After months of preparation our team of 13 young people are finally in France! Twelve hail from Mission Point, in Saint John, NB and one from Capital Community Church in Fredericton, NB. All are impacting the kingdom of God! We left on Monday, June 30th on an overnight flight from Montreal to Paris. Both passengers and baggage arrived safely and at the same time! Continue reading
This time last week I’d asked you to pray because I was heading to Montreal for Canada Conference and as you read this, this morning, I’m preparing to fly back to Saint John. Taking a break from details of our trip down south, let me give you a run-down of the past week.
This year’s Canada Conference was hosted by the incredible church in St. Laurent, pastored by Rev. Paul Graham. This church is no stranger to us (or rather, we’re not strangers there) having been there numerous times, with Rev. Dieudonné Kahozi, for various French Conferences.
The speakers this year were
Paul Mooney, Jimmy Toney, Melvin Calhoun, Raymond Woodward, Jesus Fortaleza and Albert Foster.
The worship and teaching was incredible… what a great blessing to be part of those meetings.
Bro. Woodward afforded me the opportunity to greet the conference as an appointed AIMer which was a great privilege. It took me a bit off guard because I didn’t know it was going to happen, so I don’t think I did as good a job as I could have, however, I’ll chalk it up to a learning experience and do better the next time such an opportunity arises, knowing better what to expect. So thankful for every opportunity!
I was asked to translate the morning sessions on Friday which included teaching by Brothers Foster, Woodward, Toney and Mooney… a wonderful marathon that I was privileged to be part of (*note to self… bone-up on Revenue Canada & accounting terminology for the next time I translate Bro. Foster – haha).
After the Canada Conference was over, I spent a few extra days in the Quebec District, to present our project and our burden at the invitation of Rev. Scott Grant (career church planter under North American Missions) and Rev. Dieudonné Kahozi (French pastor at St. Laurent, church planter in Montreal East and North American Director of French Evangelism). I spoke…
- Sunday Morning at the newest French church in Montreal, located in Montréal Est. This church began as a Bible study in Bro. Kahozi’s home, outgrew their second location, a rented 45-seat facility, 2 years later and are now in a recently-purchased location, the dedication service of which will take place in July of this year.
- Sunday Afternoon at International Church, a growing church on Montreal’s south shore, started by Bro. & Sis. Grant in 2009 and currently being pastored by Bro. & Sis. Hector Arriola.
- Monday Night at a Bible Study attended by international university students as an outreach of the Saint Laurent UPC. Don’t let the name fool you… there were 88 people in attendance. These young people are on fire.
Tuesday Night at the Église Pentecôtiste de Trois Rivières. This is an established church that will celebrate 25 years this summer and is also pastored by the Grants. We love the church at T-R (as it’s affectionately referred to) and have been there numerous times as well.
While in the area, I had a number of appointments between Montreal and Ottawa which related to my application for European Citizenship. Liz holds EU citizenship by virtue of being born there, my kids have it because or their mom and I am entitled to it by marriage (in the same way that Liz was able to get Canadian citizenship, by marriage, when she moved here) and can maintain dual citizenship. While on one hand it’s fairly straightforward, it nonetheless required a fair bit of paperwork, document authentication and eventually translation.
Why apply for citizenship to an EU nation?
Not because we plan to cut ties to Canada or anything. It will simply reduce the amount of bureaucratic hoops that we will have to jump through in order to live in Europe temporarily. Typically, France only issues 
residency permits for a 1-year term, meaning that after only about 6 months, you have to already begin the renewal process. Having citizenship does away with that.
This part of the process required time at both the Canadian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Ottawa as well as the Italian Consulate in Montreal, among others.
I’m back in Saint John today, but in the next 5 days we need to:
- Meet with officials about Homeschool planning for the kids next year.
- Have a final, all-morning, planning session with the 13-member team that we’re leading to France on June 30th.
- Celebrate Sophie & Dominic’s “last birthday in Canada” for a couple of years.
- Speak at Life Source Church in Shediac, pastored by Kent Carter.
- Host a 3-course fundraising dinner for our 10-day mission trip to France on June 30th.
It goes without question that we would appreciate your prayers.
God has done and is doing many amazing things and we are glad to be part of it!
