July and August in Berlin- Coming Home

 

    September has arrived, and with the changing of the month, so too my plans have changed. For a variety of reasons, I have decided not to stay in Germany and have instead returned to where my family lives in New Jersey. As I write this, I am keeping busy working at my family’s business and planning next steps. I finished my year in Germany working at the Willkommens Gemeinde, the local church, and the Notübernachtung, a homeless shelter. 

The Church: Willkommens Gemeinde and Sprachcafé    

    The Willkommens Gemeinde, the church I have been a part of for the last year, was a difficult place to say goodbye to. My friends, Kevin and Anastasiya, and I all came to Berlin with Resonate Global Mission for this church. Every Sunday, we helped prepare for the service, and we became part of the community. 

We hosted Sprachecafé here in the summer

    On Fridays, the church hosted a Sprachecafé, which is where people learning German will go to practice speaking. The tables were divided by language levels, so as you progressed in German you would move to different tables. As Anastasia and I were both beginning to learn German when we had arrived in Berlin, it was here we were able to really practice speaking. 

The Homeless Shelter: Notübernachtung

A blurry photo I took of the NÜ as I left it after my shift

    I worked in the Notübernachtung, which is in a tent, since May. In a previous newsletter, I mentioned the tent is pressurized, meaning we have to be careful about opening doors. One day, we heard a generator turn on, and the ceiling lights started getting closer and closer to us on the ground. The supervisors ran to the emergency door, where a guest had opened it, looking for the bathroom, inadvertently beginning to collapse the tent. 

    As I was there for three evenings a week, I grew to know both the volunteers and the different guests well. When I walked up to the shelter, many of the guests waiting outside would wave when they saw me. There was one who would show up sporadically, but when she did, she would run up and hug me. 

    There was one guest who would point to the food he wanted, since we both spoke different languages. When he tried speaking his native language, I would smile and shrug to show I had no idea what he was saying. Once, I had accidentally put pasta on his plate, he came back and pointed to his teeth, to show he was missing so many that he could not chew the food that had been served. 

    The other volunteers I worked with were incredible. They worked to make the shelter the best it could be. One told me how he had purchased socks in bulk for the clothing bin for the guests. He was shocked when they were gone within the week. Another put on their music playlist, and throughout the evening, we saw multiple guests dancing to it. She told me, "I'm so glad people like my music." 

    I was sad to say goodbye. 

Where have I seen God? 

    In my previous newsletter, I left you all with the question, "Where have you seen God in the last year?" and I promised to answer the question in this newsletter.

    Last June, before I left for Germany, I was listening to someone speak, and they asked the question, "If Jesus were sitting across from you, how would he see you?" I looked at myself and saw a mental image of myself, broken. When I envisioned how Jesus saw me, it was like light was pouring from the cracks where I felt broken. It felt like Jesus, regardless of how broken I saw myself, made me whole. 

    I talked with someone after I had written the question, “Where have you seen God in the last year?” They responded that they did not like the question, as “God is all around us at all times, so where is God not?” The person I was speaking to is an artist, so they talked about how, for them, they see God in art and in beauty. The beauty in art of Creation for them was in how God created order out of chaos, and they strove to do the same in their own creations.

Sometime in February, I was working in the shelter, helping to check the guests in, and I looked up and every guest that had entered the room either had a black eye, or a nose facing the wrong direction. It struck me in that moment how I was surrounded by pain. And as I began answering the question, “Where have I seen God this year?” it led me to ask the question: “Where is God in pain?” 

I know this is a question asked by philosophers. It is a question that leads people away from the church.  I am aware that I will never be able to answer this question completely or stop wrestling with it. 

I don't have an answer to this question. I don't know where God is when pain feels like it's too much. Often, I find God in the times when someone can speak through pain and give comfort. I watched my colleagues this year go out of their way to make the guests feel comfortable and safe. I watched volunteers give their time every week to work in a shelter. While I may not know where precisely God is in pain, I believe that when we comfort those in pain, we are showing God's love to them. I believe that as we live our lives, we show God to others through our actions and through our words.

    In my last week in Europe, I went to an art museum. In the first room I walked into, there was a statue of Jesus on the cross. I was struck in that moment by something I had heard once. Our God understands our suffering, as He also suffered. We pray to a God who has experienced pain. When we cry out in pain, he feels our pain. 

