The End of the Beginning

Shortly after we arrived 18 months ago, I not only settled into my job responsibilities in the library and teaching but also began developing relationships with the campus students. This wasn't an official responsibility, it just happened. As these relationships were gradually built, I was hoping there might be 2-3 I could focus on as a mentor. However, I was not expecting tight friendships nor could I have imagined that I would gain so many whom I view as younger brothers and sisters - as family.

The past week brought a strange, but very good mixture of sadness and joy as they all left the campus for the last time. Unlike previous years, this was no "See you in the fall!" kind of temporary departure. It will certainly be strange when September arrives, and the campus is no longer filled with the sounds of students moving into the dorms. At the same time, I am very proud of how they have developed and all they've accomplished. I am incredibly excited to find out what the immediate and more distant future will bring into each of their lives.

Here are a few highlights from Graduation Weekend 2011:

• Johanna Radzizewski, Wolfgang Kohler, Cezarina Cufaj, and Rebekkah Regehr not only completed their B.A. degrees but also graduated with honors! Johanna graduated summa cum laude and provided heartfelt reflection on her development and education at EuNC during her commencement address.

• EuNC rector Klaus Arnold closed the ceremony and the residential program in Busingen with a single word, "Amen!" He reminded us that "Amen" does not mean "I am now done praying," but is rather an emphatic "Yes! So be it!" In the context of graduation and the campus closure, "Amen!" not only means completion, but a "Yes" to where God will lead from here. EuNC's graduating students have completed the beginning of their education, and are moving into new phases of God's work in and through their lives. EuNC has completed its first 45 years as a campus-based educational institution, and is in a position to embrace new ways of training Nazarene ministers for a global church. For both campus and students, one phase is completed and another is taking shape.

• A stone marker, a "cairn," was erected on the campus lawn near EuNC's Welcome Center. A special ceremony was held in which we were reminded of when people of faith in the Scriptures built stone monuments to mark the presence and work of God in their lives in a particular place and time. Countless men and women, young and old from many countries, have contributed to the EuNC campus over the last 45 years. Those of us who participated in this final year of the residential program - students, faculty, and staff - each laid a stone on our own monument (with the help of Uwe and Stephan Burmeister) to represent God's work in and through EuNC from 1966 to 2011. We also contributed a brief paragraph each to describe the blessing that this unique campus community has represented, and these will be collected and published in a book so that - no matter what form EuNC takes in the future - everyone who is part of EuNC will be inspired to continue and develop the kind of community experience we have enjoyed here at the campus.

There is so much I could and want to say about each student. Right now, I don't even know where to start. Simply put, God has changed my life through them. My intention was to be a positive role model and to be a guiding support as well as one who could (and would) challenge their thinking and push them to grow. I leave all that entirely to however God wishes to use our time together in their lives. What I do know is the difference made by God in my life through them. I anticipate seeing each of them accomplish great things as they remain sensitive to His heart and faithfully obedient to His lead. Any church should count itself blessed to have young people like them in its congregation. They will be missed for a little while, and loved always.

The next six months remain somewhat unclear. I took a long walk on Sunday afternoon to clear my head, and try figuring out what new ministry I can be involved in while we are still here now that the students are gone. On the one hand, we are still here and there is work to be done. On the other hand, our own time will soon come to move on to wherever God leads us next. So, I am keeping myself available to EuNC while simultaneously preparing for the future. I confess I was expecting a little "handwriting on the wall" on Sunday during my walk as I prayed concerning the future. I'm probably not the only one around here who has been doing that. I got no answer: just a firm awareness that entered my mind like a cool breeze, assuring me that God had everything under control and that my only job was to be open, available, and ready.

This transition has affected every single person on this campus in some way, and we could all use your continued prayers. Pray for safe travels for each student, faculty member and staff-person departing the campus. Some have gone, some will leave this week, and others in the next few months. Pray for the few left behind. Pray that EuNC leadership will receive a clear vision for the future, that they will enjoy a time of restoration after the burden they've carried this past year. Pray for clarity in God's leading for each person, and for peace in their hearts even when there is little understanding.

