Something sweet

Tonight Andrew and I took off for a walk through the fields just behind campus around sunset. The fields are ripe with tall stalks of corn, heavy-headed sunflowers, rows and rows of something like a really big radish, oats and wheat. It smells amazing. We dodged a few tractors that were coming and going through the narrow gravel or paved tractor tracks between the fields. Even though it was getting dark, we saw numerous tractors moving in perfect rows by the light of their headlights.

We were almost back home in the dwindling dusk when we passed a little pickup truck parked on a gravel walking path, next to a large grassy area thick with clover. An elderly man wearing dirty work jeans, a well-worn flannel shirt and baseball cap had used an old-fashioned scythe to cut swathes of the sweet clover. He was loading it into crates to put into his truck. He smiled, giving the Swiss-German greeting, and we did the same. He gave us a lingering look and I felt like stopping to see what would happen.

He didn't hesitate at all in approaching us as we paused to point at his scythe with interest. This began a friendly conversation in which we got about 10% of what he tried to tell us because we just know so little German. He asked us if we were from the "Bibel schule," which means EuNC. The school has such an amazing reputation in the area. I guess that's why he was so agreeable to a chat with us. He tried to tell us that the clover was for his horses, I think. He mimicked horseback riding while holding reins. He tried to tell us a few more things that we didn't get, and I was so sorry that I couldn't participate much in the conversation.

Gesturing that we should wait a moment, the man hurried to his truck, fumbled around in the back seat and returned with a jar. He showed me the picture of a bee on the top, so we knew it was a jar of honey. He gestured around us, indicating it was local honey. Then he gave it to us.

We were so surprised and gratefully repeated one of the few words we know well: Danke!

We told him our names and he told us his name was Franz. Andrew noticed that Franz had disproportionately large, dry, cracked, callused hands from the hard work he must do on his farm/horse ranch/bee farm or whatever it is. He mentioned the name of a man who works at EuNC, so we think he is a mutual friend. We intend to talk to our friend at EuNC about Franz to find out more about him, and maybe where he lives. We would love to see him again, when we have more German under our belts.

One of the things that's a bit sad for me in living in this small village is that, contrary to what you would think, I almost never meet the same person twice. I have on many occasions been stopped on the street to have a cheerful, friendly conversation, mostly in German, with a village resident, going so far as to exchange names, making sure I memorize theirs carefully so I can call them by name on our next meeting, only to never see them again.

Andrew and I also desperately want to learn German so we can have more in-depth conversations with the residents, to show them that we want to get to know them and care about their town and culture. However, the two classes we had intended to take were both cancelled. So we've found a foreign language school in Schaffhausen that offers 12-week courses at any time that is convenient for us. We just need a minimum of 4 people, and we've found two others on campus who would like to go as well. We are pretty busy through the middle of September, but we're hoping to schedule the course after that.

In the meantime, I can't wait to try out the local honey we were given on some fresh-baked bread from the bakery across the street.

A wedding

Work was interrupted today by the cacophony of honking horns outside our offices. Upon investigation, we saw it was a wedding party that was slowly progressing from the 1,000-year-old church on one end of town to a nice restaurant for a reception on the other end of the village. I am told this is a traditional practice and happens a lot in August.

Sharing the Journey

Working in an English-speaking "bubble" of Christians is not my usual definition of cross-cultural missions.

Don't get me wrong. Gina and I both love what we do and who we're working with. We are both, God-willing, having a broader impact on Europe than just with the other English-speaking Nazarenes we come into contact with on a daily basis. All the same, we have not yet had the opportunity to learn either High German or Swiss-German in order to better integrate ourselves into the local community.

However, when Gina and I have traveled away from our local area, we have come into contact with people who are fascinated with the idea that we would spend a year away from the U.S. doing volunteer work. I, for one, can say that "teaching and working in a library at a Bible school" is by far the best opening for a spiritual conversation I've ever had ... followed immediately by "just graduated from seminary."

