The days are quite long now, with the sun rising at 3:48 am and setting at 9:43 pm with lots of dawn and dusk beyond those times. I’ve taped up a black-out curtain on wall because the black-out roller shade let too much light through the gaps.
The spring weather has been nice recently.
My condo gets the morning sun, and a sliver of afternoon sun. I still haven’t figured out how to hang up my hammock.
We cleaned the deck and are ready for the sunshine!
Steffi and Sophie (9 y.o.) are the mother and daughter of the friends I bought the condo from. Florian, the dad, has found a job and an apartment for them in Berlin already. The 6 week overlap with Steffi and Sophie is going really well, way better than expected. They have been good conversation partners–mostly in English, but I’m working on some Swedish too. Today it was a discussion of higher ed testing in Swedish contexts. Steffi has been teaching at the Uppsala University, so she has a different experience for me to compare and learn from. She is also an award winning teacher, so I’m grateful for the opportunity to learn from her expertise.
The past couple days has turned wet and cold. The rain has collected the pollen from the air and on the sidewalks.
I invited a few friends and students over to watch “The Princess Bride” last night. One was a student who will be going to the USA and work at a Bible camp that one of my friends serves as director. So, this was a little American cult film culture connection. Then we watched the Australian cult film, “The Castle.” Wonderfully wacky night with plenty of treats. I made my caramel/chocolate/pecans bars with a modified recipe, adapted to what I could find in Sweden.
In church this morning, the text had the line, “Herre, vi sjunger ditt heliga namn.” I would translate this into English as, “LORD, we sing your holy name. Yes, this phrase has lots of cognates, such that you probably wonder why I’m struggling to learn Swedish. However, my point here is that Herre/LORD is NOT YHWH’s/Yahweh’s name. The multi-faceted meanings and covenental context of YHWH is so powerful and full of promise, I am disappointed that there has been so much circumlocution (walking around the name–especially its pronunciation), that people think that Herre/LORD is YHWH’s name. Don’t mess this up!
On a positive note, I was invited to dinner after church to the home of Staffan and Ingela Grenstedt. Staffan was my host in Ethiopia my first time. Today, they invited me to join Rev. Dr. Bruk Ayele, the President of Mekane Yesus Seminary in their home. I’ve met Bruk a few times before and have a high regard for him and all the challenges of his work. Today, I was blessed to hear more of the stories of generosity during the great famines, the communist regime, and at one point a gun held against his head challenging his profession of faith. So, I am blessed to share in these stories.
I haven’t been writing much. Some of this is a little funk. So, I thought perhaps I need to use this as a means of reflecting upon gratitude. I think that some of the lull is the little amount of teaching in the spring, and teaching keeps my focus and stimulates the core of my calling. However, I have a lot to do the next few days as the end of the term approaches, so somehow I have to muster my A-game.
With blessings,
Beth