Gina and I have both posted some pictures from Graduation Week 2011 on our Facebook profiles. Go to http://www.facebook.com, search separately for us under our full names, and "friend" us in order to be able to see the photos.

I would like to close by sharing my brief reflection which will be added to the "memory book" I mentioned earlier:

How difficult it is to summarize a year-and-a-half as part of the EuNC
campus community. Still, it is not impossible. In fact, I can boil it
down to two words: opportunity and gratitude. I have enjoyed many
opportunities I could never have experienced at home. I have learned
so much each and every day as I have embraced many challenging
opportunities, and this has served to teach me, transform my life, and
bring my calling into sharper focus. I came to EuNC intending only to
serve one-year and return home. I was not expecting my time here to
become so fundamental a part of my life, nor for the campus community
to find such a deep place in my heart. I am grateful for Klaus and
Antonie taking a chance on an unknown, inexperienced seminary graduate
and giving me so many opportunities to serve their students and become
part of their lives. I am grateful for the students - you will never
know how much I love all of you - who have been patient with me, who
have taught me how to laugh at myself, and whose questions have
challenged and re-shaped my own thinking as I have offered support,
encouragement, and advice. I am grateful, finally, to EuNC's staff:
without your tireless efforts, none of the rest of us in the campus
community could do what we do. Thank you for all your service in
feeding us, keeping the coffee flowing, keeping the campus property
maintained, the accounts balanced, and for all you do that is unseen.
I will never be the same because of this campus community, and cannot
now imagine it ever being otherwise.

Update on Gabi

You may remember that Gabi is a woman who attends the English classes offered to the community by our church. A few weeks ago, while she was working on the roof of a new building on her farm, the material broke underneath her and she fell quite a distance. The doctors said she broke the majority of bones in her body, and sustained a serious head injury. She has been in a hospital, in intensive care, and being kept in an artificial coma. They have conducted surgery to repair most of the bone breaks and are hopeful that all of the breaks will heal normally. However, doctors decided to keep her in the coma for a while longer, and they still are not sure about how bad the head injury is.
I briefly visited Gabi's husband and mother-in-law on Saturday with some cake in hand. Through another lady at church who went with me and conducted the conversation in German, I learned that the family is holding onto hope that she won't have brain injury. After she fell off the roof, she was coherent and talking, and was also able to move all of her limbs on command. So they hope that this is a sign that the head injury would not involve long-term brain damage or paralysis.

Dorothea shared with the family that many of you are praying for Gabi and her husband and children. They said they really felt cared for and are grateful that people are concerned. Others in the community have also stopped by to express prayers, concern and love, including members of the other Protestant church.

Please keep praying for complete healing for Gabi , and peace for her family as they watch and wait.

A prayer request

Today I ran into Karin, a woman who attends the free English classes offered by our church. She speaks very little English, and I speak equally little German. Our conversations are often stilted and very limited.

This morning, she was able to tell me that another student from the classes, Gabby, fell last week and was terribly injured. I don't know any details, except that she is in a coma in intensive care at a Zurich hospital.

I contacted the leader of our English classes to see if we can get in touch with Gabby's family and maybe offer our support.

In the meantime, if you could pray with us for God's touch on Gabby, and her complete healing, we would appreciate it.

What's mine is yours

One thing that's so nice about this little community of Nazarenes here in Busingen is how we share all we have (Acts 4:32-25).

Most everyone arrived with what they could carry in a few suitcases, or ship in a small container. Those who plan to remain indefinitely gradually pick up things here or there, like a vacuum cleaner, a bread machine, baking dishes, American or British cooking ingredients, DVDs, books, and the like. The rest of us do our best -- often in vain -- to avoid accumulating much more than we brought, knowing we have to fit it all into several suitcases for the eventual return home.

Therefore, in many cases, people like Andrew and me are dependent on what we can borrow or inherit as hand-me-downs from others.

