Unity through Repentance: The Journey to Wittenberg 2017

Chapter 5

Switzerland

Switzerland has lots of cowbells … but you are not satisfied. You want even more.

The Layers of Church History

Pierre Cathedral in Geneva, Switzerland, is John Calvin's home church. In the 1990s, they renovated it, and part of the process was to remove the floor. This revealed multiple layers of ruins beneath, of previous smaller churches (you can clearly see a round baptistery, for example).

I love this photo, because it shows how our current church is built on the foundations of our forefathers.

Photo credit unknown - this was a postcard we purchased at the cathedral, that I took a picture of

Bathtubs

From the opening paragraphs of Chapter 5

One of my favorite bathtubs was the upstairs tub in my parents’ historic house in Austin, where I grew up. A green tub, with colorful tiles all around on the floor. There were three identical knobs—one for hot, one for cold (which I hardly touched), and one for letting the water drain—when you turned it to this position, it ominously read “Waste,” as if it were a century-old prophet of modern-day water issues. It was in this green upstairs bathtub that I had the brilliant idea to pursue Amy Craver until she married me.

 
 

This photo shows the clawfoot tub in the finished-out upstairs attic of the Canterbury house. Being strategically angled so as to avoid embarrassing Justus even more than it already does, the camera cleverly caught the corner of the skylight reflected in the mirror. Note also the reading light. Now that was a bathtub!

From the opening paragraphs of Chapter 5

When I became the master of my own destiny, I had the freedom to create a bathtub space with not only a reading light, but also a skylight! I designed this bathing architectural wonder when we remodeled an old house on Canterbury Street in Austin in 1998. With its clear glass skylight spanning the length of the tub, it was a good thing that drones were not omnipresent back then.

I had also always wanted, but never had, a clawfoot tub. So I amused my wife by taking her to antique stores in small Texas towns, where I proceeded to lie down in each dusty bathtub to make sure it was comfortable enough for me.

It was from that Canterbury clawfoot tub that I announced to Amy, “I’m taking you to Switzerland!” Her response told me the bathtub muse was at work again: “How did you know that I have always wanted to go to Switzerland?!”

“And now Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the creation of the universe.”

John 17:5 (IEB)

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Chapter 4 - God's Landmine

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Chapter 6 - “The Guts To Go Through With It”