Letter From Elsa - December 2, 2007
posted in Missions, Europe |Dear Friends,
Thank you so much for your continued prayers. You continue to be a great encouragement to me. It seems like so long since I have written, though it has only been a few weeks.
Since the funeral I have had a lot of bureaucratic things to take care of but most of that is now behind me. I’ve also had a number of health tests to avoid a surprise like we experienced with Jim. My blood work was really good, but the stomach test showed irregularities that even made my doctor nervous. Believe me, during the six days I waited for the pathological report I was a basket case. I simply couldn’t keep my thoughts and feelings under control, and with the help of several of the Christians here, I spent those days crying my way through a soup of emotions that I wasn’t even aware were in me. Some of the thoughts were so silly, that I had to laugh even as I was expressing them, but there was no holding them back, and as draining as the whole thing was, I am in much better shape since than I was before. Tomorrow I will be having a colonoscopy, but I think that the stomach experience will help me wait more calmly for the results -at least I hope so. God continues to be very good to me but still I forget sometimes that He is in control regardless.
Bremen
The church is doing well. The men are taking turns preaching and teaching and are taking care to make decisions together and carefully. Fortunately they already had experience in doing that and the general attitude in the church here is one of mutual respect even when opinions differ. Though none has the Bible knowledge at hand that Jim had acquired over the years, they are dedicated to finding their answers in God’s Word and are trying to help each other in doing so. Two of the men, Rudi and Florian, have arranged with their employers to reduce the number of hours they work so that they can do concentrated Bible study. Rudi has already begun with a Bible class online, and in January, Florian will start studying one morning a week via Skype (internet) with the preacher in the city of Kiel where he comes from. Florian and Rudi complement each other very well and together will be great assets to the church.
ETM
I promised in the last letter to keep you informed about continuing ETM. After some brainstorming via Skype and telephone conference calls, Larry, Stephan and I, who have been the ETM mentors up till now, along with our daughter Karin and her husband Christoph have scheduled the next ETM Basic Course for April 2008. Larry will teach it and though we sent out the information only last week, we already have three people signed up and five more who are hoping to do so. Of course, there are a lot of things still to work out, but we are encouraged. We have also invited all the past ETM-ers to a fellowship weekend in April at the close of the Basic Course to share with us and each other how ETM has affected their lives and serving, and to help us in the planning of future advanced courses. I am very thankful that there are five of us to share the organizational load. All our different talents will be needed to make it work.
Sara and Frank
In the PrayerChain before we found out that Jim was sick, we mentioned Sara (40), who had been diagnosed with Leukemia, and Frank Z. in the church here who started taking an experimental treatment for rheumatoid arthritis. I’m pleased to tell you that Frank is doing extremely well and uses only a fraction of the cortisone he used to take.
Sara is still in the hospital and will be for several more months but has been responding well to treatment. I just found out, however, that she has developed pneumonia. Please pray again for her.
All in all, things are going along well for me except that I can never anticipate how a situation (or a subject I am talking about) will affect me. Even that is slowly improving, though, and I am actually able to concentrate on something other than myself sometimes now which gives me hope. Thank you again for your continued prayers and your words of encouragement. You are of great comfort. Gott mit euch!
Your fellow servant,
Elsa Springer