Snow, Glorious Snow!!!!

So, this blog I will start out with some pictures of the snow!



It's been snowing for the past three days! These pictures were from the first snow, so it's a bit more white now than you can see here. It is still beautiful even though it's not enough to really cover the ground yet. But this week I think it will really start to snow.

We have a new guest lecturer this week--He and I will need prayers, because his lectures are a bit confusing and disorganized. But, one thing I really appreciated about what he said today was that we may not feel like we're really learning much now, and we may even go home and wonder why we spent a year at Bible School, not really doing anything. But that God has us here for a purpose and even if it takes 5 years for that purpose to be made clear to us, or even if we never figure out why exactly we spent a year in the Middle of Nowhere, Sweden, our experiences here are significant.

Also, I thought that when I came here I would suddenly know exactly what God wanted me to do with my life career-wise. But, I still have no idea!!! I'd love prayers for direction after Holsby. My thoughts at this point include:

• Missions work with orphans (though I have no idea how to make this one happen)
• Working at a college campus preferably doing student life or writing center stuff
• Working in Alaska in general (this is a cool idea in theory, but would best work out if I found a position in a university there)
• Working for a church with the youth
• Working at an outdoor store

These are all just ideas. I'm still asking God where He wants me and how He plans to use me.

If you know of any jobs I should look into, let me know about them!!! It seems early to be looking for a position for next fall, but I enjoy thinking about the future and planning things, God-willing.

Thanks for all your prayers!

Em

Holsby, God and Gothenberg

I realized two things about this blog recently: first, I don't update it nearly as often as I should. Second, I told all that it would be a blog about what God is doing in my life here at school and I haven't done much of that.

So, about God. We've had so many great speakers that it gets to be an information overload! I know I'm learning a lot about God and about Christianity and my role in relation to those two things, but with 5 lecture hours a day I have a hard time spending time thinking about what I'm learning. I need to remedy this, I know. Your prayers for that are encouraged and appreciated!

In summary, we've had one lecturer who spoke on 1 Peter, one who spoke about ethics, another on biblical history, one on counseling and understanding differences in personality, one on practical evangelism, and my favorite guest lecturer who spoke on the blessing of having nothing.

The blessing of having nothing was really great because he spoke a lot about grace and needing Jesus, which are two topics that can be difficult to really get the mind wrapped around. At the end of one class period, he said that if anyone needed money, they could stand up and walk to the front and he would give them some money. It got really quiet in the classroom and for a long time nobody went forward. We weren't really sure what to think. Then someone got up and he gave them the equivalent of about 8 USD. Then when that person sat down he said, now if you still need money, come up and get some money. And the girl who went up first didn't want to go again. But another guy went up. The same thing happened about 5 more times, but the same guy went up each time. I'm probably doing a horrible job of explaining this, but it was really neat.

After, the speaker told us that it was like God's grace because it requires humility to go and to admit a need and then to receive something for nothing. Then, when the first girl didn't want to take money a second time, he said that that is all too often what we do with Jesus. We accept grace once and "get saved" but then we feel that we don't need anymore than that and we don't want to ask too much. Then, when the guy went up a number of times, after about two times, the speaker asked him to give some of the money he had received to someone else who needed it. It was cool because it showed how we need to give the same grace that we have been given to others.

Anyway, the illustration made my pride more apparent. It is hard to keep going to Jesus over and again for the same silly problems or sins in life. But it's really cool to think that God's "money" will never run out and that He loves to give and give and give.

So, that's just one of soooo many great things I'm experiencing with God here at Holsby.

Now for some more pictures!!!

The weather is beginning to change around here. I love this picture for some reason. It's really serene looking. I took it at 7AM and you can kinda see that the pond in the background is starting to freeze over!



This is my "family group." We meet every other week to hang out, eat dinner together and get to know a few people on a deeper level. Dan and Esther are the two in front--they're our family group parents and the two RAs here. Then, starting with the boys in the back row, R to L it's my three brothers Mike, Chris and Davide. The girls L to R are Jaclyn, Maike, Jodi, Me and Danielle. It's an awesome group. We really do feel like a family, which is nice!


