Pentecost Weekend

As I sit to write about some of what’s been going on of late, the wind is howling.

Although we’re about 2 hours from the coast, whenever there are winds out there, we feel the effects of them here as well. Gusts are up to 100 km/h today, which is enough that we put away anything fairly light and move medium-weight items closer to the house for a bit of shelter.

The feature image is one I took this week at the massive St. Stephen Cathedral in Bourges. I’ll tell you about it below…

Ministering in Eastern France

Back a couple of weeks ago, we had the chance to minister at the church in Romilly-sur-Seine, pastored by Alain & Pauline Kabesa.

This church was planted a few years before we arrived in France but is still very much a newer work. The Lord is blessing them and that Sunday there were over 70 people, including a healthy gaggle of kids.

Liz encouraged the ladies with a short message, the five of us sang together and then I preached on the River of Living Water, from Ezekiel 47.

That Sunday was Mothers’ Day in North America & Belgium (not in France) and since we were on the side of France that was close to Belgium, before heading home, we popped up to surprise Liz’s mom and wish her a happy Mothers’ Day in person. She was surely surprised. We left to drive back the next morning so the visit was short and sweet!

Visit from Canadian Friends

For the past week and a half, we’ve enjoyed sharing France with Bonnie Taylor and Marilyne Cary, special friends from home. They did a lot of sightseeing on their own, but we were able to spend a bit of time with them all together – on top of celebrating Auntie Marilyne’s birthday.

We visited Brézé Castle (featuring the deepest dry moat of any castle in Europe) as well as the city of Chinon… a lovely riverside community with the royal fortress of Chinon visible on the hill behind us.

They joined us for church Sunday morning and Oh what a difference the presence of a few more apostolic believers makes – we felt a powerful presence of God as they intermingled with the rest of our church family.

I can’t even begin to express how special it was to have guests from home here with us… a rare treat!

Preparing for #AYCFrance19

This year, once again, the General Youth Division of the UPCI is sending a team of 40-ish young people to France for 10 days of exposure to and involvement in the missions work here – Apostolic Youth Corps. They arrive in just one week. (You may recall that we accompanied the AYC group in 2015 as well.)

This year, we’ll only spend 3 days with them. They’ll be with us for one day in Châtellerault. We’ll travel with them to visit the church in Bordeaux and then accompany them to the city of Bourges as well. Missionary Brochu and I travelled to Bourges on Tuesday to visit with the local pastor and make plans for the visit to that city.

One of the things they’ll see is the massive Cathédrale de Saint-Étienne. Looking at it from behind (top picture) you could almost think you were looking at Notre-Dame in Paris – it’s built in the similar style. From the front however, the difference is clear… this church has a much bigger footprint than Notre-Dame. What you see in the lower picture is not quite 1/2 of the facade (note Pastors Brochu and Chartier in comparison).

Pentecost Convention & Taxes

This morning, we’re driving up to Melun for the Pentecost Weekend Convention. This year, we celebrate the 40th anniversary of the church in France and to assist us, Pastor & Mrs Anthony & Micky Mangun will be with us from Alexandria, LA.

I’ll give you a bit of a run-down on that next weekend.

If you think that it’s a chore to declare your taxes in ONE country… try doing it in TWO! That’s us. We have someone helping us, back in Canada, with our Canadian tax return but since I work part-time here in France, I have to declare here as well.

Imagine filling out an income tax declaration in your second language!
🙂