even with our front door open, I missed making contact in the morning. That served to extend my intrepidation of telling him the bad news.

Christ did say that I needed to take up my cross and follow him.

Later in the day, I was on my way out and stopped at the end of the drive to set up my cell phone for driving. As I made ready to pull out I noticed that Andreas had been waiting for me to get out of his way so that he could pull in the drive. Oh great, I thought. Now he is pre-frustrated with me. This is going to make telling him that I scratched his car so much easier.

When I returned, he was outside and I finally was able to point out the scratch and he took it very well.

I have two prayer requests.

1. That God will glorify Himself through this so that Andreas can see Him through me.

2. That God will help me bear the cost of fixing his car. The repair costs are just above my deducible. Not worth the risk of raising my insurance, but still not an easy hit to take.

No matter the costs,

Paul

Tuition

Dear Praying Friends,

We are in need of your prayers and God's provision. Vivian Kleeblatt, a young lady from our church here in Wittenberg, Germany, feels God's leading in her life towards full-time ministry. Unfortunately, her parents are not yet believers and do not support her decision to pursue full-time ministry as a life-decision. She has chosen to attend a Bible college in the states where she can receive a degree in Music Education. She auditioned for their scholarship program and was awarded a $5,000 renewable scholarship for the 2007-8 school year. Now for the prayer request. In order for a foreign student to receive a Visa Permit allowing them to study in the USA, they must pay for their first year of schooling in advance. This means Vivian still needs $12,000 in a stateside bank account in order to be allowed into the country. Several have already helped towards this need and we currently have $3,500 in an account at our sending church in Newton, Iowa, designated for Vivian's college fund. That leaves $8,500 that is still needed by May. Vivian is applying for other scholarships almost on a daily basis while finishing up her high school requirements and working odd jobs, but due to the poor East German economy, has been unable to find a regular job. We are asking you to please pray for us as we seek God's provision for this young lady.

Thank you,

Paul and Chelli Sudbrock

Wittenberg, Germany

And God said, "Tree be moved."

The Orcan ’’Kyrill’’ was responsible for massive damage and 47 lives in Europe. An orcan in a mixture of extreme straight winds and an occasional cyclonic wind. Wittenberg was hit severely on Friday around 7 pm local time. The neighbor lost the front side of his roof as the wind broke through the large window. The wind simply filled the house and lifted the roof off and threw it to the ground. There was damage all over town. Please pray for us as we look for the open doors that God has created through this storm.

Our one hundred year old oak Tree found a resting place leaning on the back corner of our church building. See more pictures here: pix Thankfully, last year we did a extensive trim job which lightened the tree's overall mass. God leaned the mighty tree against our building. Rough estimates are about $1500, but I believe that it will be more. Please pray that the insurance deals favorably with us. I would like to see a new insulated roof instead of the simple roof we have presently.

This could be a blessing in disguise as any proposed building plans have always been thwarted in the past because of the placement of the oak. And in Germany, you can't cut down such a tree without a permit and lots of money. We have worked the past two days cleaning up the mess from the orcan. God blessed us with much help. I teased some of them that a disaster is the only way that I can get them to come to church. They all enjoyed the humor that will hopefully bear some fruit. Well, I am in sore need of some muscle rub and some rest. Please keep our church and our city in your prayers as we recover from this disaster.

Paul