In March 2009 I have completely changed my personal diet. I have been reading a lot of books and articles about healthy nutrition for men. I then took what ever sounded suitable for me and adapted it into my personal lifestyle. I’m trying to cook my own meals as often as I can. I’m going for low fat and low sugar and I’m eating a lot of chicken. Some products with “healthy fats� like fish I do eat as well, but in healthy measures.

I have stopped drinking all sorts of sugary fizzy drinks of the like of Coke. During my worst times I sometimes drank 500ml of coke every day of the week. This has now been replaced by a lot of water, some tea, coffee and fruit juices. Some of the fruit juices have almost the same sugar content as Coke, but it is natural fruit sugar and the body seems to react differently to that.

Instead of sweets and chocolate I’m trying to eat a lot more fruit and unsalted nuts. Every weekend however I’m allowed to treat myself and will have an ice cream, cake or some chocolate or biscuits.

I have also changed the way I eat in the evening. I try to eat as early as possible, even though I’m not always able to have my tea (dinner in Wales) early. And then I’m usually not having any carbohydrates in my evening meal. The unwritten rule is: “No carbohydrates after 5 p.m.�. So I would have meat or fish with a lot of vegetables, but no bread, cereals, potatoes, rice or pasta. Again, that is not always possible, especially when the money gets tight at the end of the month.

Besides the difference in nutrition I have also started to exercise more. I’m doing a lot of walking and hit the gym a couple of times. I desperately need to go back to the gym soon, haven’t been for 5 weeks now. But I’m still trying my best to do some fast and long walks.

So far this effort had the following results:

I started at 150 kg or 23.620 stone in March 2009 and the last time I weighted myself I was 128 kg or 20.156 stone and that was the result from July 2009. Recently I found that I had gained 1 kg or 0.157 stone between July and August, but that was down not having moved around enough in July I guess. And I treated myself a little too often in the past month. As soon as I found out about the weight gain I got my act together and I’m trying to keep on losing it.

I don’t believe that all this weight loss is just the result of different eating and exercise. I think it God had His hands in there as well and I praise Him for that. The weight loss journey continues. Watch this space…

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In March this year I decided to stay in Wales until God is going to tell me to go to another place on His beautiful planet earth. The 2 years I wanted to check if living and surviving in Wales was possible weren’t exactly over, but I kind of sensed that it was time to make a decision. I prayed and thought about it for a week and decided to stay on. At the time I was still living in a shared house in Barry town centre. Not the place where I wanted to be. I wanted to live in Gibbonsdown, the place where my church is doing all the social and community work.

Short after my decision to stay on, I started talking to one of the guys from church who was thinking about moving house inside Gibby. We prayed about it and both of us had the impression that it would be good for us to look around for a house for rent and start a new house share in Gibby. Around the end of May we found a house that we wanted to check. The day of the viewing came and even though it was the first one we looked at, we both loved the house from the first time we saw it. Believe it or not, it became the house for our house share. We handed in our notice to our individual landlords and moved at the end of June.

This place is just a little piece of paradise. It is in a quiet cul-de-sac at one end of Gibbonsdown and according to Google Maps we’ve got one of the biggest back gardens in the area. We managed to negioate the rent amount a little lower then the initial request of the landlady. We are both under the impression that this a place where one can just take a deep breath, relax and be oneself. The landlady turned out to be a very friendly lady and her partner is brilliant as well.

I’m glad that I’m back in Gibbonsdown. 18 months was a long waiting time and I didn’t end up getting a council house, even though I was threatened by becoming homeless at least twice. They just didn’t see me as a priority. But I didn’t want to cheat myself into the scheme either.

So I’m back in Gibbonsdown. The first part of the good news. More to come. Watch this space…

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As I’ve started a process of thinking about this last year and all the weird and wonderful things that God has been doing in my life and around me this year, I am very thankful. He finally made it happen that I was able to follow His call to move to the United Kingdom. He provided me with a job and temporal accommodation at a lovely families home. Today I’ve signed the rent contract for a nice room in a shared house, where practically I’ll live all by myself, cause the other tenant is hardly ever there. God is great!

This past year has not always been easy and I was very unpatient sometimes. I didn’t want to wait until God would finally do something about some situations and yet at the end He always arranged the right things to happen in my life. He is in control and He sits on the throne in my life!

Since I’m working fulltime, my relationship with God has changed. And it was a negative change in some areas. I’ve not been soaking in His presence as much as I used to. And I know I don’t need the “ritual” of soaking to do that. But there is a high priority in my life for taking some time off the everyday life and to reserve it for time with my heavenly Dad! I need more of that and I need to drink more from Him…. Drink, drink, drink. I like John Scotland, he is one of my role models in drinking. I’m looking forward to become as wrecked in God/for God as Heidi Baker. I don’t know if there will still be time for a fulltime job in the world. But at the moment, God want’s me to work in that callcenter and He uses me there. But I want so much more of Him. I’m thirsty. The Joy of the Lord and the drinking of His New Wine will be one of my top priorities in this new year! 2008 is my year of drinking and more personal transformation. Is that a difficult task? No! I’ll just be the clay in the potters hands!

