Der Mensch lebt nicht allein von Brot, sondern von allem , was Gott ihm zusagt! *

Sunday was Erntedankfest (Thanksgiving) at church. We went to the City Mission Church's monthly service at the "mall" in Lorrach. We were invited by a couple who lives close to us here in Stetten. They called us Thursday night and let us know that they would not be at the service as they had to go out of town. We managed to do church all by ourselves. It was a great service, complete with praise band, a wonderful altar decoration that would make great soup, (according to the pastor) for those who wanted to help themselves after the service. The songs that the praise band led added to the worship instead of just being part of a performance. We were able to follow the sermon - pretty well. The youth pastor from the City Mission Church preached on Matt 4:4. After service we went upstairs for Gemeindekaffe (coffee and cake) and got to talk with a number of the folks who had come to the service. We got a visitors' packet with information about the church.

This past week has been terrific. We spent the better part of it on our own just getting settled and acquainted with the local area. We has found two of the local DIY stores. The one in Lorrach is a Home Depot on steroids! We have been to IKEA in Basel, Switzerland along with all of the rest of the Germans on the Day of German Unity (a German not a Swiss holiday). We are officially registered in Germany - the first step toward our VISA and Residence Permit. We bought our monthly pass for the train to Freiburg all by ourselves.

We have secured a bank account at the one of the banks in the local area. We were able to do the majority of our banking business in German, even though Herr Fooken spoke to us in VERY RAPID Bank-speak and 30 year old "schule-Englisch". We have gotten signed up to pay our electric bill and we have been to the Deutsche Telecom (T-Mobile) office to get in line for our home telefon und internet. We finished our school shopping today and will start at the Goethe Institute in Freiburg on Wednesday. Sadly, we didn't get a "tootie" for our first day of school.

WE are soooooo thankful for all of the blessings God has heaped upon us. Everyday we wake up and get to go and spend some quality time with the Lord, before anything else happens. We get to live in Germany. We get to learn the German language and culture. We get to practice our language everyday. The best part is that one day we WILL get to share Jesus with our neighbors in the same language in which they laugh and in which they cry. That God has blessed us with some material stuff pales in comparison the to Spiritual things with which He has blessed us. What Bernhard Kohlman said yesterday at the StadtMissions Gemeinde is absolutely true - *we do not live by bread alone, but by EVERY word that comes from the mouth of God.

Please join us in praying from Psalms 119:9-16

• Pray that we will stay pure by obeying God's Word;
• Pray that we will try hard to find God and that He would not allow us to wander from His commands;
• Pray that we will hide His Word in our hearts so that we will not sin against Him;
• Pray that we will praise the Lord and that He will teach us His decrees;
• Pray that we will be bold witnesses, reciting aloud all that God has given us;
• Pray that we will rejoice in God's Word and that we will delight in what the Lord declares and that we will not forget His word

Next time, I will try to be more punctual in our posting. For some reason, the "borrowed" internet connection we are currently using went "piffffft' over the weekend and we were complete cut off from internet connecting. Paula's new iPhone 3G(s) has a GPS on it and kept us along the straight and narrow all the way to IKEA in Basel, Switzerland and back. Tune in again next time for more of Paula and Ray in Germany.