 |
Eastern Europe Renewal |
| Home | |
| Workers | |
| Schedule | |
| Affiliates | |
| Lectures | |
| Letters | |
| Support | |
| Contact | |
| Links | |
Dear Friends of Eastern Europe Renewal:
The Peace of the Lord be always with you.
Greetings again from Riehen/Basel. Mary and I are well and hope you are also. There has not been so much travel in the last couple of months but some good and interesting work to do more locally. I’ll try to attach the schedule for the next quarter to give you an idea of the mix of activities and places. Thank you for going along with me in prayer.
In Switzerland round number anniversaries are very important. This year Mary and I have a triple rounder: Mary is 80, I am 60 and our marriage is 30. Some friends came to help us celebrate with a garden grill and long evening conversation. We are thankful to God at these milestone in our lives.
In a separate mail I’ll send some photos. They can be smaller and easier to open that way. Hopefully they will be labelled so you know what they represent.
Many of you pray and support this work financially so I thought to put some student comments from various places during the last 4 months here to give you an idea of the effect of the work you are involved in:
Thank you for modelling what it means to sincerely listen to people, show interest in them and ultimately love them!! May the Lord continue to fill you as you continue to empty yourself.
Thank you very much for all your inspiring and thought provoking inputs. I've got some excellent tools this week.
"Thoughts have consequences"! It's been great having you during this school . I've really been enriched.
Your talks have been 200% amazing for me. I have never seen thinking and articulation like this. You are blessed and have helped many of us with difficult issues.
Ellis, thank you for helping us think outside our boxes.
Thank you for challenging me this weekend, encouraging me to explore who God really is and how all aspects of my life should reflect Him and His Truth.
Hey Mon. Thank you so so much for your hard work and service toward us.
Thank you very much for taking the time to be with us this weekend and for showing the value in art for Christians. I study art History and it was a real encouragement to me to hear from a Christian point of view. It's not pointless as so many say! Thank you.
Lot's of things now seem to make more sense than I thought they could. Thank you.
Thanks for taking all our questions seriously and helping us to understand the big miracle better.
Please pray for our home Church here in Basel. We are going through a strong pruning and regrouping process. It has been painful and disorienting for some but many are beginning to see God’s hand in it and to look for what He is going to do in us and among us next. I can do very little in the Church because of all the travelling, but I try to support and encourage here and there.
Albert Anker was a Swiss painter of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He is much loved and shows family, village and school life very realistically and almost romantically in his paintings. His paintings are very realistic, with very little symbolism and little political or religious content. So, it was a thrilling shock to find the painting "Armensuppe" – "soup for the poor" in the Bern Art Museum. Try to see it on the web. Look for the altar, the chalice and host of the communion, the woman priest and man server, the shekina glory of the Lord rising as steam and the white horse running in the steam. I cannot find a comment on this painting anywhere and hope to prepare a little lecture on it.
Two items in the news during the past week have stuck with me and connected somehow: The development of hydrogen fueled cars and the comment of a Saudi government minister that "The stone age did not end because we ran out of stones." God takes us seriously and we should treasure His creation and take care of it. The unfolding of history belongs to His Mercy and Grace and we can truly trust in Him.
May the Lord bless and keep you in every moment of your lives.
Yours in Christ,
Ellis
After Church in Lausanne
Armensuppe
Basel Toilet Elephant
Mary's 80th Birthday Party
City View in Riehen
Copyright © 2008 Ellis Potter.