    I walked into the next room, and there was an art piece consisting of seven paintings, in which Jesus stood among the crowd. Jesus stood among those waiting for food as they begged. Jesus among the sick. Jesus in prison. Jesus among us. 

Feeding the Hungry 

Comforting the Sick 

Ransoming the Captive

    So, in conclusion, throughout the year, I saw God within the grace and kindness shown in the words and actions of others, and I, too, saw God within the artwork. 

Lastly, 

    Thank you to everyone who has reached out throughout this year. I am incredibly grateful for all your prayers and support, as well as for all the people who responded to the emails. It was pretty cool knowing people read them. 

    Back in August, DoJustice, a blog within the CRC, published an article I wrote on missions, which you can check out here: https://www.resonateglobalmission.org/stories-more/notubernachtung 

As I sign off from my last newsletter, may God bless you and lead you to unexpected people and places. When pain comes to you, may you find comfort in a God who understands our suffering. May you see God's hands working in your life. 

A. Kuperus 

May and June in Berlin

  Guten Tag aus Berlin! 

    I haven't sent an update in a few months, during which quite a lot has happened. I changed which shelter I work at, from the shelter outside my window to a new one forty minutes away by subway. I went to the States to celebrate my sister's wedding. I left the States for Budapest, where the Cohort said goodbye to each other as our year together came to an end. My year in Berlin will end in August, so I plan to send out one more newsletter around that time. 

Budapest

    Cohort Europe is a part of Resonate Global Missions. It is the program I came to Germany with. It gives young people a chance to do missions and learn about missions in different contexts, with the hope of getting more young people interested in missions as a career. We have been able to travel to multiple countries to see how missions work in different contexts. It has given me a greater understanding of European culture. 

    There were six people in this year's Cohort. Kevin and Anastasia were with me in Berlin, Rebecca and Hanis were in Budapest, and Caroline was in Lithuania. I have been able to build good relationships with those in the Cohort, from living with some to having weekly phone calls with others. At the beginning of June, we went to Budapest and said goodbye to one another, marking the end of our year together. 

From a Basement to a Tent 

    On April 15th, the shelter where I had been working closed for the winter, and I was transferred to another shelter that remains open during the summer. In making this transition, I moved from a shelter in a basement to one in a tent. 

    Throughout the year, I had heard stories about the shelter in a tent. In previous years, some of my friends worked there until it deflated, and they ran the shelter out of a church for a winter season. 

    The first day at my new job, I walked across a cement parking lot with weeds coming through the cracks in the concrete to a faded silver tent. To enter the tent, there is a pressurized door, and inside the tent, there are benches to one side in front of the kitchen and rooms made from plywood on the other, and the tent goes up to create a dome over the space. 

    The new shelter is smaller than the shelter I worked at during the winter, with sixty guests coming each night, instead of 130. The work is similar to the work in the other shelter. Every evening, our guests get checked in. They can be served dinner until 10pm, and here they can have the same bed for as long as they stay. Each guest can stay for up to 10 days, but to stay longer, they can meet with the social worker, who can help them with paperwork or find a new job or apartment. 

    I have been able to shadow the social workers, which has given me a better understanding of the job social workers do, which has been helpful as I am considering pursuing my master's in social work next year. 

Update on Next Year 

    I have received a few inquiries about whether I plan to do missions next year. I am still figuring out what I can do next year, as I hope to stay in Berlin to continue being part of the communities I am currently involved in. However, I do not plan to continue doing missions, since the program I am in only lasts for one year. As a result, I am beginning to search for other things to do. I hope to further my education with a Master's in Social Work and continue working in the shelter. 

Lastly, 

I plan to send out one more newsletter after this one. A question I have been asked quite a lot recently is "Where have you seen God this year?" and as I begin to think about how I will answer this question for my next newsletter, I leave you with the same question: Where have you seen God this year? 

April in Berlin

April

    April has been a bittersweet month for me. The church hosted a dance evening, the Notübernachtung closed down for the summer, the Cohort went to Lithuania, and Ima and Abba came to Berlin to visit me. 

Dance Evening

    This month, Kevin and Anastasia asked different people in the church if they would help to host a dance evening at the church, and people came prepared with their cultural dances.

    We were taught a Ukrainian dance, an Arabic dance, a Belarusian dance, a Greek dance, and the tango. One man was thrilled to teach us a traditional wedding dance from his country. 

    When the evening ended, everyone was asking, "When is this happening again?". 

