So it has been a really, REALLY long time since I have last written a post.  I have got to say, life has been really good for me.  As many of you know, I have been living in the Czech Republic for a year now, doing missionary work with a church in the city of Liberec. I have done a terrible job of keeping this site updated so please forgive me. Right now, I am sitting at home,  and I would like to share a little bit of information about what is going on, and what I have been able to be a part of since I have been in Liberec.

Being the leader of the youth group in Liberec is my main role in the church. In the time that I have been here, the group has grown from a handful of people to 18 at the last meeting I was at. Isn’t that amazing? God has opened the doors for our church to do ministry at schools in our city. Through these activities and events, we have been able to reach, befriend and influence people.

Speaking the language has been a big goal of mine in this past year. I studied some Czech while I was in Liberec for three months, but I would have to say that my language studies really started this time last year when I arrived. Making a life in the country has exposed me to the language so much more than I thought it would. When I came, my goal was to be able to have conversations in Czech, as well as to preach in Czech. Before my “vacation” to America, I had the opportunity to lead the discussions at FreshPoint (that is the name of our youth group) in Czech – twice – and conversations in Czech for me are quite normal now. I definitely praise God for helping me get to this point, and I look forward to the increasing opportunities I will have to talk about Him as I get better in the language!

During my stay, I have been able to establish many close friendships, and many mentoring-relationships with the youth in my church.  Without going into too much detail, I have been able to speak into people’s lives here in a way that many people have not received before.  I have been having very transparent conversations with people, and through those conversations God has been able to encourage and bless people in amazing ways.

This past week, I was just at an event called Kristfest (literally, Christ-festival).  It was a good experience for me.  I have never been to something like this, and I didn’t know what exactly to expect.  I went into this just expecting God to do some new things in my life, but more so in the lives of my students that went.  From our church there were five (but I would claim six) students that went to Kristfest.  The whole week was full of seminars and sessions, and the main focus was how we choose to make our life with Christ “cool”.

My role at Kristfest was mainly to teach English, and I tried to focus on doing it in a way that people with some English background already could begin to have conversations about Christ in English.  My secondary responsibility was being on the prayer team for the evening service “alter-calls”.  I would have to say that praying with people was a very enjoyable time.  Getting to pray with kids who wanted to see God do more things in their lives or who wanted to have more faith to hold on… It was really beautiful.  I know that these times of prayer really influence how we pursue our relationship with God.

Kristfest was a lot of fun, and really good not just for the ministry side of things, but also for what God did in me.  I just returned back to Czech after spending a month and a half in America with my family.  It can be really hard for me sometimes to be so far from them, but I really got affirmation that God has me here in Czech for a purpose, and I intend to follow Him to see that purpose accomplished.

So, that is a little overview of the last year!  Like I said before, I will do better to keep up with my blog so as to keep everyone who reads this informed on how things are going here.  Thanks for taking time to read this!  Feel free to drop a comment!