Christin had a wonderful family life. “I could    not have had better parents,” she says. “They taught me so many things, and we still have a very close relationship.” Her hometown was Hohenmoelsen in eastern Germany.

But life was different when she was young. “My mom would always tell me stories about when I was a child,” she says. “It wasn’t easy for her, for example, to get bananas for me. You had to have good connections to get such rare things back then. The situation was the same with clothes and other things.” But Christin maintains that those who grew up in eastern German “care more for their family. We had to work together to get through this difficult time. I’m proud to be born there because we grew up with lots of love, not just money and material things.”

Christianity and faith, however, were missing in her early life. “Religion was never an important part of our family life, because it was forbidden for many years . . . ,” she says. “Both my grandparents used to go to church when they were young, but when the Soviets ruled over us, you had to leave church for your workplace. That was the case with my grandparents, and afterwards they never got back to it.”

But Christin started to question things. She decided to take the religion course offered in high school. The teacher managed to make it interesting, although only one boy in the class was a believer. High school was not a good time for her. “My high school time was pretty tough, and there is not much I like to look back at,” says Christin. “There was lots of gossiping going on and much arguing. Overall, it wasn’t a joy to go to school even though it has always been easy for me. I guess I was looking for something different.”

An exchange student in Texas

One reason Christin became an exchange student was to escape from her school. She is thankful that her parents let her go so far. When she arrived in Houston, her host family was waiting for her when she got off the plane. She remembers, “I went over to them and, with tears in my eyes, fell in their arms. I will never forget the moment, and every time I think about it I get goosebumps.”

The Lord had a hand in this meeting. Her host family was the VonDeylon family. Marc VonDeylon is pastor at Lord of Life, Friendswood, Texas, and Monique, his wife, is a preschool teacher. The VonDeylons had four boys. Christin had always wanted to have siblings, and from the first day this family simply accepted her as a part of their family.