Today, 17 October we are celebrating the opening of our community centre ´The Greenhouse´ in Schwerin Lankow! After three years of building this house up, together with our team and neighbours, we are thanking the Lord for all the blessings we received and that we finally can celebrate this moment. Please pray for the guests who are coming to join us in this party and also pray for the coming months where we have to experience how a running community centre functions in practice.

Please pray as we continue seeking long term accommodation. We have had a recent set back in our journey with this but are continuing to trust the Lord as we take steps ahead. With the new school year starting we are beginning to work at shaping the leadership teams and the plan for the youth and young adult’s ministry in the Church. Please pray for wisdom and that the Lord would raise up people with a burden to serve in this area of Church life.

Church planting issue network continues to champion the cause of collaboration amongst church planters across Europe. Pray that more church planters would promote national collaborative efforts with the view of saturating their respective nations with the gospel through the multiplication of churches.

Thank God for sending us to Hagenow. Now we want to pray that He sends more people to us. There is so much to do and so many opportunities. But we need a team for that.

I am currently on a semi-sabbatical until the end of the year. I will only be working two days a week (Thursday and Friday) and taking some time on the other days to look after myself as I was experiencing a number of burnout symptoms. Please pray that these next months will be restful, and that I will do the important work that needs doing, while postponing the other work until next year.

Pray for the spiritual growth of the newly established Nepali church in Varaždin, that it would be firmly rooted in Christ and His Word and grow both spiritually and numerically. Pray also for a new space that could serve as a base for missionary work in the cities of Križevci and Novi Marof.

From 9-13 October, we'll be in the UK and Carolien will be preaching at our sending church in Bishop's Stortford on harvest today, Sunday 11 October. Please join with us in praying for good travel, meeting supporters and a niece, and for the Word of God to bear fruit. Thank you.

Please pray for ministry with international students through GBU Coimbra. May the Lord soften their hearts as I share the good news of Jesus.

We continue to look for a suitable place to open Rincón de Luz, our ministry centre. We’re asking God for the right site, which allows us to create a welcoming, useful and safe space. Pray for new friendships and reconnecting with old students as we recommence Spanish classes for migrants. Pray for Mikey as he joins our team, for his transition and orientation, and for us as we keep being formed as a united, prayer-dependent, and grace-filled team.

‘Shalom House’ is growing and we are excited that people are taking turns to host and lead. Please pray for Shalom House as next year we are making plans for holding a monthly Christian meditation and prayer in the community hub.

We praise God for our Sports Week for Refugees in August. It went very well, with around 40–50 refugees joining us each day. We are especially thankful for the more than 30 volunteers who faithfully served throughout the week. After the Sports Camp, we invited 15 Turkish refugees to our Community Café to prepare and share their traditional food. We had good opportunities to build relationships and share the Gospel. We are especially thankful that one family who attended the Community Café later joined us for Sunday worship.

A main focus of Rachel's ministry now involves supporting survivors of childhood sexual abuse, of whom there are many. Please pray for the groups she's running with survivors. It's such an encouragement to see the positive impact that it's having on their lives. Please also pray as Rachel continues to undertake further training to better support survivors, and also women who struggle with sexual addictions.

UKRAINE: Ukraine Cluster

We are currently advertising for an assistant pastor. We ask that the Lord finds for his church the man he wants.

Today I get married to Xavi, a Catalan guy who started coming to our little church plant in Catalonia. Praise God for the gift of marriage. Pray for us as we start life together: for communication (we speak in my 3rd language) and for Christ to always be the centre. Pray that it won't rain (it's outside), that the technology works (we're sharing it on YouTube as my parents and many others are unable to fly out to Spain).

The Andersons and the Mortons will be representing the work of ECM and the needs of Europe at the annual missions’ week at Liberty University from September 28 to 2 October. Pray that God would call those he wants to serve in Europe from the on-campus student body of 16,000.

From 3–4 October, please pray for Al as he preaches in Alexandroupoli, northeast Greece, and spends time encouraging and supporting the young pastor there and his family. Please also pray for Rachel as she helps out with MumCo at Kypseli Church in Athens. Pray for Rachel and the team as they reach out to mums in the local community, that this ministry will be a source of encouragement, friendship and support.

We were pleased to be able to facilitate both a month-long sabbatical in Portugal for a Welsh pastor called Jason in the spring and a short-term placement to Greece this summer for a young British woman called Rebekah. Please pray for another young woman, Rosie, as she spends two months in France this autumn and for other young (and not so young) people to respond to God's prompting to spend some time in ministry in Europe.

It is always encouraging to run the Foundations Course. In August we had 11 participants, most of whom are in their first year or two on the field – in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Czech Republic, Germany and Poland. Thank you for praying for these people as they continue language learning and begin ministry.

Please continue to pray for our neighbours following the death of Elfi (89 years old). May the Lord continue to use David’s words at the funeral to draw people to himself. Walter is 96, frail and has just lost his wife of 69 years. Understandably he is very lost.

Praise God for the opportunity to run the Emotionally healthy spirituality course. We had a really engaged group with up to seven different languages represented. Pray for Hope as she goes back to school and Rafael as he starts preschool.

Pray for our MCE-Iberoamérica team as we strengthen our mobilisation work and seek to see people respond to God’s call to mission in Europe. In October, we will host a ‘Come & See’ experience, bringing people to meet missionaries, see what God is doing and discern how He may be inviting them to participate. We long to see men and women say yes to God and go where workers are few, so that more people across Europe may encounter the hope and transforming love of Jesus.

I will be on a ‘semi-sabbatical' for the rest of the year. After 15+ yrs with ECM I have been feeling somewhat weary, and so I will be taking some time for rest and refreshment. I will continue to serve ECM NZ two days a week in order to maintain ECM NZ, but I won’t be taking on any new speaking engagements or responsibilities during this time. Please pray that this will truly be a time of rest and refreshment for me.

Do join with us in thanking God that some asylum seekers have been to the international church here recently, welcomed prayer afterwards, and one is reading a Bible. Pray they will begin to discover the amazing love of God.

Please pray for a new service opportunity in Gdańsk, Poland, a vibrant city welcoming refugees from around the globe. At the centre of this work is Revelation Church, an international community founded by Nikolay, a refugee from Ukraine. Because he knows what it means to lose everything, his church has a unique heart for welcoming the stranger. We are searching for a "Gateway Missionary"—an individual or family called to help turn this church into a true home for those starting over.