Outreach to Hamburg.

My friends, life has really been getting REAL, lately. I have been here over a month now and it seems like I have spent a year away from all of you. I have been staying busy join different projects around the base. I am on the edge of a maxed out schedule, however I have still set aside some ‘me’ time.

This next week is when things get turned up and days blend into each other. I am leaving for a conference “to educate and motivate a generation to counteract human trafficking and sexual exploitation”.

http://movemeant.org/hdl/object/

(here is a link to the event website)

This is a three-day conference with amazing speakers, a gallery exhibition presented by Pick A Pocket, and workshops on how you can start to end the trafficking of humans.

I am in charge of setting up the gallery and building freestanding walls for the gallery. Its funny how you volunteer to help then before you know it you are in a leadership position. This will be a tight squeeze to get these walls built and standing before the opening of the conference. I leave Tuesday to Hamburg, Germany, and the conference begins Thursday night. Leaving a day and a half for 100% of the set up for the entire conference, gallery included. It is, as they call it in show business, “Go Time”.  

Not only am I leaving to help set up a gallery, I am leaving on an outreach. I am headed out with a mission to bring the hope of Jesus to the people in Hamburg, and capture the hope I see there with my camera and bring it back to you and the rest of the world. I want to go out and paint on the streets. I want to leave my mark on Hamburg before my time there is up.

It just so happens that the church the conference is being held at, is several blocks away from Hamburg’s red light district. This will be such a powerful event. We are planning to see red light district workers and pimps walk in to the conference. We are hoping for lives to be changed. The vision is huge for this event; I cannot wait to return to share what God did.

I want to be honest with you on a personal level. I am lacking financial support for this outreach. It has been amazing to see what God has done with getting me to Hamburg, however I am still waiting on the support for while I am there and my return trip. It is really a very low cost trip. I was given 50 euros for my registration to the conference and we were given a place to stay for free. I have even had my trip to Hamburg planned for me, however that was not free. With food, inner city and cross-country travel, I really only need $100-$150. I leave the 5^th of November and return the 10^th. 

Please let me know if you want to support this outreach. I will need prayer just as much my bus fare.

Please pray for me this week.

Photo Contest!

            As you all know, I have been pushing myself to get better at my photography. Being here at the castle, I have unlimited access to a highly professional darkroom. I have spent a lot of my weekend hidden in there staring at photos trying to print a winner.
            Here at the castle, there are contests for the staff to enter their photography and compete to have the best photo. This competition is on portraits on the staff here at Herrnhut. I have chosen my model and my concept, now I need to shoot and print. I will be jumping into the studio tomorrow and try my hand at medium format film. Medium format film is a lager film and allows for bigger printing. This is where everything gets tricky. I have never shot this style camera and I have only used studio lighting once before. Also printing larger than an 8x10 is kinda scary. 
            To enter the contest, the fee is 10€. The winner will take it all, the more entries, the bigger the cash prize. I have everything I need but the paper to print on. The size I need to be printing on is 30x40 cm (12x16 in).
            I wanted to share with you what my latest art project is. If you think I have got what it takes to win this competition, I need your help. I try to spend my money wisely, and prioritize my finances. Even still, I don't having enough to buy a box of photo paper. I will spend you a copy of the photo if you decide to help me buy a box of photo paper. I need 75 euros for a new box, which is 102.61 dollars. Or even if 10 people gave 10 dollars, I could still get it. I would still send you the photo, no matter how much you gave to my art fund.

            Even if you are not in a spot to give, I would love for prayer and encouragement during this contest. I am nervous to go up against the other photographers, but I am confident I have a good chance.

(test shot)

(Nicole Crittenden)

Pick-A-Pocketeer

            I am now apart of the cool kids club. It’s better known as Pick A Pocket. This is probably the most radically creative group of young people to join together to further the calling on their lives. These artists reach for dreams that push the limits of imagination. Pick A Pocket sets goals that require the movement of nations. They have embraced the theory of dreaming big. Now I am apart of this radical group. I have been waiting more than a year to be called a Pocketeer. It is a good feeling to have accomplished this goal. It has been a long journey from my first introduction to PAP (Pick-A-Pocket) till now being introduced as a new member of PAP.
            What happens now? Art, utter chaotic creativity, and planning my attack against world poverty and injustice. I have been sent out with the promise of mountains being moved by my life’s work. I am trying to set that prophecy in to focus so I know which mountains need shifting. I have a fire in me for expansion, I want to see PAP grow and spread like ink over paper, creeping and soaking through the veins of the world. There is a lot of potential for PAP to grow, yet it is not about the number of people in the group, its about bring people together to move against the wickedness of the world. There is a solution to the injustice in world. It begins with the individual. I have been trying to do my part, now I am in a group, who has started what I have been dreaming of. I can feel huge things happening ahead.