We recently returned from traveling in Italy. Along with seeing some amazing historical and natural sights, we met some fascinating people. In Rome, we met Francis and Susan - a couple from the U.S. who were traveling Europe on their way to meet their son in Vienna, Austria. As we were first becoming acquainted with them, the words "just graduated from seminary" popped out of my mouth and from that point on, Francis and Susan were extremely interested in us. "Are you a priest?" they asked, much to my embarrassed laughter. Imagine a young priest traveling with a beautiful young woman like Gina, alone, in Europe, with both of them wearing wedding rings. The scandal! I corrected their misconception, and we both explained what we were doing in Europe for a year and why. Oddly, we ran into Francis and Susan at least twice more during that trip. If you account for the random paths both families took through Rome amid millions of people, you would have thought our meetings a little more than coincidental, too.

In Amalfi, which is a coastal area about an hour south of Naples, Gina and I were ourselves the recipients of God's grace. Or, at least, a vivid image of it we will not soon forget. We learned of a very reasonably-priced seafood restaurant on the coast in view of Mt. Vesuvius, and headed out in search of it. When we got there, we realized we had forgotten to bring enough cash that evening. The waitress arrived, and we tried to explain our mistake and prepared to leave the restaurant with our heads hanging low. "Oh, no, no, no! Stay, sit! Eat!" she said. "You can come back and pay us tomorrow." With our mouths hanging open in shock, we enjoyed an incredible meal and service that made us feel like we'd just paid hundreds, instead of nothing at all, to eat there. Of course, we returned the next evening, enjoyed another wonderful meal, and settled our bill for both (even though they seemed not to remember us, and would have let us eat for free a second time). We left that restaurant with a new perspective on the lavish generosity of God's grace!

On our last day in Florence, we had a couple of hours to kill before boarding a train and it was raining anyway. So we sat in the lobby of our hostel and enjoyed the time talking with Leonardo (one of two brothers who run the place). He shared some funny stories with us about other tourists and guests, and we mentioned that I had also spent a few years working in the hotel business. I shared a couple stories of my own from that experience, and his expression communicated absolute amazement. I thought it was funny that a guy who had worked in the business three times as long as I ever did, and who must have surely seen everything, was so astonished by what I'd experienced as a hotel desk clerk in the U.S. Toward the end of our conversation, the topic began moving in a more spiritual direction (it seems even "I worked at a hotel" can serve as a great opening line, given the right opportunity). Gina had apparently talked with him previously, because he already knew we worked at a Bible college. He shared how he wasn't particularly religious himself, but was adamant that people who disagreed with religion should disagree and leave people of faith alone. We shared that we understood and appreciated his perspective very much, but unfortunately the conversation was not able to go much further.

Finally, the hour-long train ride between Florence and Pisa afforded us the opportunity to meet and share conversation with a Hindu man who was traveling with his family. Originally from India, they were currently living in the U.K. and were traveling Europe on holiday. I can't immediately recall how we got onto the topic, but we quickly moved in a spiritual direction. He shared how open and tolerant the Hindu faith was, and shared with us some of his perspectives and listened willingly as we shared our own. While our faiths are vastly different from one another, we were also able to reach some common ground. That conversation is probably worthy of its own entry on our blog, and I will let Gina take you through it in more detail. Suffice it to say that both parties were completely fascinated by what was said, and it was a very peaceful, positive encounter between "rival" faiths and cultures. He appeared to have genuine interest and appreciation for what Gina told him about Jesus, and about a relationship with God, and, yes, even about entire sanctification (which she brought up when he asked about what makes our "branch of Christianity" distinctive). She did a fantastic job of explaining these things, using terms and images that he, as a Hindu, could readily understand.

Always, such encounters were unplanned, spontaneous moments of opportunity. Often, they came as interruptions to our plans. We might be hot, tired, or hungry, and not exactly thrilled about conversing with a nearby passenger or talkative desk clerk. Yet we were enabled to recognize these moments and rise to the occasion as best we could. We understand that such moments, whether or not they immediately lead to any conversions, are why we're here in Europe. Yes, we live in a beautiful, quiet area, and, okay, we get to do some traveling. I don't wish to minimize the very cool experience we're having here on a daily basis. But I do want to emphasize the entire reason we came here was not to "experience Europe" but to share, in some small way, in what God is doing here - in and through the lives of everyday people like the Hindu train passenger, the waitress in Amalfi, the desk clerk in Florence, and the American couple in Rome.

