Hello everyone! Greetings from one of my favorite places in the world, Lago di Garda, Italy. The Care-a-Van is on day 3, and what a beautiful day it was. It is so gorgeous around here. But back to the beginning. Aaron and Nicole Varner and the 3 of us landed in Munich on Wednesday. By Thursday morning, the six Americans on the Care-a-Vaners were on the ground with us and we started off with a 4 hour drive in grey and rainy weather to Haiterbach, Germany. Despite the grey skies, the town itself is charming and the church people were great. We had a really fun evening event on Thursday night which included a dinner and then a time of sharing where we learned about the German Church and they learned a little bit about the United States, Africa, and Three Worlds.
We had a great time staying in the home of Ricard and Meta who are Germans that were born in Uzbekistan. They have a very charming family and invited us to come back for a conference or 3W Seminar. So hopefully we can do that in 2013. We really enjoyed our time with them.
The next morning we had an Eastern morning service which included the Lord's supper and footwashing. Jesus, just before he was captured and taken to the cross, washed his disciples feet. It was a sign of deep humility as feet were considered very dirty (and were very dirty) in the ancient Near East. In the Church of God, many of us engage in this ritual where we wash a person's feet. I washed the feet of a young man that I know from Fritzlar Bible College. (at Heiterbach, you wash the feet of the person next to you). This is done on Maunday Thursday--the day before Good Friday when Jesus was Crucified.
After lunch, we started our 7 hour drive to Arco, Italy. Luckily the weather cleared up as we drove along the Swiss border and into Austria. The Alps were looking gorgeous as always as we climbed up on our way to the Italian border. Sharp mountains and rocks with castles on them dot the landscape. This is a spectacular area of Europe. I'm sure the Care-a-Vaners were amazed.
One of them said, "What more could we possibly see?" And the trip is only about 1/5 over! Another said, "I'm going to run out of photos by the third day." That's the kind of scenery around here. It's just stunning.
Today we spent the day in the Lago di Garda area looking at the cliffs that surround the lake 4000 ft straight up. We took them into the mountains for lunch and then met with the Pastor and his wife in the evening. We also spent a lot of time sharing about the challenge of Secularism in Europe and the Three Worlds of Christianity. Throughout the trip we will have these mini-lectures that give people a full overview of 3W.
Tomorrow we will attend church in Arco before making the 2 hour drive to Venice. I'll be speaking in Spanish both in Arco and in Treviso and it will be interpreted into Italian. Then Monday we will hit Venice.
It would be nice if I posted some pictures but I'm busy being the tour guide along with Aaron and Nicole and Jamie and Marco---and I'm really tired. So maybe at the next stop? You know me. They will be blurry and useless anyway.