Merry Christmas and a drunken new year! (God’s New Wine only, please…)

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This stage of my life here in Woelmersen feels a bit weird now. Seminary is over. Many of my friends and fellow students have started working at their internships at “New Life” or have moved somewhere else already. A few are still here, but they don’t live nearby. My two flatmates are gone as well. They will be back at the end of the week and the other guys who live in our house are gone too. I’m the only one left and try to be busy with packing my stuff. But I’m not really motivated to do so. Soon I will move in with my parents in Dresden and will stay there unti 31st of July. And this whole combination of having almost everything done and having said good bye to most people already feels really weird.

Last sunday I had to say good bye to my church here in Eitorf. I preached a message about the full armour of God and they prayed for me and blessed me for the rest of my journey in life. I’m really thankful towards this church. I felt at home there. It was my spiritual home over the last three years and I will for sure miss many of its members and visitors.

On Saturday I will finally move to Dresden. But before that I will meet two families from my church for barbeque and today Renate wants to pick me up for shopping and icecream! Yeah! And I almost forgot to tell you…. This morning I had the (inspired) idea to go online and have a look on NationalExpress website and see if they have any cheap fares. And guess what I found? My trip from London to Cardiff on July 31st will cost me only 1 Pound!!! That is crazy. So alltogether (flight included) I will pay 25 Pounds for my trip from Dresden, Germany to Cardiff, Wales. Wow! Thank You God! I was also able to sell some of my not longer needed books on saturday and sunday and now have some more money to pay the transport of my belongings to Barry. That is awesome!

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With God’s help I have passed all my exams at the theological college / seminary and I received my certificate of graduation during a service the school had invited everybody to. Hallelujah! It is done! YEAH!

Thank you for praying for me!

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In his newest column J. Lee Grady from Strang’s Charisma Magazine wrote:

Old churches are crumbling, but God has not given up on England. Today immigrant Christians are evangelizing the nation.

and

“Some people say, ‘Oh, the church is dying in England,’� says Harold Presley, a Pentecostal church planter from the United States who has worked in England for 17 years. “It’s true that a lot of the beautiful old church buildings are decaying, but underneath the surface there is a bustling spiritual movement.�

and then this prophetic word here:

During one evening service at Ashburnham I couldn’t hold back from releasing a prophetic word about the future of England. The Lord spoke to me and said: “A great thaw is coming to this land. Although things look desolate, as if winter has killed all the trees, I am bringing resurrection life to England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. The time of springtime has come. Though it looks desolate, if you could see in the spiritual realm you would see the buds have already appeared.�

Hallelujah! That is something I needed to read! Yeah! One more conformation that it was not only my own plan to move to Great Britain! Thank You heavenly Daddy!!!

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Like I wrote in my last post, I am out of the hospital now. Here is a new picture of mine, just to show you, that I am fine again. With me on the picture is my cat Rosi. She is born in spring 1992! A pretty old lady, isn’t she?

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Due to the heavy storm we decided to take a one night break in Frankfurt before we went on traveling to Berlin. I stayed with a very lovely young family from the local JesusFreaks group and had a very good sleep that night. Next morning I met with my two co-travelers and we went on the “Autobahn� (highway) to go to Berlin. Early in the moring I had some noise going on in my abdomen but I thought, a little bit of diarrhoea shouldn’t be a reason to not move on with my trip. After around two and a half hours on the Autobahn I got so sick that we had to stop at the side of the street. Vomiting and diarrhoea was what kept me busy from this moment on for two days and one night. My condition would become so worse during the next minutes that our driver decided to make an emergency call and ask the guys on the line what she should do. They asked her how the colour of my face and my lips was and they said palely face and grey/blue lips. They decided to come over and take me into an ambulance. So I was brought to a local hospital and stayed there until Monday.

Thank God, the precious sister who prepared the weekend with me and the other leaders we had invited managed the weekend without me. I am so glad about that. I already received one report on what happened and about all the experiences the teams had on the streets. I will add some testimonies to the blog as soon as I’ll know more.

Thanks for your prayers. I think the fact, that the weekend went on without me and they didn’t cancel it is a reason to be very thankful. Also that I feel much better today and that I was released from the hospital on monday shows, that God blessed me and listened to your prayers.

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Please pray for Germany and our weekend of prophetic evangelism. A hurricane (not a whirlwind, but a huge storm) with a speed of around 150 km/h has been announced on the news to hit Germany on today (Thursday, 18th of January 2007). I will travel to Berlin by train and car today and I’ll leave here in the afternoon. Please pray for protection and health. To me this looks like a prophetic sign for our weekend. God will get Berlin like in a storm. He definitly will use our team to reach people on the streets and places of Berlin. There is no doubt. This has a purpose!

I fear not, because the good shepherd Jesus Christ is with me always. He lives in me through his Holy Spirit and I am protected!

PLEASE PRAY FOR THE PEOPLE OF GERMANY AND EUROPE.

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