"I want to believe in something...but I just can't," said Emil. Josh, a student from Duke, and I met Emil, Jonatan and Eric at Stockholms nation (think co-ed fraternity that everyone has to join with a restaurant) during lunch. When the conversation turned to spiritual things, we learned that Emil is an atheist, "but not a belligerent atheist like Dawkins," Jonatan and Eric are agnostics; they have belief in some sort of higher power, mainly just to "cover their bases." The lawyers, as Josh and I refer to them, are great fun, but with their strong personalities, its hard to keep the conversation on spiritual things when they decide to take it elsewhere. We had a great time hanging out and cutting up with them. When it was time for them to go study, they expressed a lot of interest in hanging out again.

Since then, we've been able to hang out with them again and with Jonatan. We were able to ask him a lot of spiritual questions and dialogue quite a bit about his beliefs. Near the end of our conversation Jonatan said that no one is asking these types of questions, but they need to be asked. Please pray for Jonatan and the rest of the law students as they think about spiritual issues for one of the first times in their lives.

2 1/2 wonderful years!!!

Today (June 2, 2009) Reece and I celebrated 2 1/2 GREAT years of being married! We both really enjoy the opportunity to celebrate the time God has allowed us to enjoy each other...it's been amazing! We worked on campus all day-which I'll talk about later- and then enjoyed a nice meal out to eat by the river that runs right through downtown Uppsala!

Here is Stephanie posing on a bridge that runs across the river in downtown Uppsala!

In other news, SO much has been happening with our ministry here! The first two weeks were pretty discouraging because most people you talk to here don't even have the desire to know God at all. It's been challenging and we've needed to cling to the Lord to keep stepping out on campus everyday to bring the Gospel to a people who seem like they really don't want it.

We're starting to see that there are people who want to know God--and we've been privileged to walk alongside some of these students in their journey to know more...here is just one snapshot of what God is doing here in Sweden...there are seriously so many more stories so we'll keep posting! Please keep praying because we are seeing God really do cool stuff in the lives of students who have never ever considered God before!

Stephanie met Sophie, a self proclaimed agnostic the first day we stepped foot on Uppsala University's campus. Through various conversations and getting to know Sophie, she has expressed that she believes something is "out there" but she doesn't think it's necessarily God. One night at dinner, Stephanie was able to share how she had experienced the reality of God in her life, which launched into a long conversation about how Jesus impacted her life. Sophie initiated asking her questions about "Why Jesus had to die?" and "how is God's love shown in Jesus' death." It was so obvious that God had been at work in Sophie's life even though she didn't even aknowledge Him as God. It's been great seeing God at work in Sophie's life! We are continuing to meet up with Sophie to talk through her questions and she is really considering this faith in Jesus that we profess...please pray for her...that God will help her see the reality of His love for her in Jesus!!I'll end with this really pretty random picture of the Domkyrkan viewed from the river. We wish you could be here to see how beautiful this city is!