Oil spills, Church, Politics and me...

Hello all,

I hope you are all doing well. I am in the midst of a very busy week, but the sudden and pleasant shift in weather here in Den Haag has made life a lot brighter. It is amazing how the last month has been such a whirlwind of travel, activity, and doing. Last week was no exception either.

I was recovering from a great conference in Portugal with most all the Christian Associate Leaders, when I took a trip to Kirchiem, Germany to help scout out a venue for our Staff Conference for 2010. Last Thursday I headed off with Al Dyck to meet up with a couple staff members in Kirchiem, which should have taken us 4 ½ hours to reach for the Hague…Should have. Well we were about 4 hours into our road trip, which was amazing; Germany really does have some spectacular views, and the Autobahn, wow, what a highway.

After cruising around Germany at about 100 mph we came to a dead stop just 20 minutes from our destination. Neither one of us thought it was serious, but after the first hours we soon realized we could be here for a while. At one point I opened my computer and we started watching a movie. There was a period where we didn’t move, not an inch, for about 30 minutes. Well, 2 hours later we started going, as we started moving we noticed that their had been an oil spill. As we drove over the dust they spread over the oil I realized that this was a huge spill, by my guess was about 100 yards long. As we were driving over the spill I took back all the stuff I had muttered under my breath about the German roadworks. They did a great and efficient job in cleaning up this huge spill.

Well due to our little delay, we arrived 2 hours later than we had planned, so in stead of 4 ½ hours in the car we were in the car for about 7, when it was all said and done, that was a long day. We then met with Melinda and Dudley, for another couple hours, recapping the hotels and retreat centers they had visited that week. The next day we took a tour of the grounds, which were very nice; it was like a summer camp in the middle of rural Germany, very nice and peaceful.

After we dropped Melinda off at the train and got Dudley to his hotel in Frankfurt we headed back to The Hague this time with no surprises, it took us 4 hours as it should have. On our way back Al and I were able to have a very good conversation, it was deep and honest and I appreciated the time we shared.

The next big adventure of the past week was finishing my Independent Study for School. This is the last requirement I have for my Master’s, outside of finishing this internship. This weekend was a sprint to the finish line, I read three books out of 9 and wrote 14 pages, and yes I am bragging, because this killed me, but I did it. My study was on the relationship between Church, as institution, and Politics. This is a subject that has interested me for a long time and this was a great way to get my feet wet in the ideas and personal accounts of people who have thought and acted in the political realm. I was challenged by many of the author’s and have a lot more reading and thinking to do. Needless to say this subject is not a simple one, but it is a issue we all face. How do we as Christians, with our allegiance to Jesus, interact with a system that also requires our elegance? This is not just a Dutch question or an American question, it is a question that all believer’s face all around the world, in varying degrees. It is also a subject where bright, honest, believing people disagree completely, the challenge for me in this was deciding how I want to act in this realm. How will I act in relation to political systems? I am not ready to state a view and act on it yet, but I think I am close to buying a cabin in northern Sweden and doing the Thoreau thing, haha, just kidding.

Out of the study my favorite personal account was by David Kuo in his book “Tempting Faith.” David is a good writer and tells about his journey from becoming a Christian in New Jersey all the way up to serving as a special aide to President Bush, it is a very good read. The most challenging book was “the Subversion of Christianity” by Jaques Ellul. Ellul builds a great argument for why Christianity cannot exist along political systems, it is impossible. Ellul take the approach of legal, sociological historian. Ellul’s study of ancient political systems helps him greatly in understanding how Christians interacted with Politics in the past 2,000 years. I recommend this to anyone who wants to be challenged in their understanding, and beware this is a heavy read.

Well, tomorrow I am off to Brussels’ on another one day journey; here I am going to sit in on training for our Field Orientation. Then this Saturday I am giving another Strengths Finder Seminar and Sunday I am speaking for our service, yes a full week.

I will let you all know if I survive this week, haha

Jason

Prayer Requests:
1) Sunday I am speaking and this Sunday is our International Justice Mission Service. We are introducing IJM to the congregation and hoping that many people get on board with Prayer and support for this organization
2) My Health and energy, that I would make good decisions on keeping myself healthy. Life has been very busy and erratic and I need to make sure I am taking care of myself.
3) Pray that God would continue to lead me in my future plans as things are getting much clearer and actually some job offers are coming I am excited, but want to make sure I am following God’s will in this.
4) Pray for our Congregation here in The Hague that God would continue to work in and through the people here.