We found out during our first week how eager everyone is to share with each other. After all, they remember what it was like to have empty kitchen cabinets, no TV and nothing to watch even if they had one, no car and few kitchen appliances.

That first week, I'd ask different people where we could find this or that cooking ingredient. People would say, "Oh, don't buy that. I have half a bottle and I haven't used it in a year. You can have it." Or, "I have some of that. I'll bring a little for you in a plastic container."

One missionary moved into a different apartment and the prior tenants left him their vacuum cleaner. So he showed up at our door with his old Dirt Devil to see if we could use it. Previously, we'd shared one vacuum cleaner with all the residents in our building. Yes, we have LOVED having a vacuum cleaner of our own! When we leave, someone else will inherit it from us.

Germans and Swiss don't use slow cookers, but one missionary has a crock pot and happily lent it to me so I could try out a new recipe for chili using pork tenderloin. Today, I borrowed a casserole dish from the girls' dorm to bake a berry pie.

One Sunday, I mentioned to an avid cyclist at church how much I would like to get beyond my usual routes and trails nearby to explore other paths farther away, but our car is too small to fit my bike into it in order to drive to a new area to explore.

"I have a bike rack. You can just have it. It's just sitting in our garage gathering dust."

I was so surprised. A few Sundays later, he left it by our apartment door. I'm so looking forward to driving out of this valley and into a new area to explore by bike.

My friend Isabell was wearing cycling shorts that had numerous pockets on them.

"Where did you get those?" I asked, pointing at her shorts. "I have to wear a fanny pack when I go biking to carry my keys, money and passport," I said.

"I have another pair. Do you want to borrow them for the summer?" she asked. So, no more biking with a fanny pack. :-)

Today, I asked a woman at church if she knew whether there was any place we could rent English DVDs. She said there was no place she knew of. We mentioned how frustrated we were that we could not even subscribe to Netflix over here, because it is blocked to subscribers outside the U.S.

"We have tons of DVDs," she said. "Why don't you come over and borrow some? We're going back to the U.S. for two weeks (and I'm getting more while we're there). You can watch them while we're gone."

I was so surprised, because we'd only just met! We arranged for Andrew and me to swing by tomorrow and go through their selection.

Living and working with a community of people from Germany, Russia, Switzerland, Great Britain, Canada, America, the Netherlands and more, we have found our friends' willingness to share a big help as we've settled into life in Europe.

13 Things That Are Different Here

I (Gina) keep discovering things that are done differently here. Mostly with food, but a few other things, too.

1. You can buy tomato paste in a tube, like toothpaste. Genius! You squirt out what you want, recap it and return it to the fridge for next time. This is unlike a can of tomato paste: For most recipes you only need a few tablespoons and I always end up throwing away the other half of the can.

2. Eggs are sold in packages of 10 instead of 12. No baker's dozen here. They don't refrigerate them in the store. Mine often come with a few chicken feathers attached, as if to remind you that these are fresh from CHICKENS, not some other animal.

3. Shelf stable milk. Hardly anyone here buys refrigerated milk. I know they have it but I don't even know where it is in the store. This is one of the things I really like here. You buy very small packages of milk that don't go bad for months. You can store them in your cabinet to have on hand, kind of like flour or canned tomatoes. When you empty the carton in your fridge, you just pull another one out of the cabinet. They're such small packages that you use them up before they can spoil. You don't have to stand there in the store, glaring at the refrigerated wall units, agonizing for 30 minutes over whether you need a 1/2 gallon or a gallon, and if you can use it up before it spoils. We NEVER waste milk anymore. I have also found butter, creams, whipped cream and some other dairy products just sitting out on room temperature shelves.

4. Baking soda. They sell baking soda in tiny envelopes instead of boxes. You tear off the top and measure out up to 2 tablespoons. But what if you don't need a tablespoon? What do you do with the rest? You have to store it in your pantry and hope you don't knock it over so that it spills all over your cabinet. I DON'T like this. I'd much rather have a larger container with a lid instead of a bunch of little sugar-packet sized envelopes.

