Les Sept Laux

The last post's pictures were taken on the mountain in the far left of this first photo right above the guy's head. The French Alpes are beautiful and it has been a privilege to stay here for the past 6 months and traverse all over them.






Sort of bizarre seeing this here but really neat at the same time.

steel mills and toyotas

Grenoble- from the Bastille. What a view! I was wondering why I kept getting sick, but then I realized that it might have been that entire steel mill I breathed in. If you look closely you can see it floating around in the sky.
Harriet, Joram, Rebekah and I some others went up a mountain. It was quite a view also though I wouldn't recommend hiking in snow without snow shoes. There is also Mont Blanc (the tallest mountain in Europe) in the center of this photo.
I think this picture clearly shows the steel mill. It is between the tops of the mountains and the tops of the hills.
This might not look like much, and it wasn't much...room, that is. We were all four crammed into the back of a Toyota something. I think it was too skinny for production in America. Normally they tell you how many airbags they put in your car, but they were telling us how many cars they put into their airbags. WHAT?!?!?

spelling lesson

I guess "Eiffel" is spelled like that and not this "Effiel."

I am embarrassed but this is what I get for learning a second language. I have forgotten the first, which is a problem because I can't write in the second yet either.

What is even more embarrassing is that I was corrected by someone for whom English is a third language.

Thanks Joram.

Chasing Shadows

I have been thinking about how we prefer suck on the wrapper of life than eat the candy God provides. When we are given an opportunity to store up candy for the future, we more often opt to chew the wrapper for taste right now. This sounds a bit ridiculous in this context, but we often do this in our spiritual life. God promises us every good thing that we could possibly want, but the attainment of these good things does not come 'til the future. Like the Holy Spirit is a guarantee of our future inheritance in Heaven, God has given us shadows of future glory on earth. These come in the way of relationships, places, possessions, entertainment and food. All these things will be present in Heaven in some perfect way for us to enjoy in the presence of God, but attaining them requires present sacrifice and difficulty on earth. Because God is good, He has given us true joy in sacrifice and every spiritual blessing in earthly trials, but why do we settle for the shadows?

Why do we spend our energy searching out satisfaction in present relationships, entertainment, or possessions? These things are just shadows of our future hope and glory. My shadow tends to be the places I find myself. I like to make them comfortable, without stress or tension, and friendly. Sometimes God chooses to bless me with these things, but more often than not, I will have to wait 'til heaven to experience the perfect place. I can spend all my time trying to find or create or fix this shadow, but it will never work. Well, it might, but when life is dead and gone, I will have to forgo the words, "well done my good and faithful servant." Instead I would get, "Well done on the shadow chasing, you can now enter the shadow you chased......... the shadow of the blessing you would have obtained if you sought first My Kingdom." I know that I don't want to be caught chewing short-lived sweetness from a plastic wrapper when I am called on to enjoy it's contents.

ok, ok, I'll post pictures of Paris.and berlin

ok, well i do do more things than just hang out here in Europe. This is a picture of me and a few young kids i was watching with Mike for a church event in Germany. Don't let their sweet little faces fool you- they were vicious. the three yr old in the pink could formulate sentences that would baffle Shakespeare.
Mike and I were posing on the red carpet when these Serbian girls asked to have their photos taken with us.

This is the famous Sony center. That big white thing is a roof that is situated over a bunch of skyscrapers. Pretty cool.
Paris
The Notre Dame Cathedral
Effiel Tower. Never ask someone to take your picture WITH THE EFFIEL TOWER and assume they are going to do a good job. And WHY is my spell corrector telling me that Effiel is not a word.
You won't see this shot in National Geographic. The Effiel tower is not as big as it looks.
The cool thing about Paris is that all the buildings are like this. And everyone wears black and doesn't talk to each other. So the black against the light stone and the erie silence is unnerving. I think they speak Spanish in Paris. I stopped for directions three times and every time they couldn't tell me anything because they only spoke Spanish. WHAT?!?!? NO COMPRENDO?

the series

I decided to delete the two previous posts and abstain from posting the last post in this series. I just had this sneaking feeling that maybe someday when I will older and wiser I would disagree with what I had written.

It also might have something to do with the fact that I had a conversation with a guy who encouraged me not to be too hard on fellow Christians that are philosophically or doctrinally confused. I have a tendency to be quite vocal about my disagreements, but I agree that since we are on the same side, whether or not I agree it might be wise to let God sort out the balance.

I am getting ready to wind down these last two weeks here in Grenoble. I have been sick as a dog since Saturday, but hopefully I am coming down to the tail end of it. Being sick is making me more excited to go back to the US, and I am excited to get chances to work and rebuild my physical stamina.

Berlin vs. Paris

I recently took a trip to St Etienne, Lyon, Berlin, and Paris. There weren't that many impressive things to show you pictures of in the other places, but Berlin was quite possibly the coolest place I have ever been outside of Banff(thank you Andrew). In order, there is a concentration camp, a gate that is really famous, the Berlin wall, and checkpoint Charlie with my friends Mike and Jesslyn. It was very sobering seeing the history of the Nazi and Soviet Regimes and it is thoroughly documented at each point of interest. After the three of us went to each place, it was a bit difficult to talk because of the atrocities committed there.
On a lighter note, it was great to hang out with Mike and Jesslyn. They are a neat couple and are excited to learn German and start making an impact for Christ there. We had a lot of neat German foods and we even got to visit the world premier of a film and stand on the red carpet.

I don't really have pictures to post from Paris. I wasn't as impressed with it. The architecture is unbelievable, and it was a cool place, but after about four hours there I visited a few friends and then took the next train back to Grenoble.