No Matter Where You Go In The World....God Is Already There And He Is Waiting.

This thought has really become more and more evident to me as we have reached out here in Sweden this summer. That God is already here and that He is at work in peoples lives, even if they don't realize it.

We are wrapping up our time in Sweden now and we don't have much time left. It has been amazing to see God continue to work in the stories that I mentioned before.
One in particular is the story about a young athiest named Eric.  Eric was the one who previously upon first meeting with our guys stated his views rather bluntly that (edited version) the Bible was worthless. He has continued to meet with some of our guys, and beyond that started to introduce our guys to other Christians he knew. This is really rare because there are not many young Christians in Uppsala. Through Eric we have now met 3 young Swedish believers who basically want to talk more about what we do and want to get involved with the ministry here. Eric continues to be willing to meet and talk and it is encouraging to see that God has brought and is bringing Christians into his life to help him process the gospel.

Another story is of a guy named Andreas.   We met Andreas when he was sitting with his friend in a cafeteria. He told us that he is agnostic and his friend who was with him was a Christian from Stockholm. Andreas wanted to meet up again to talk and then invited some of our guys to his house (this is a big deal culturally). He wanted to talk more and brought up spiritual things pretty early in the conversation. God is definitely working on his heart. Andreas had to leave early during the first meeting but what was also really cool was that his friend turned to us and said, "I believe that in this meeting God revealed His heart for me to share my faith with my country". This may not sound like a big deal, however culturally this is huge. Swedes don't want to stick out...they actually have a word for it. The goal is to be "Lagom" which means: not to little and not to much but just enough.  This spirit of lagom has really invaded the church so that believers don't talk about their faith at all. After coming here for several years now we are are seeing this spirit of lagom begin to fade among young believers. God is working in the hearts of the Swedes.

Another story is one of a girl named Osa. Osa met some of our students and invited them over. They talked about the gospel. Osa was somewhat fascinated and asked many questions. One of our students asked, "Osa, what do you think of Jesus?".  Osa replied "Swedes don't talk or know much about God, I think after hearing you talk it is because we do not know this Jesus that you have talked about. If we knew this Jesus as you do, we would talk about Him."  It is a beautiful thing to see somebody who previously had no idea of God in her life, know is putting the gospel together in her life.

There have been many other things going on this summer as well. Another short story is of how God is reaching the many refugees here. There are alot of Afghan and Farsi refugees in the city. They are hurting and broken people. God has raised up a couple on staff with Crusade to reach out to these people in Uppsala. Yesterday we were able to see a Farsi woman place her faith in Christ. Many of these people are without hope and broken. It is amazing to see God reach out to them, restore and redeem them.

Thank you so much for reading. I will post pictures below. Please continue to pray for us as we close things down and have final meetings with students. Also please be in prayer for those who are still lacking support in funding this trip.
Thank you so much once again!
Britton and Brooks

This is one of our students, who came contact with a girl who trusted Christ in the states but didn't know any believers in Sweden. They have been going over how to study the Bible. This young believer is currently reaching out to the Muslim community in Stockholm.

To meet students we have several cookouts in the park. We invite Swedish friends that we have met and it is a relaxed environment to be able to talk about things more.

Cultural Moment: This is what happens after a Swedish High School Graduation. They get into the backs of trailers and ride around town for hours. These are decorated with tree limbs and they throw presents to the crowd and the crowd throws presents back....this was hilarious...the sailor hats they are all wearing are their graduation hats....we thought they looked funny, but then realized for some reason we were cardboard squares on our head when we graduate....suddenly sailor hats made more sense.

Cultural Moment #2: We were able to go to a Swedish Soccer game which was hilarious. This is in the 1918 Olympic Stadium....the green awning on our right was where the royalty sat to watch the games.

This was at our MidProject Retreat. God blessed us with being able to go to a monastery, that is housed in an old castle. We had to leave our hostel in Uppsala because they had a big group coming in that booked before us. So through a friend found out about this place. When hearing what we do, they gave us an amazing discount and God really blessed us there. It was so refreshing to take a break for a couple of days to reflect and recharge!! One of the coolest moments was when doing a tour of the castle they led us to a music room and asked if anyone played the piano to demonstrate the acoustics. One of our students did, and he played the song I have linked to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-4wUfZD6oc  . It was one of those moments that time just stopped and God's beauty was on display. Hope you enjoy the song!

This is what happens when you live in a shoebox for a room for to long! The viking and the princess!

Living in the land of the midnight sun....well at least for the summer.

Greetings from Uppsala, Sweden!!  We are at the beginning of our third week here in Sweden.  We are leading a team of 34 students and staff in reaching out to the 50,000 university students here in Uppsala.  So far things have been going really well.  We have had a few surprises and some obstacles at times, but they end up making some pretty funny stories.
One of these is that when we checked in the first day at our hostel we went to our room....it is tiny.  Like even by Europe standards tiny!  I measured the other day and it is 6ft 8 inches by maybe 7ft....maybe.  Brooks and I looked at each other and after saying, "how are we going to do this?" started laughing.  The students rooms are a little bigger but we are all learning about patience and grace this summer.  I will try to post some pictures of this, but we really do think this is hilarious and have laughed a lot.
We have been able to form a new partnership with the Baptist Church right beside of us and they are now letting us use their kitchen.  That has helped us to save money which is big cause when we got here the dollar had dropped and prices had gone up, so for example in a restaurant a coke is running between $4-5.  Pretty crazy.
Ministry has been going well and we have already started to see God do some pretty amazing things.  Some of the girls where able to meet a girl named Johanna.  She had studied in the USA during high school and lived with a Christian host family.  Towards the end of her time she became a believer and then moved back to Sweden.  That was 3 years ago.  She hasn't known any other Christians since then.  We met her on campus doing a free bike wash for students.  She wanted to meet up and said that for 3 years she has been praying that God would bring her in contact with other believers her age.  Our girls are now meeting with her and teaching her how to read the Bible on her own and the basics of Christianity as well as taking her to church with them.
Another cool story was when we meet Maya who is a doctoral student from Iran.  She said that she is an atheist due to the religious persecution that women faced in her country.  She actually lives in Stockholm (40 min south) and commutes.  She wanted to get together more to talk with some of our girls because she was curious as to why they were so interested in religion and how they talked about freedom because it was so opposite of her experience.
We have also met a guy named Eric.  Upon first meeting him, Eric told us (in his own slightly more crude way) that he believed the Bible was full of crap.  We said, "Oh, have you read it?"  He said yes and then his friend that was with him called him a liar and they argued (which was really funny to watch).  He asked us what we thought and we began to explain about a relationship with God and the Bible.  By the end of the conversation he said that he wanted to meet up again to talk more.  Even more crazy was that a girl that came over to bum a light for a cigarette from Eric and asked what we were talking about.  We said God, and she said, "This is so cool!! I have always wanted to talk with someone about this but nobody talks about that kinda thing here!"  We asked if she wanted to meet up later to talk with some of us and she said yes.
So although Sweden is one of the darkest places in the world spiritually, it is obvious that God is at work here.  Someone recently compared it to trying to keep an inflated beachball underwater.  You can try but it keeps coming to the surface.  Swedes keep trying to use knowledge or possessions to keep the need for God down, but He keeps coming to the surface, despite their efforts.
Thanks so much for your prayers. We hope to keep you updated more often!
In Him,
Britton&Brooks