Author: Sean Jacobsma

As I think back on the trip, I keep thinking of the stories of Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit. In The Hobbit, Bilbo jumps from adventure to adventure without any time to catch his breath. That is very similar to how the Germany trip was set up. Every weekend we were of on some new adventure.  Continue reading “There and Back Again”

While in Wittenberg, we visited the church that Luther nailed the 95 theses to and began the reformation. This was a very different city from the ones that we had visited before. One thing that many of us noted was that it seemed that Wittenberg was a town that was working hard at becoming a major tourist attraction. This was especially true with the 500th anniversary of the reformation just a few short months away. This  seemed very weird to a lot of us because the only really monumental part of Wittenberg was the Church. Other than that, Wittenberg is really just a small town in Germany. Continue reading “The Tourist Church”

At first I thought that my inability to write a blog on time was a problem. As I try to write now however, I find that I am grateful that I didn’t write it on time. Sure it would have been nice for my friends and family to know what I have been up to the previous weekend, but the thoughts I hove would have been rushed, quickly jotted down without a second thought. this way I think back and remember what I liked the most about that trip.

With that being said, there is a large amount from Köln that I will remember for a long time to come. My favorite part of the trip was the Cathedral. It was a couple of weeks ago, but I can still the the enormity that it had. every inch of the outside had some sort of detail or symbol on it. As you got closer you got to the Cathedral you could see all the dedication that people had put into it after hundreds of years of work.

As I walked into the Cathedral I held my breath in anticipation. It was spectacular, and I knew the work that is put into Cathedrals to make them sound incredible. We walked in as tourists as an evening service was taking place. My heart stopped when the organ played. It filled the space, and no matter what direction you turned, the sound was perfect.

It is incredible to think that people made that building all in dedication to God. We don’t do that anymore. How often do we go through our day doing things only for ourselves? How many times do we sleep in a Sunday instead of worshiping the God who gave us everything? If building a Cathedral is what a group of people could do in a lifetime, imagine what we could accomplish if we lived every day to the glory of God.

I was supposed to write a blog about Sachsenhausen after I went to see it. That was over two weeks ago, and I still haven’t written anything out. I guess I just don’t want to talk about it. It was a very powerful experience and it made me realize just how forgettable my life is to others. Walking through the camp I realized how many people were there, and how many people died there. At many of the camps and museums, there are several stories of people who did not survive the horrors of the Holocaust. Thousands upon thousands of people whose life is summarized into a paragraph. Continue reading “Better Late than Never”

It has been just about a week in Germany now (posted late), and I have really enjoyed the experience I have had so far. I have gotten to have lots of good food, get to know many people who two week ago, were complete strangers, and experience what it is like to be the person who doesn’t speak in the common language. When I first got here my German was very uncertain. Now I can confidently order something and ask for the key to my room. Continue reading “Deutschland or Bust”