            The first things I will be doing with PAP is helping out the Marriage of the Arts DTS running here at YWAM Herrnhut. It’s a school of 200 students from many nations around the world coming together to further their walk with God and collaborate their art with other students. I am helping with the fine art group. The students mainly draw and paint, but are encouraged to mix mediums as they create pieces of art. I have been helping critique and give tips as they work. I help talk students through their concepts and push them to take their art father then they have on their own.
            I will be taking a trip to Hamburg, Germany to help with a conference Pick A Pocket is exhibiting at. I will be helping set up the gallery and making sure the art is displayed in the best way possible. The conference is put on by Hope Dies Last, the goal of the weekend is to bring awareness to the people caught in the human trafficking world. The art displayed is aimed to bring dignity and glory to those who have gotten out the trafficking world. We are praying for pimps and prostitutes to be there to see the hope outside of trafficking, and to encourage those who have gotten out.

            Please pray for blessing for this conference and the school. We need housing for the staff of the conference, as well as the students when we go to Hamburg.
             Pray for the Pick a Pocket members and provision for the new studio space we have just gotten blessed with. We need chairs, tables, easles, and stuff for a little kitchenette. (just to keep us going as we work a way on our art down there).
            Please pray for my new house family, we are in a small apartment so we bump shoulders a lot. We all love living there, we just need for increased grace and love for each other. I live with 5 great men of God, and I look forward to our friendship as we live together.

            A praise is we finally have wifi at our house and a working washer machine. And huge fridge!
            I have just found a bicycle the needs a little air but that will make my walk to work be cut down by 25 minutes!

            Go God.

Zebra Kids

I am a Zebra Kid

According to the label on my new bike. I have been walking around Herrnhut, to and from friends houses. Some of them live 45 minutes away and the base where I work is 25 minutes away. I like walking, sometimes. Just it takes a lot of time. Yes somebody call the wah-bulance (whining ambulance).         

            I have a lot of time to think, while I walk to and from home, so I thought I would just ask God for a bike. And BOOM. My roommate told me about two bikes that needed a little TLC
            Now I feel like a king. I can go so far so fast now. I never thought I would enjoy a bike so much. Its not much to look at but it is perfect for me.

and they would be right as rain. I went to look and found that the pink one only needed air in the tires. So I took it home with the air that was left in it, which was not enough. Alex the said roommate, told me about this bike shop at the edge of town that was open for the next half hour. Aparrently his daughter is California at a YWAM base. They are fans of us YWAMers. I went to his shop just wanted a little air in my tire but he ended up fixing my front brake, completely replacing it, oiling the chains and gear cables. He only charged me 16€ for the parts and his handy work.

Thanks God.

Fallin Leaves

Fall is steadily approaching, leaves are turn and every day is a bit crisper than the last. I have learned about a hundred names this week. And there always sees to be someone I haven’t met yet. I have been scratching away in my sketchbook more. I am working on a concept using bunny rabbits to portray human trafficking. I hope to finish the whole concept soon and start on full size finished drawings. I am so happy to be back in this community. So many artists, its perfect!
            I have seen God’s provision so much lately, he has filled my flat (European apartment) with so many little things I would never have thought of. Yet the one thing I never thought I would have missed is a mirror. I walked into my kitchen this morning to eat my yogurt, and saw my roommate trimming his bread in the reflection of the glass cabinets. We laughed at our situation and asked God to provide a mirror. I am sure we will have one by the end of the day.  God provides.
            This week, as staff, we have all been talking about the needs and repairs around the castle. The roof and the sewer system need to be majorly repaired. The whole cost to fix both is approximately 100,000€. This is not that daunting of an amount to reach but it comes down to each person providing their own share. The castle is a place where a lot of students live and where every eats lunch. It is headquarters for YWAM Herrnhut. So many lives are affected here and changed by God in the very place. It would be very upsetting if the castle crumbed to the ground. So I am going to be praying and giving to the castle cause I believe in what happens here. The castle has given me a place to grow into the man I am now, and I can see people like myself going through the same growth. I want to ask you to pray for radical provision here and ask yourself if the castle is a way you would want to support this month with extra God has given to you.

I have a praise to report. I have been wanted to get in the darkroom and enlarge photos I took in Bozeman. As well as the photos I shot in the last year. In the darkroom, you need three kinds of chemicals to develop a print on paper; developer, fixer and stopper, then just good old water. These chemicals don’t cost that much but still it adds up after you get them all. So when I was headed into the darkroom I walked in on a world-renowned photographer that works and lives here at the castle. He has photos in Paris and New York. When he prints, he needs to mix a whole new batch every time he does a finished print. Yeah that is a lot of chemicals. He knew I was going to be in there working after him so he said like it was nothing,

“You can have these chemicals, I can not use them. They are fresh, do what you want with them.”

I got really stoked really fast. Now I have two batches of fresh chemicals for endless hours of work in the darkroom. Man, God really knows how give in excess. I now have all I need except an enlarger, to build and manage my own darkroom. I just need time to disappear and begin my chaos in there. I will keep you updated on my progress as I print. Keep your eyes peeled for new art daily.