Some days in Switzerland

 

On Monday, I was up at the crack of dawn for my flight to Geneva, Switzerland. Our "Reformation Tour" outreach has begun. We're a team of almost thirty people - young people and families - and we'll be travelling 5000 km around Europe over the next couple of weeks, following in the steps of the Reformers who played such a key role in the development of church history five hundred years ago.

Arriving in Switzerland, I immediately noticed how different everything is from southern Spain. Everything is so green, while down in Malaga things are already dry and brown from the summer heat. Although it was a lovely sunny day, there was a noticeable drop in temperature. I slept with a big feather duvet for the first time in many weeks. And, because we're further north, it was strange to go to bed when it wasn't yet completely dark.

On Tuesday we had a full day in Geneva, walking around the city on foot and learning more about what the Reformation had meant historically. God had warned us in prayer that there would be surprises in store and that we shouldn't feel put out when unexpected things cropped up to "mess up" our planned schedule. Sure enough, there were some interesting "divine appointments" in the course of the day.

The first of these happened when we were in the cathedral. We had been hearing about how the Reformation helped the church recover the understanding that salvation comes through faith alone and not through anything that we can do to earn it. Someone in our group proposed that we sing a song of thankfulness and worship to the Lord, so we lifted our voices and sing right there and then - most in French, some in English, some in German. Suddenly we were joined by a Korean lady, and then by a full choir, who invited us to sing with them. As the strains of, "How great thou art" still echoed around the cathedral, we also spoke out the Lord's Prayer together. Their cameraman also interviewed a couple of us about what we were doing there. (Perhaps I'll unknowingly appear on Korean TV.)

The second surprise encounter happened in the afternoon. We were visiting Geneva's Reformation Museum and had heard how the invention of the printing press had made it possible for the Bible in their own language to be spread more widely to the people of the day. A huge replica of the first printing press had been set up, and some of our kids were enjoying inking the text and printing a page from the Bible. Suddenly, one of the museum staff came up to me and said, "Could you move aside for a moment, please? The King of Egypt would like to print a page."

The King of Egypt, as you may know, has been in exile since a revolution in 1953, and currently lives in Switzerland. As he printed his Bible page, our kids huddled two by two in the next room, taking time to pray for him and for his nation. Then, as he finished printing,  we asked if we could sing for him, and he said yes, he'd like that. Once again our music filled the building, but this time is was the museum and not the cathedral.

That evening, debriefing the day in small groups, we reflected on how the effects of the Reformation had reached the whole world.. and how, on the first day of our tour, we had met people from all over the world.

Having heard a lot about the Reformation on Tuesday, we took some time on Wednesday to learn more about how Catholics express their faith in the 21st Century. Finally, we took the team to the town of Rolle, where we had a time of worship, a picnic and a swim in the lake. That concludes our days in Switzerland, and on Thursday we take to the road, travelling northwards into Germany.