5. Sparkling water. Carbonated water is 19 cents for a 1 liter bottle. In the States, that would cost almost $2. I will definitely miss this whenever we leave. I have cut way back on my soda intake by replacing it with ice cold carbonated water.

6. The windows here open two ways: straight out into the room, like your front door, with the hinges on one side or the other; or with the top of the window tilting inward to let in just a bit of air. Most windows can do both, and you can alternate it by turning a handle to open it one way or turning it another way to open the second way. I really like this.

Additionally, the blinds aren't things you buy at Home Depot and hang on the inside, getting the cord tangled up, or collecting dust on the flimsy horizontal plastic thingys that let in 90% of the daylight as if the sun were standing directly outside your window, peeking in. No, these blinds are like super, space program, military grade metal blinds that are BUILT IN to the wall outside the glass of your window. There is a cord attached to the side of the wall by the window and it goes into holes in your wall. You pull the cord one way or the other to lift these rather heavy blinds. When you close them, they block out every speck of light (and I suspect all air particles as well) so that you think the sun no longer even exists. Take a nap? You'll think it's midnight when you wake up. Wake up at 7? You'll think it's still midnight. LOVE these, too.

7. Friendliness. Here, it is customary to greet every person when you enter a room. For instance, you enter a doctor's office, so you say "Hello" to everyone, and they all look up from their magazines and say "Hello" back. Now, at a more intimate gathering, like a housewarming party, you are expected, when you enter, to go around the room and say hello to each person in turn, and introduce yourself to anyone you don't know. When it's time to leave, you go around to each person and shake their hand again. Sometimes even in a restaurant when there are only a few people, the other diners will say goodbye to us when we leave. It's something of an introvert's nightmare, but I also kind of like this expectation that people include everyone when they enter a room and greet people, and no one is excluded.

8. "Coffee with cream" here is a cup of very dense coffee with a huge dollop of homemade whipped cream with heavy whipping cream. Not those cute little tubs of thick milk.

9. Grocery shopping. Grocery stores don't give you bags for your groceries, and no one bags them for you while you stand there and wait for your total. You have to bring your own bags and do it yourself. If you forget your bags, you can buy some. They have varying thicknesses of plastic bags -- most intended to be used multiple times -- or big vinyl shopping bags that you can use forever, I think.

10. I haven't really seen fruit pies here. I don't know why German people don't seem to eat them -- especially not the two crust kind. They either eat a huge variety of cake, or things made with flaky pastry dough, but that's about it.

11. Honor system. In this immediate area, a lot of people sell things outside their homes on the honor system. There's one cabinet standing across the street from EuNC which has pots full of water and then gorgeous fresh roses in them. You can pay $10 or $15 francs into a box in the wall and take the roses. There's no one there to take your money or to prevent you from just stealing the roses. There's another thing like that with eggs; you pick out how many eggs you want, drop your money in the box and go. I also saw a big milk dispenser at someone else's house; presumably they have a dairy farm or something: you bring your jug, put in so much money and then collect your milk from a spigot. Can you imagine how long something like this would last back home, even in one of our small towns? A day. Maybe.

12. Toy cars. Apparently, some European auto makers don't build cars to actually be driven. Or I should say, they don't build them to go long distances, or to be driven on the autobahn. I'm not talking about cute little toy electric cars that fit one person in a reclining position, and look like they could take off into space, or even tiny Smart cars. I'm talking about your average-sized BMW sedan. We keep trying to drive different cars that look perfectly normal to us, and take them to, say, Zurich, or a few hours south in Switzerland, or a few hours east in Germany. People keep telling us, "Oh, you can't take that car. It's not built for the highway." Or, "That car isn't made to travel in. You need to stay around here." No explanation has been forthcoming so far as to what distinguishes these apparently toy cars from "real" cars, and why anyone would build or purchase a car that you don't intend to drive.

