Matthew and Katarina Colegrove

Germany has always been a core part of our family’s story. Germany is where we met and where we ultimately fell in love. We owe our marriage to the ‘God-thing’ that happened when we found each other while serving in a small church in a town called Rostock in former Soviet bloc East Germany. We left Germany after a year, but Germany and our memories of the people there never left us. We felt God calling us back to Germany and waited on Him to make it clear when that would happen.

After seven years preparing to return, we finally begun fundraising for full time ministry in Germany. During this time we talked with the pastor we knew in Rostock, and we learned his church had been wanting to open a coffee shop in order to reach their community. But they didn’t have the people to run it! We immediately jumped at this opportunity because this whole time we had a dream to open a café in order to reach the community for Christ. Matthew had opened a small coffee shop in Ottawa, ON and had judged the National Barista Championship in Canada. Katarina had been using her administrative skills and was pressed to move higher up within her job, all while both of us were working in and with our local church. We knew this opportunity was perfect for us and that God had lined it up.

We have now been serving in Germany since February 2023. The café is officially open! It serves as a hub to connect the church to the surrounding neighbourhood. There are many barriers to community people face in our area. People tend to be standoffish and cold, very suspicious of outsiders. It can take years to build trust. There is a high degree of loneliness and dissatisfaction with life; in fact, in a 2025 survey Rostock was found to be the unhappiest city in Germany. The neighbourhood where we are located has the highest number of single parent households in the city. More than that, there are very few Christians and Christianity is seen at best as cute and laughable, at worst as cultish and to be avoided. The café gives the space for people in the area to come find community and build relationships, and for the Christians to experience desperately needed fellowship with other believers.

Katarina also serves as the Director of Operations for the GEM Germany Sending Entity, serving German missionaries serving with GEM across Europe. The German entity was overloaded and had made the unfortunate decision not to take on any new missionaries. That’s where Katarina and her administrative gifting came in! She now works part time caring for the employment needs of current employees, mobilizing new missionaries, taking care of all regular administrative and human resources tasks, and working with missions organizations to develop best practices. Her work directly allows for more missionaries to be mobilized, hired, and to get on the field!

We need your help to answer this call to serve in Germany. We need the support of Christians and the church in North America to make our ministry possible. Please prayerfully consider joining our team of prayer and financial ministry partners by giving a monthly gift today.