    It was amazing to celebrate so many different cultures. 

Notübernachtung

    The shelter closed for the summer on April 15th. As it is an emergency shelter, it is only funded for the colder months of the year. We said goodbye to our guests, and many of our guests thanked us for our work over the winter. 

    On the last night working there, my coworker took a photo of a shopping cart outside the shelter. When I asked her what she was doing, she replied, "taking a photo for Instagram of something that looks forgotten, because when we close this shelter for the summer, it's like our guests are forgotten". 

    From November 1st to April 15th, we had over 2,000 different people come through the shelter. We had around 130 guests most nights. Some people came every night, while others came only once. Regardless, I hope they know they are not forgotten. 

    I will begin working at another shelter that is open during the summer. 

Lithuania

The Cohort in Lithuania 

    At the beginning of May, the Cohort traveled to Lithuania. We visited Vilnius and Klaipeda, two cities on opposite sides of the country. We were able to learn about Lithuania's history and culture. Resonate has many people working in Klaipeda, including Caroline from the Cohort, at LCC University in Klaipeda. We were able to see the work they do there, see how they had integrated into the culture, and the impact they were making within the university. 

    We arrived in Vilnius, Lithuania's capital city, and got a tour of the city from one of Resonate's missionaries in Lithuania, where we learned about the country's history. It was interesting to learn about how Germany and Russia had such a large impact on the country's history, with lasting impacts to this day, including how concerned they are with the war in Ukraine. 

(Side note: while we were there, it was when four American soldiers died in a training accident, and their vehicle was recovered in a swamp. So while we were there, we saw many American flags at half mast in honor of the soldiers.)

    Lithuania was the last Pagan State in Europe; it became a Catholic state in 1387. Through the years, it has changed its religion multiple times, depending on political circumstances.  We visited a church that was a representation of this. It had changed what it stood for every time the country changed its belief system. It was built as a Catholic church, changed to Orthodox, and under the Soviet Union was a shrine to Atheism. Today, it has been returned to the Catholic church. 

    On this tour, we also visited a part of the city that was a Ghetto during the Second World War. There had been around 208,000 Jews in Lithuania before the Second World War. Lithuania had, for much of its history, been a safe place for Jews, which is why there had been such a large Jewish population there. I believe that after the war, he stated, there were 3,000 left. The majority had been killed. 

    In Klaipeda, on the other side of the country, we got a tour of the city from a local. Her family had been sent to Siberia when the Soviets had taken over the country, and she told us her family's story and how they eventually worked their way back to their city. 

    There is a monument in Klaipeda of a little girl. At one point during World War II, Hitler came to Klaipeda and gave a speech. When he went to see where he was giving a speech, he saw that the statue had its back to him, and he had it removed. It was rebuilt (a little smaller) a few years later, and is known as the girl who turned her back on Hitler. 

    Lithuania is located along the Baltic Sea and is one of the three Baltic States, along with Estonia and Latvia. These Baltic States have an example of one of the largest and most successful peaceful revolutions. On August 23, 1989, two million people joined hands from Vilnius in Lithuania, Tallinn in Estonia, and Riga in Latvia, becoming known as "The Baltic Way". One-third of all three countries' populations helped to create this human chain. A show of peaceful resistance against the crumbling Soviet Union, showing that they could organize. Six months later, Lithuania declared its independence. 

    It was incredible to be able to visit a country and learn able it and its history from people who are so deeply invested in the culture there, whose families experienced the hardships of its history, of a university that is reaching out to people from around the world in a small city there, to visit churches that speak a language I can not understand, but in which we worships the same God. 

Ima and Abba 

    Ima and Abba came to Berlin to visit me. I showed them around Berlin, during which time I learned that I have not been using public transportation enough, as I got them lost getting home from the airport. It was great to see my parents and show them my home here, even if we often took the long way round. 

Döner: A very Berlin meal 

The Brandenburger Tor

Checkpoint Charlie and the Berlin Wall

    A. Kuperus

March In Berlin

 March

    March was quite a busy month for me. I finished a German course and spent time working in the church and the shelter. I also spent a week in Rome at a Resonate Retreat, where the Cohort group met CRC missionaries from all over Europe. 