God is not just at work outside the U.S., and you don't have to give a week, two weeks, or a year of your life in some other country to participate in His work of renewing people's lives and redeeming creation. Moments like we've had happen as "accidents," and the idea is simply to make yourself as "accident-prone" as possible. Recognize opportunities as they arise all around you every day. Be open, even when tired or otherwise generally unwilling, to the Holy Spirit pairing you up with someone who may either be an encouragement to you (like the Amalfi waitress) or someone who may need to encounter Him through you (like the Hindu man or the American couple in Rome or Leonardo the desk clerk in Florence).

German History Lessons

I've gotten permission to share this conversation I had with one of the staff at EuNC. Her name is Ingrid. I was sufficiently moved by our talk that I felt it was worth sharing. - Andrew

* * *
I just got a heck of a lesson in 20th century German history from a lady who works at EuNC named Ingrid.

She initially asked what further travel plans Gina and I had for the summer, and after filling her in I mentioned that one place I'd love to visit happened to be Berlin. She then shared what it was like for her and her husband, Jacob (pronounced YAK-ob), to travel Germany while the Wall and the Iron Curtain were still in force. She told me what it was like being in Berlin before the Wall came down, again during a time in the late 80's when the situation was uncertain, and again in '89 when she could hear people chipping away at the Wall with their hammers 24-7 as it came down.



I shared that I was a young teenager at the time, and didn't remotely grasp what was happening but would never forget the radio announcements that the Wall was down or, following that event a year or two later, the coup de'tat against Gorbachev and the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Our conversation moved further back in time, and I took the risk of bringing up the Second World War. Various times in the last five months, I've tried to learn more about that period in history from a German perspective without any luck. The Germans I've spoken with aren't thrilled about talking WWII. It's like going through a really bad divorce and then having someone clueless come along and ask you intimate questions about your marriage. It's a pretty sore subject.

True to form, Ingrid was less than thrilled that I'd brought it up but she also said she felt it was important for Germans to talk about what happened. She said it was important that Germans not hold it in and act like ignoring history would make an especially dark period go away. She also said that, to this day, she isn't proud of being a German because of what took place over 60 years ago. When she was in Holland with her husband, who was then her fiancee, the whole country celebrated the Dutch Queen's birthday by hanging out flags. Ingrid was mortified by this display of national pride, because she had been raised with the idea that national pride had to do with nationalism ... specifically with National Socialism (Nazi), and was therefore dangerous and bad.

Our conversation revealed a division between the mindset of a German (or even European) and an American. America has its own dark periods of history, as does Christianity. I specifically mentioned slavery, racial prejudice, and the Crusades. I explained that, as an American Christian of a generation far removed from such times, I could learn about these things and talk about them freely with a sense of sadness but not a shred of guilt. I explained that I was able to separate my sense of personal responsibility from that of those individuals and people groups of the past who carried out such deeds and possessed such attitudes.

On the other hand, Ingrid reinforced my perception that Germans (or Europeans) internalize their history to a far greater degree. While she did not explicitly say whether or not my theory was correct, she clearly possessed a far greater sense of personal responsibility and share in the corporate guilt of the German people for what was done during the Third Reich.

Two interesting stories emerged from this conversation:

First, Ingrid shared this story. After she became engaged to Jacob, he returned home to Holland. An older man he knew asked him how things were going now that he returned, and Jacob happened to mention he was engaged to a German girl. This man ended the conversation, and hasn't spoken a word to Jacob since. This man had personally suffered under Hitler, and decades later, continued to harbor the hurt and bitterness in his heart so that he could not accept that his friend was going to marry "one of them."

