Easter Monday

That's what they call this day here in Germany. Everybody has the day off for Good Friday and Easter Monday. We love the amazing Easter egg decorations. They are everywhere. And some of them have hand-painted eggs like this one.

This Easter season has meant more to me than any other Easter I remember.  It wasn't the gold foil wrapped German chocolate eggs we hid in the yard or the finger painted flowers. Nobody even got a stitch of new pastel apparel. 

It's simply because this year I have learned a lot about the resurrection power of Christ. Over the past four months I have felt the need for Christ's power over sin and death more keenly than ever before. Starting out as a new missionary has turned me into an awful scary nasty person! It's really just what was there all along, now oozing out under the pressure. It's not that we haven't had pressure before; but these are totally new pressures, and they are hitting me in places that I never knew existed. But every time I collapse, Christ breaks my fall with His resurrection power. Power to forgive, cleanse, reconcile, and give new life. 

And I thought I was whole lot better person than all this! We came over here ready to win Germany to Christ. After all, we had the training, we were called, we were going. But when the tests of missionary life came, I realized I was the one who needed to be won to Christ - again and again, more and more. Each time a new work of resurrection.