The house under construction

Wanted to share this because it's been a small, but very cool, part of my semester here . . .

Hamburg is a very rapidly growing city, and one of the first things I noticed when I came here was all the huge building projects going on everywhere.  If you go up on top of the planetarium at the Stadtpark and look out across the city, you see big cranes sticking up all over the place.  Over the past five months, I've had a front-row seat to one of the many Hamburg construction projects: an apartment building has been going up just across the yard from my bedroom window.

I've been watching the progress on what will be the back side of the house.  When I first got here in February, the building only had two floors and there was a gigantic crane filling the sky outside.  Now, five months later, it's a complete apartment building with six floors, and although it's still not finished, it's been incredible watching it take shape over the semester.

And as I've watched it being built, looking out the kitchen window at it every morning while I'm reading my Bible and eating my cereal, I've developed a sort of fondness for this new building (even though the construction workers very often wake me up early with their power tools and their calling back and forth to each other), because I've started to see a connection between what is going on with that building and what is going on with my own life.

The earlier phases: adding the floors with the help
of a crane and building the walls

I always thought those "Life under construction--God isn't finished with me yet!" stickers were kind of silly, but the longer I watched this apartment coming together, the more I realized how true that concept is.  It takes a lot of time for us to become who God wants us to be, and the "construction project" isn't really complete until we get to heaven.  Our whole lives, from beginning to end, are a sort of "building" process, and each phase of life adds more pieces to the "building" so that it gets closer to becoming the complete structure it's supposed to be.  I feel like this semester in Hamburg was a major growth phase for me, both in who I am as a person and who I am as a follower of Christ.  I learned lots of practical skills--cooking, money management, printmaking, career preparation, a little bit of German--but I also grew spiritually for sure.  I saw God provide for me in ways I never could have expected or asked for, which proved to me even more than before that I can, and should, trust Him with everything--from the big, complicated stuff to the most trivial things.  I gained a fresh perspective on evangelism and on the basic vision and goal of a church body by being at City Light.  I also saw God put me in the paths of specific people at specific times, so that they could help me when I needed it or so that I could help them when they needed it.  And I learned a lot about generosity from the people I met--Anja said the other day when I told her about this that people in Europe generally just stay on their own program and don't interact with others much, but that wasn't my experience at all.  After meeting Ineke, Indra and her parents, and everybody at City Light, I've felt like I need to work harder at being generous to other people, especially with my time.  I saw this semester how much it can mean to somebody for you to just take time to hang out with them.

Anyway, I wish I could see the finished house, but like my own life, there are still more phases to come.  I asked Indra to send me a photo of it when it's all done.  I wonder what my "finished project" will look like when God is finally done with me . . . thankfully He's the builder, not me, so as long as I stay with Him I should turn out okay!

The later building phases: adding plaster and brick to
the outside.  I'm sure lots is going on inside too!

Today I wanted to go downtown for a final drawing day, but it didn't work out.  I had to go to Haspa to close my bank account, and it took me probably eight hours total to clear out my room and pack everything.  It was harder than I'd expected--I've got a lot more stuff now than I did when I came, and even though I'm leaving a lot of it (I'm giving Indra and Corina my leftover food and leaving a big bag of toiletries and other stuff for them to use if they need it), I still could barely make things fit.  Praise the Lord, my suitcase was JUST big enough for all my printmaking portfolios and my U2 poster . . . if they were any bigger they wouldn't have gone inside.  At something like 7:30, I made crêpes for dinner to use up my last egg and then I finally took a walk at 9.  I couldn't decide at first where to go, but I finally decided to do my route down the canal to the Alster and back one last time.  It was really humid today and there were a ton of people out because the night was so warm.  Felt soooo good to get out, and it was an absolutely beautiful evening, but the fact that this was my last time walking it made it kind of surreal.

Also ran to the post office and mailed off the portrait of the couple I met at St. Pauli.  I told them to pay me for it online once they receive it.  Hopefully it will meet with their approval!

Got to get to bed.  Tomorrow will be a long day!  Kenneth is coming at 11 to go with me to the airport.  My flight leaves at 2:20 pm Hamburg time.  I'll have about an hour-long layover in London, which gives me enough time to get through customs, and then comes the LOOOONG flight back to L.A.  I'll land at LAX around 7:30 California time.  Do the math . . . how many hours long does that make my day?  (If you can figure it out, you win the gold star!)  Anyhow, I've got to say I'm looking forward to heading home.  This apartment has gotten eerily quiet with Indra and Petra gone, and my room is so empty that it doesn't feel like home anymore.  I can't wait to be back with my family and to see everyone at church, at Bible study, and at the pool!