This is a picture of the beautiful countryside from the 3.5 hour walk Veronika and I took to a town called Skiro, two towns over from Holsby. There were about 7 other rock walls in seeing distance from this one and I really felt like I was in Europe when we were walking on this one-lane road.


Me and a Viking we met on the 3.5 hour walk : )


Here's Gothenburg's canal at night. The lights made really great reflections on the water, and I really liked this bridge. I have like 15 pictures of it!!!


This is an alleyway in Gothenberg. This was the point when I told the other girls "I think this is my favorite day. It's good to be alive!" Another, "I'm actually really for real in Europe!" moment.


Here's one of the harbors with a small village surrounding it. Typical swedish colored houses.



And here's Adolf Gustav or someone pointing at me.

In Gothenberg it was a great time of shopping a bit, frequenting cafes for hot chocolate and taking our time to enjoy the buildings, canals, and free time. The first night we actually went to bed at around 9pm!!! Sounds totally stupid, but it was nice to have a more relaxed schedule than we do at school.

So, that wraps up the longest blog in the history of mankind. Hope you enjoyed it!

Some Pictures!!!

Picture time!!! The captions for pictures will be under the picture the caption describes. Enjoy!

This is typical evenings in what we call the "Bik" it has no Swedish meaning. No clue why it's called that. Anyway, this is (Left to Right) Agnese, Veronika and Annie. Agnese and Veronika are two of my four roommates.


These are two of my German friends, Anna (left) and Maike (right).



The pizza at the top there is the disgusting Ox pizza I wrote about in a previous blog entry. The dish on the right is what they call Kebab, which is lamb meat with a sort of mayonaisse sauce over french fries... kinda gross as well. The left pizza is normal vegetarian (whew!).



This is a view from a nearby bridge. This area of Sweden has a river that runs through it leading to many lakes and all along the shores are little red houses with white trim. I canoed for 5 hours down this river recently! It was beautiful!!!


This is the little chapel with the swing!!! It is cute now, but just wait till it snows!!!


Lastly, here's all my roommates and I. Left top-Veronika from Germany, left middle-Me!, left bottom-Attalee from Canada, right top-Agnese from Latvia, right bottom-Annika from Oregon USA.

Update... Finally!!!

So, I've been in school here in Sweden for one week now and it's awesome. First, I almost missed my stop getting off the train, but had the conductor person phone the train driver and stop the train to let me off!!! Once I made it here I met my 4 roommates from Germany, Latvia, USA and Canada.

In order not to write a novel here, here's a brief rundown of what I've experienced so far\been up to:

5 classes a day
soccer at least once a day
people thinking I'm an 18-year-old German
bundling up in warm clothes--yesterday it was only 9 degrees C, which is cold for me!!!
walking around Vetlanda, the nearest town where I ate the most disgusting pizza in the world. It was made of ox, shrimp and gorgonzola. Di-sgus-ting.

Also, lots of Bible reading which has been good!

Even though the workload here isn't nearly as bad as it was at college for me, I'm not doing a great job of setting aside time to journal or reflect on what God is doing in me here at Holsby. HOpefully that will change as I settle in more.

Keep keeping in touch!!!

Em

Uppehallstillstand... What???

I have no clue what that word in the title here means, but it doesn't matter, because that's what it says on the visa stamp in my passport, which arrived just a few days ago!!!

For real this time.

Now, with only 6 days until I leave, I am getting anxious. I've got all my gear spewed across my bedroom floor--down jacket (which, by the way, isn't as frumpy looking as I thought it would be. See it posted in the corner there? Cute, huh?), long-johns, camera, scarves. The temperatures in the region of Sweden I'll be in in less than a week range from mid-40s to low 60s already. Snow is on its way and I cannot wait!!!

Before I go, here are some things aside from snow that I'm excited for:
* Being in a close-knit community of students again
* Learning about different cultures
* Actually taking time to learn more about the Bible--willingly
* What God will reveal about me, about Him, and about my future (i.e. possible career paths, etc.)