13. Washable paper towels. They sell these things here -- napkin-sized thin cloths that you use to clean surfaces in your house. They're really soft and washable. You wipe up the counter in the kitchen, or dust all the wood surfaces, or clean the bathroom sink and shower. Then you just wad it up and throw it in your laundry. A few days later -- Voila! A clean, dry paper towel, all ready to use again. I LIKE these. I'm totally bringing some home with me.

The Transition Begins ...

The 2011 academic year is quickly coming to a close - along with EuNC's residential program - and many of us are exploring what God has in store for our future. With the recent departure of our American exchange students, the approaching end has become more real. However, I am very pleased to report that, despite the trying and difficult days endured since the announcement was made regarding the closure of EuNC's campus, the general atmosphere has been very positive. Students, faculty, staff, volunteers ... none of us know exactly what the future holds, as it brings change for every single one of us. Yet, as two of our students (Johanna Radziszewski and Cezarina Cufaj) reminded us in recent chapel messages, we trust in a good and loving God who promises to be with us wherever we go (Josh. 1:7-9).

Gina and I are also thankful for your continued prayer support as we move into a period of transition. My work for EuNC will be completed by Christmastime, and Gina will continue her work for the Eurasia region until our volunteer contract expires in January 2012. She will, of course, continue her work with "Engage" magazine as it does not limit her to a single physical location (see below for news on an upcoming series). We will remain in our campus apartment until that time, at which point we do not yet know where our next step will take us. However, as possibilities and opportunities seem to be multiplying, we are confident that wherever we go from here will be God's best for us at that time.

There are two main options we are currently considering. We can either both focus on our careers immediately by pursuing full-time employment, or we could work toward completing my education at the doctoral level (it would be a history degree, rather than theology). Every other option presented to or interesting to us depends on that basic decision: career or education. It is not a decision to be made lightly, and we are both thinking, praying, communicating and exploring the possibilities in both directions. This is certainly a major area of concern for us, and we ask for your prayer support in this area along with your prayers for EuNC and the region as a whole.

Still, we've got about six months ahead of us, and we plan to work hard and enjoy it! I am helping a pair of students complete the Nazarene History & Polity class I taught online in January. Next week, I begin teaching an online course called Intro to College Studies, which is designed to help familiarize new first-year students with their academic program at EuNC. My main project over the next six months will be to complete the development of online classes for Church History I and II. Each church history class will have two separate approaches: one for 3 credits and one for 5 credits. Neither will be offered anytime soon, and so I am able to work on that project free of any looming deadlines. This morning, Klaus Arnold, EuNC's rector, mentioned his desire for an online version of Holiness & Identity (which teaches students about our Wesleyan theological heritage), so there is a possibility I will be developing this one as well.

In addition to publishing stories and news from the Eurasia region, Gina is working with several writers and a committee of scholars to develop a 9-month article series on mission for Engage magazine. Expected to launch this summer, part of this series will be devoted to clarifying concepts such as "missional," missionary," and "mission vs. missions." Keep an eye out for it at www.engagemazine.com!

You are vital participants in this work through your prayer, your notes of encouragement, and your financial giving. We are grateful to God for you, and your continued support as we move into the final phase of our amazing two-year experience serving God through the Church of the Nazarene in Europe.

Teaching English again

While the regular English teacher is teaching in another part of Europe, I'm filling in with her group on three of the Thursday night sessions this month. I'm sad that after mid-May, they'll suspend classes for the summer.

I've only subbed a handful of times, but I have made a point to visit the after-class informal gathering over coffee and sweets every week. It's my way to meet and talk with people from the village and surrounding area, who come faithfully every week to add to their English fluency. I've made one good friend out of the class, and just had fun chatting with the others, who come from all kinds of places -- Italy, Germany, China and Switzerland. Some of them even speak Spanish!

I have come to realize that language classes are a really great way to provide a much needed and valued service to a community, to build new relationships and to share unconditional love with others. I know that language classes are utilized in various parts of Europe as an outreach and I can see why.

I am looking forward to being involved again when they reconvene in September.

-- Gina