holland!

i'm back from a really quick but amazing trip to holland! we were supposed to go on friday.. but due to various circumstances, we left early saturday morning, sabine and i, in katha's little car. i drove.

it took us about 3 and a half hours to get to stan and marnie's. holland is such a beautiful country. it's incredibly flat, with canals being nearly as common as streets, and swans and sheep wandering about everywhere. and there are fields still full of flowers- i can't even imagine what it would be like in the springtime. we got to stan and marnie's and had coffee with them and maarten, catching each other up on things that have been going on. the last time i was at their house was 5 years ago, my first semester in germany. a group of us from the bible college drove out there to visit them and to pray with them about the church they were going to be planting a couple months after we were there. since then, i've heard reports of an awesome work going on in holland. maarten and roloef came to the bible college to study, the same two years that i was interning and on staff. roelof left a semester before he graduated, and maarten graduated the next semester, which was my last. i led worship all the time with roloef in siegen, and at the black forest academy twice. maarten went on my outreach team to vienna and was the person responsible for getting me on facebook [he reminds me of that every time we meet!]. they're really sweet guys and it was such a joy to see them again, this time in their home church.

saturday afternoon bini and i went to the BEACH and had such a great time taking pictures, looking at seashells, enjoying the sunshine, sliding down the sand dunes, and knowing that for those few hours, nothing was wrong in the world and we could just enjoy it!
saturday night stan's nephew and his girlfriend came over for dinner, and we sat around talking for a long time. they aren't believers, but this was the first time they opened up with s&m and talked about the Lord and asked questions! it was really cool to be there for that. and marnie made her famous burgers. you need to get to know marnie and experience her burgers. trust me. i also tried some drop, which is salty black licorice. wasn't too keen on the first one but by sunday afternoon i was really liking them! they sent me home with the rest of the package, to encourage my newfound habit.
sunday morning was church at cc cross culture! it was great. i got to lead worship with roelof- 5 songs in english and two in dutch! i loved it!! dutch is fairly similar to german, so i understood some of the words, and i knew what the songs meant already, but it was absolutely delightful trying to read and pronounce along while singing harmony. SO MUCH FUN. i need to learn dutch. they use their throat a lot, and their R's aren't as tricky as german ones! :)
roelof translated the service for bin and i, which was really helpful- we were in 1 thessalonians. got to hang out and drink coffee afterwards, and then they packed everything up and we went home to have lunch with s&m, their daughter alyssa and her fiancé michel, and maarten. another fun time talking and sharing. we were helping maarten try to figure out how to decorate his new apartment. lots of opinions!
we took off at about 4:30, so we could be home by 8pm or so. everything was going great, and about a half hour before home we stopped to get a sandwich. we were off the road for maybe 10 minutes. got back in the car, kept driving, and all of the sudden there were fire trucks and police cars everywhere, going our direction. 1.7 kilometers before our exit, everyone stopped. and waited, and waited, and waited. finally we all had our cars off, and were walking around. no end in sight. stau. heard on the radio that there had been an accident with 5 cars [nobody killed but all were hurt], and that the road was closed until 1am. so we put on our extra clothes and tried to keep warm! we saw the moon rise! it was so weird, like we were camping but on the autobahn with hundreds/thousands of other cars. i was getting really sleepy and all of the sudden after 3 hours at like 11pm we heard cars starting... and saw lights turning on... so we quick turned on the car and got ready- and got to keep driving! sooooo thankful. we were only 20 minutes from home but it could have been 2 or more hours waiting there. so thankful that God had us pull off when we did- we might have been in the accident. so thankful we were safe.. even though it was a little disappointing to be stuck so close to home with no way off the road!
so by 11:30pm we were both home and getting settled in. 2 crazy days but such a blessed trip. God is so good. Dank U Vel, mijn Herr!