The second story Ingrid shared also had to do with a man who had suffered at the hands of the Nazis. Jacob and Ingrid went to the United States, as non-Americans, on "home assignment" and toured the American South for six weeks. Following the service at one of the churches they visited, the pastor suggested they stand out front by the door and greet the church members as they left the sanctuary. As they were standing there shaking hands, an older man came up to Ingrid with a very stern look on his face. Ingrid was immediately fearful she had inadvertently done or said something wrong during the service to upset him, due to cultural differences. This stern-looking older man came up to Ingrid and told her how much he had suffered as a soldier fighting the Germans. He said that, as a result, he hated all Germans. But when he became a Christian, the love of Christ entered his heart in such a way that he was able to release the hatred and the pain behind it. He wrapped her up in his arms, and said, "Ingrid, I love you. Because of what Jesus Christ has done, I love you."

Ingrid blinked after telling me that last one, smiled, and said, "This is heavy talk for coffee break, isn't it?" At which point, I thanked her big-big for sharing these stories with me, since I had hitherto been unable to get anybody else to talk to me about the past in Germany. I'm so grateful she was willing to share, and I wanted to share with you as well.

A visit to the doctor

Back when I (Gina) was a newspaper reporter, I wrote an article about a company that provided free interpreters for Spanish-speaking immigrants visiting doctors or going to the hospital. The head interpreter had explained to me that even people who are becoming fluent in English may have difficulty with the specific medical terminology that they otherwise wouldn't encounter in their daily interactions in a new country.

I could see the importance of this service and was happy to hear someone was providing it for people in our community. Yet, I couldn't personally appreciate the incredible sense of security and comfort having a translator could provide in a medical situation until I faced one here in Germany.

Recently I experienced some inner ear problems, finally realizing I was going to have to make the dreaded doctor's appointment.

It's one thing to go to the grocery and muddle your way through a new language to purchase your food for the week. It's entirely more difficult to try communicating with someone about your health in a different language. While you have been learning the words for milk, fish, chicken, apple and the words for how much money you owe, you are unlikely to have learned the German words for "vertigo", "dizzy", "inner ear", or "does this hurt?"

When I entered the doctor's office, the impasse began immediately, as I know almost no German and the woman processing new patients had a similar unfamiliarity with English. We tried to fill in the blanks with pointing, gestures, facial expressions and blundered attempts to pronounce the few words in the other language that we knew.

Having gotten processed, I found a seat in an examination room. The doctor was much more fluent in English, thank goodness, and made up for my miserable lack of German. However, even here we had many pauses and attempts to find the right word for something. Finally satisfied that she understood my complaints, the doctor said she would have her assistant perform a series of tests on my inner ears.

The assistant was the same person who checked me in. So began a nervewracking battle of communication. It's very important to understand a person who is explaining a health test to you: Did she just say I should press the button when I hear a tone through the headphones, or that I should hold down the button? Should I push it when I think I hear something but I'm not sure, or only when I'm positive? Maybe I am supposed to push it only when I don't hear something?

Misunderstanding the simple nuances of these instructions could completely undermine the test and result in a diagnosis of hearing loss when I don't have one, or show my hearing is fine when maybe I am losing it.

It was at this moment when I first felt true empathy for immigrants in my home country.

I could have asked one of our German-speaking colleagues to go to the appointment with me, but I hadn't wanted to be a bother to anyone. Now I was wishing I'd asked.

Fortunately, everything went fine and I emerged from the tests with the doctor hailing my ears as completely healthy. The experience simply gave me a new appreciation for the numerous obstacles facing strangers and immigrants as they settle into a new country.

Yodeling Fest parade

The annual Switzerland Jodelerfest (Yodeling Festival) was held in Schaffhausen this year on July 2-4. On July 4, a new friend and I went into the village to see the big 2-hour parade. It was an amazing display of traditional Swiss culture.

To see the video click here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL95Ud1mL9M

What it's like to be in a German city when their team wins a World Cup game

Andrew and I were in nearby Ulm, Germany, Saturday when Germany played its quarter-finals game in the World Cup. Germany won 4-0 and the city was going crazy. (You'll need to give the video about a minute to load.)