The Shelter

    When I look out the window of my room, I see a stark contrast between two worlds. For context, I live directly across from the homeless shelter where I work. Every morning and evening, the shelter's guests sit crowded on a bench, waiting for the shelter to open. On the other hand, kids in my building run around carefree, playing soccer, climbing on playground equipment, and playing hide and seek, whereas with the guests one can see the weight of the world on their shoulders. They will often carry around bags containing all of their worldly possessions. They will layer multiple jackets because they are out in the cold all day. I suppose there is a harshness to the world that those who are homeless understand, that I hope those kids will never experience. 

    Sometimes, the contrast strikes me in my own life. Every evening after a shift at the shelter,  I come home to a group of my friends rather than sleeping in a room with people I haven't met before. I come home to the privacy of my own room after having given men or women at the shelter a bed in a room with up to fourteen other people. I don't worry about where I will sleep, how cold the weather is, or if I will eat. I’m grateful that I get to be a part of their lives, and am also grateful they get to be a part of mine. 

 Resonate Retreat 

    March was a month of rest. I traveled with Cohort to a retreat in Rome for Resonate’s European missionaries. For four days, we debriefed our time in our respective countries. Meeting the Resonate (or CRC) missionaries from around Europe was incredible. Listening to their hearts for the countries that they serve was inspiring. The effort they put into learning the language and the culture was incredibly moving. We listened to a speaker (in English, which I greatly appreciated) and took time to soak in the sunshine (which I also greatly appreciated since Berlin is still quite grey). 

    The day I returned to the shelter after the week off, I was standing at the door of the shelter. A woman who is a frequent guest of the shelter looked at me and said, "Ich weiß dich" – “I know you.” Since I spend three to four nights a week at the shelter, for someone to say "I know you" when I came back was, I suppose, a way to acknowledge I had been gone and come back. 

    I was glad to be back. 

Photos from Rome 

As we celebrate Jesus' resurrection, may we be aware of the blessings around us. 

A. Kuperus 

February in Berlin

February in Berlin 

    Since February is the shortest month of the year, I’ll keep this update short and sweet.

    One of the biggest things that happened was finally having my long-awaited appointment regarding my residence permit. After five months of waiting, I finally got it!

    But the most meaningful moment of the month was something much smaller.

    My boss at the homeless shelter had been encouraging me to host an event in the main room where our guests eat dinner—something simple, like playing ping pong, singing songs, or coloring. I thought about it for a while and eventually settled on coloring. It’s something I enjoy and a good way to connect with people. So, I dragged my roommate Anastasia into helping me, and we set ourselves up in the middle of the shelter with stacks of coloring pages and half-sharpened pencil crayons. Then, we waited to see if anyone would join us.

    A woman almost immediately came and sat down with us, she talked and talked and had her friends come sit with us as well. We sat and colored and talked. When she finished coloring, she folded her paper and put it in her purse. 

    Anastasia, my suite mate who speaks Russian, found other Russian speaking people and had them join our table. She talked with them about life and got some of them on the medical list to see the doctor when they spoke of injuries. They talked about why they came to Germany. One talked about his trouble in getting lost on the streets of Berlin, how he has found a friend he hangs out with all the time, so he will not get lost. He informed us he had bought a ticket home. If memory serves right, he was scammed into coming to Berlin through a job offer that didn't turn out to be what it had promoted itself to be, something I have heard from a few different guests. 

    At one point Anastasia looked over at the food line and shouted the name of a man standing in line, the men sitting at the table echoed her, trying to get the man's attention. The man looked over really confused. "No, no, no" Anastasia said "That's okay. I was just really happy to see him here". We had met a homeless man elsewhere and recommended he go to the shelter for food and a bed, and when we had seen him there, I think part of us was relieved that we knew he would have a dinner and a warm place to sleep. 

    At 11pm, we packed up, the lights went off, and the guests who had not gone to the sleeping houses began to fall asleep on the floor and the benches in the main room. One of my friends stated the first time she had come into the Notübernachtung was at midnight, and she stated it felt surreal, walking past people just sleeping on the floor and on benches in this darkened room. 

    The woman who had sat at our table for the first half of the coloring time, now becomes really excited when she sees me and updates me on her life, asking when I will host the coloring event again, at one point even pulling the paper out of her purse to show me she still had it. 

    Something for next month, I suppose. 

\

Jeremiah 29:7 

Nayaris, Anastasia, and I on Our Way to Church

Anastasia and I eating at a Well-Known Berlin Restaurant

Thank you for your continued prayer and support. 

A. Kuperus