It Was God All Along
You never know when God is going to use something as small as an email to change your life forever.
I grew up in Eastern Germany. I was seventeen when the Berlin Wall came down. Spirituality was entirely absent in my life. Looking back I see that the whole region was—and mostly still is—spiritually very dark.
Religion was never something I sought after, but in the summer of 2008, I found what I was not looking for. A long-term relationship ended terribly, and I was in one of the worst crises of my life. Lost and unsure of my future, a business partner suggested that I move to another city for a fresh start. Almost right away I started thinking about Hamburg, which was odd because I didn’t have any connections there.
A couple of weeks later I visited and immediately fell in love with the city. Some inexplicable force was pulling me there. Today I know it was God calling me, but back then I just wanted a change in my life. On my first weekend in Hamburg, I felt utterly alone. That’s when I remembered an email I had received from a friend. (I found out much later that he was a Christian.) It said something like: “If you feel lonely after your move to Hamburg, check out this event” with an invite to the very first Hamburgprojekt service.
i am absolutely convinced we cannot do this in our own power.
I found myself at the service and was impacted from the start, though it felt strange. I wrote in my diary, “I liked the message. No person in the world can satisfy all our needs and all our wishes, and there is a God who wants to do that.”
For the first two years, I just went there, cried many tears and felt God’s love and healing. He really pampered me. He showed me that he was the one I was waiting for to take care of me. He touched something very deep inside. I was baptized in June 2011 in the Elbe River, the same place that inspired me to move to Hamburg three years before.
No person in the world can satisfy all our needs and all our wishes, and there is a God who wants to do that.
My new life as a Christian brought a whole new set of priorities to my life. I had always idolized my work and the status it provided. As God worked on my heart over the years, I realized two things. My identity truly rests not in my work, but in my status with God, and that the church in Germany has a lot of work to do in the intersection of faith and work.
Today I lead our faith and work initiative called “WIRKUNGSKREIS” with some fifteen team members. I am absolutely convinced we cannot do this in our own power. I experienced the transforming power of Jesus in my life, and I look forward to the transformation he wants to do in our city, its people and its workplaces.
I had no idea at the time, but God was guiding my story the whole way. He took a terrible break-up and an email and transformed my life.
About the Author
Anke Steinbach owns her own consulting firm and donates 30 percent of her time to voluntarily leading the faith and work initiative. The initiative has reached out to several hundred people over the past five years and hopes to see that multiply. Hamburgprojekt (Church) launched in 2008. Lead pastor Daniel Bartz attended the International Intensive in NYC in 2007 and leads CTCDACH (Germany, Austria and parts of Switzerland).