I'd love prayers from you all for the roommate selection (they haven't done that yet... I hope I can live with some girls from other countries!!!), and travels.

Thanks!!!

Or Not...

So, the package that I failed to open the door for was not my passport.

Alas, who knows if I'll ever make it to Sweden...

God willing!!

Passport!!!

My passport arrived from NYC today in the mail! Only, I was home alone and had just gone running and when the knock came at the door I didn't feel like opening it, sooo my passport is now on its way to the place where they hold mail when nobody is home to pick it up!

There's not much else in other news. I successfully moved my life from Santa Barbara to Felton, called a few friends from around here to catch up, knit myself a pretty cool headband, and have rediscovered how much I love to go trail running.

Oh! And, my mailing address in Sweden is:

Emily Huebscher
Fackelbararna
Brunnsvagen 31
S-570 15 Holsbybrunn
Sweden

Note: That second line, the word Fackelbararna has two little dots above the second "a." I just don't know how to create that symbol on here : ) Also, in the third line, the word Brunnsvagen has the same two dots above the "a."

Christmas in July

I've always heard of those Christmas in July parties that people have. Indeed, I've scoffed at the idea a number of times. But, lately, I'm thinking it's not such a bad idea. My reasoning? Twofold: Ever tried to buy a down jacket in July--in Santa Barbara nonetheless? It's not the easiest task, let me tell you! I've been searching the stores for a coat to take with me to snowy Sweden, and so far, I've only found one. My fashion might have to take the back-burner, so that I'll have enough warmth (i.e. a totally un-hip black boring down jacket) to keep any burner going at all!

My second holiday inspiration comes from my recent obsession with choral music. Trouble is, I can only find "holiday" pieces. I'm embarrassed (though not too embarrassed to exclude it from my blog) to say that I spent 7 out of 8 hours today at work humming cheerily along to silent night, Ave Maria, stille nacht (or however you say silent night in German), and various other songs that make even the bah-humbugers want to grab a cup of egg nog and pull the old Santa hat out of storage.

But, hey, Jesus wasn't necessarily born in December, right? Actually, it's pretty refreshing to be meditating on the holiness surrounding the birth of Christ during this time of year. I still don't think I'm ready to actually throw one of those Christmas in July parties, though.

Maybe next year.

So, Here's the Scoop

In less than three months I will be living and studying in southern Sweden! I am getting more and more excited for my adventure in Europe with every passing day--for a while it seemed so far away that it was hard to believe I was actually going.

While I'm there, for those of you who don't know, I'll be at a Bible school called Holsby Brunn where I will learn more about the Scriptures, about missions, and Christian leadership--and I'm sure I'll learn a lot more about myself, too! I'm really hoping to get a good feel for what the missions field in Eastern Europe is like--we'll have opportunities to do work projects in Estonia, Latvia, or Poland (to name a few places). I've always been interested in working with orphans, and I hope to visit an orphanage in one of those areas to see if God might be calling me to that kind of service sometime in the future.

The school used to be a health spa, and is located in a forested area in the Smaland region. I've only seen a handful of pictures, but I have already fallen in love with the school grounds. The main building looks like a big red barn, with white trim. There's a handmade swing with a wooden seat big enough for two people. There's also a tiny white chapel in view of the swing and in front of the woods. And it SNOWS there!!! I can't wait to catch some of Sweden's finest snowflakes on my tongue! There's also a ton of opportunities to explore the outdoors--there's a ropes course, camping, canoeing, rock climbing, and hiking right out the back door!

So, this blog is a place where I plan to record my adventures in Sweden and Austria (more about that later). I'll be gone for a full 12 months and I'm sure I will be missing you all terribly, so please feel free to comment on my blog!!! I will be writing mostly about how God is using and changing me while I'm away (so selfish!), but I still want to hear what's going on in your lives while I am away.

BUT, until mid-September I'm still around in Santa Barbara, and Santa Cruz in the US. So, give me a call and let's get together before I leave!