Alp Baptized in the Red Sea

One of our first blog posts when we moved to Turkey in January was about Alp, who got saved shortly after we arrived here. He is a Jewish Turk, so it was really amazing to see him get baptized by Pastor Matti and Roger in the Red Sea - where the Jews were delivered from certain death by the hand of God!
Please continue to pray for Alp and his spiritual growth. We believe that Egypt was just the beginning of a great work of God in his life!

Unbelievable

We witnessed - by far - the most unbelievable sight we have ever seen. This is a video of a Coptic Church service that we went to with the group. As you can see, this is no ordinary church. Not only is the architecture stunning, and the layout unique, but it is its location that makes it so incredible. Around the 1960's, the government banished all the trash collectors to a certain area of the city, now known as the Garbage City. Muslims refuse to do this job, so all the garbage collectors are of Coptic Christian descent. There are over 50,000 people living in the Garbage City. Some time in the 70's, a Coptic priest was called by God to preach to the "untouchables" there in the midst of the garbage - and there was a huge revival that took place there! Since then, they built a church into the limestone rock cave that is in the middle of the Garbage City. As you can see from the video, its a huge outdoor auditorium and can seat up to 20,000 people! The singing that you hear is in Arabic. Even though it was in a different language and even though the Coptic church has much different doctrines and traditions - you could see the life and joy in this place, surrounded by filth and poverty! It was truly life-changing.

Trip to the Pyramids in Giza and Sakarra - up to 4,500 years old!

Amazing time in Cairo!

Pastor Matti's Art Exhibition at Zamalek Fine Arts University

The exhibition turned into quite a politcal event - with ambassadors, camera men, ribbon-cutting ceremonies, and alot of people! It was really cool to see Pastor Matti honored in such a way.
In addition to all that, something else very interesting happened to me... I was the only person this TV crew could find that spoke French well enough to do an interview in French for their French news channel...so I did an interview about my thoughts on the exhibition - in French! I still can't believe it actually happened because I really don't know much French. Until about 3 weeks ago, if someone had asked me if I spoke French, I would have just said no. But since then, I became friends with an Iranian woman who speaks only French and so I was forced to try out what little French I have kept from my childhood...and I was shocked at how much I could understand! So I gained a little much needed confidence from that friendship. Who knew I would be using it in an interview fro Egyptian television!
We go to the Giza pyramids tomorrow and to the Red Sea the day after that! So please keep us in your prayers. God is faithful and is protecting us at every step, of that I am sure.

First looks at Cairo

Art, Music, Pyramids, the Red Sea - and FAITH!

Please keep us in your prayers as we go on a faith adventure to Cairo, Egypt! We fly tomorrow morning and will be there until Sunday. Our prayer is that Pastor Matti's art exhibition would be a huge success both spiritually and financially. We also will be having a classical music concert and we are hoping that will attract alot of people. Egypt promises to be a new and exciting experience, with lots of unforgettable moments! But we don't just want to be tourists - we want to leave a lasting eternal mark on the country!
So thank you for your prayers!