Life

Hey all, sorry I haven't written in a while, it's been a crazy last couple days.  This is the first chance I've found to sit down and fill you all in on what I've been up to, and what I've been thinking about.

Wednesday night with Emil was great.  We had terrific conversation about God's existence, relevance, and impact in our lives.  The highlight of the conversation was when he earnestly asked us if there was proof for God.  We told him some about the historic evidence, but then I made it personal and told him that I have seen things in my life that I could clearly say were God.  My teammates said the same.  Emil sat back for a second, and finally said "Wow, I've actually never heard anyone say that before."  This seems small, but for us it was a major victory.  The spiritual environment in Sweden is so hostile that most Swedes don't even know a Christian, and have never heard anyone make a public statement of faith.  I am praying that God has been tugging on his heart since then, and making him question how he sees the world.  I feel like God has a plan for him, and am praying boldly that God will move in his life this next week.

This weekend, an anime conference (the Japanese cartoon genre for you oldies) invaded Uppsala.  Literally.  We saw people dressed up as cats, Chinese wizards, and whatever other crazy thing you could think of from Uppsala all the way to Stockholm.  So we were kicked out of our hostel, because apparently anime fans are great at booking rooms really far in advance.  This ended up being fantastic for us though.  We spent the weekend at an 18th century country manor, which has been turned into a Christian retreat center.  We swam in the lake, used the sauna, played frisbee on the lawn, and did a lot of reflecting and praying about our trip.  It was incredibly relaxing and rejuvenating, and well needed at this point in the trip.  But now we're back at the hostel, ready to go into battle again.

On a very personal level, I want to share some of what I have been contemplating the last few days.  As those of you in SFC community probably know, high school Sophmore Tim Snider tragically took his own life this last week.  Though I can't claim to have known him well, a few years ago I spent some time with Tim at a church retreat, and often saw him around for the few years after that.  This was when I was first stepping into student leadership, and he was one of the kids I specifically remember trying to pull into the Church family and be a good example for.  Hearing about his death was both shocking saddening, and has been leading me to reflect a lot on the fickleness of our earthly lives, and the personal despair that would bring a person to that point.  I was talking to my trip mentor about this, and he had some fabulous input.  He told me that tragic situations like this can bring us to one of two responses.  We can either give into the tragedy, and let it get us down so we can't continue to do God's work here.  Or, we can use it as inspiration.  Seeing how short and fleeting life is should spur us on to do God's work, to let God's named be proclaimed to all people of all nations, so that all have the opportunity to embrace God's love in their life.  My question to myself then, has been, what will be my response?

In His Grip,
Ethan Ruby