During our time in Denmark, God led us to talk to many people on the 6 campuses our campus teams visited. It was eye-opening to see that the Danish spiritual climate is very similar to our experience ministering in Quebec; with a tougher spiritual soil, historically strong church influence, but only few true followers of Jesus. Although people intellectually believe that they are 'better' than Christianity and don't need it, a number of them are curious about how Jesus can change their life. An example of this was talking to a student named Kenneth.
Kenneth is a PhD student studying climate change. As an atheist with mostly atheistic friends, he was interested to hear a different worldview. Trevor and his teammate John talked with Kenneth about evidence for the existence of God and relative vs. absolute truth among other topics and shared ideas. Kenneth seemed compelled by some of the arguments we were making and when we challenged him on his belief in relative truth and compared it to whether climate change is real or not, he conceded that we had made a good point. Soon, he did ask about how Jesus makes a difference in our day-to-day life and we were able to share about the purpose and supernatural resources we have through Christ.
One thing that helped us to minister was learning from a local missionary how Denmark is very paradoxical:
- Has an official state church which many people are technically in, but is a very secular culture
- Denmark is one of the “Happiest” countries, but also has the highest rates of depression
- It's a more reserved society, but also has a massive partying culture
- Historically Vikings, but now very socialist
- Generally taboo to talk about spiritual things, but we found great openness to the gospel
On the last day, we spent some time looking back on the doors that God had opened and the conversations that we had with people like Kenneth. You can see from the picture below that we wrote the names of the people we talked to on 100 Danish flags (and ran out of flags) and prayed for them. You might not know most of them by name, but would you continue to pray with us that these students would discover Jesus and walk as His disciples?
Here is picture of our team with our resident Viking, Alex, who helped us understand what Jesus is doing in Denmark
It was such a joy and encouragement to partner alongside Danish Christian students. Please pray for them as they continue to persevere as light in a dark place.
Thank you for praying for our mission trip in Denmark. We know that God has used it to change lives of not only the Danes, but also Canadians. As the Canadian students finished off the trip we asked them what were some of the highlights they had, here are some of their answers:
- "Meeting Danish Christians and seeing them persevere in their faith"
- "Becoming friends with Benjamin who became interested in knowing more about Jesus"
- "Seeing the two agnostic German girls excited about the worship night"
- "I loved living in community and being on mission together"
- "I came in knowing no one but am leaving with lots of deep friendships"
AMELIA UPDATE
Amelia did so well during the rest of the trip. She enjoyed all the big brothers and sisters she had. She is growing so quickly. Her favourite things now are to bring us her shoes when she wants to go out to play, wearing her sunglasses like mommy, helping unload the dishwasher, and sitting on little chairs or ledges. It was a step of faith to bring her on a mission trip but we are so glad that we did.
Trevor & Hannah