Thank you for following our preparations and for your prayerful support… with it you become part of what God is doing and will do in France.
Unless you’re in our local church, you probably don’t know that in addition to preparing to move to France in January, we’re also leading a team of young people to France, in July, for a 10-day missions trip. Although I’ve entitled today’s post “Paris in July” it’s really Châtellerault and Paris in July… with a few more awesome stops along the way.
We’ll be known as #MPTeamFrance
(where MP = Mission Point, our home church)
Strange name?
Perhaps… but it’s “hashtag-able” and isn’t it all about hashtags nowadays? After all the twitter invention is now key to huge social media players like Tumblr, Pinterest, Instagram and even Facebook, which integrated them in June 2013 since users were using them anyway.
Hashtags are powerful because they allow users to follow public conversations outside of their own network of friends. Whichever of the above-mentioned platforms you use, come July there will likely be a steady flow of the #MPTeamFrance hashtag as team-members share their experiences and photos with family & friends back home.
The team is made up of 12 people from Mission Point and a lone courageous member from Capital Community Church in Fredericton (three were absent when the photo above was taken).
Because we will be involved in ministry on various levels this summer, it was important to plan some prep-times… when we could focus on:
sharing information on travel arrangements, timetable & activities
- planning roles, responsibilities & involvement
- gaining interaction experience… a.k.a. team-building (just because we all attend the same church, we don’t take for granted that we automatically know how to work together).
- praying together
- Preparing testimonies & music, to be shared in service settings
We call these prep-times FX-Nights.
(France X-travaganza).
Last night was our second one and among other things,we had to breathe life into those that were still hyperventilating from FX#1, when we told the team that they could only bring a carry-on sized suitcase each as well as a personal item (Stopping to think though… it can’t be about how much an individual is able to carry… but how much we can fit into the cars once in France, and 26 pieces is already a lot!). So one of the things we did last night was show them just how much you can put in a small suitcase, when done efficiently.
One of the main ways that we expect to be able to lend support to the Châtellerault church, once on site, is by helping prepare for and distribute several thousand invitations to a gospel music concert that they are currently organizing. This will be the first time that outreach on this scale will be attempted in Châtellerault and we expect it to accomplish the following:
- Build awareness of the church among thousands of local and regional residents
- Provide an opportunity for those same residents to experience anointed worship in a Holy Ghost-filled atmosphere
- Build a foundation for contact with those in attendance
- Obtain Home Bible Study opportunities with hungry individuals that would desire.
Overall… our goal is to put the local church in touch with a much larger number of contacts than would normally be possible, from which they may obtain followup opportunities for later in the summer / year.
Who knows… when Liz & I get onsite in January, we may get to be involved with someone whose first contact with the church was during this summer’s outreach!
If that’s the case, it may be part of God establishing the “Crown” around Châtellerault, like he said he would.
We will also spend a bit of time in the Paris region, with the church in Melun, but plans are still being formulated for that leg of the journey…. more to follow!
One of the other great things about this summer’s trip is that it gives more people from home a first-hand experience with the field in which we’ll be working.
- When they pray for us… they’ll do so with personal experience.
- When victories are won spiritually…. they can know that they were part of it.
- When others wonder about us, the work, the field… they can help educate others.
You’ll likely hear more about this trip as we get closer, and certainly when we’re there, but for now know that it’s one more way that the Lord is working out his calling in our life. I’m so jazzed for the team that we have preparing to go… Great things are in store #MPTeamFrance.
As always… thanks for stopping by!
What about you?
- Do you think YOU could do 10-days abroad with only a carry-on sized suitcase?
- Have you done it already?
- Tell me about it in the comments section below. (Your comments could encourage & inspire the team… of course your horror stories would be fun to read too.)
A Rare Treat!
How cool that we got to spend time with part of the Missionary Family in France, a week or so ago – both in our home for supper, at church for service and at Tim Horton’s (where else?).
Marcus and Renee Brainos are currently on deputation for their second term in France. Having spent the first term in Melun, at the headquarters church (where we met in 2009), they will branch out during their second term and head down to the southern city of Nice (pronounced: Neece), establishing a new French-language work there.
The Brainos’ were with us in the context of their deputation travels. It was the first time that they’d been to Mission Point and there was a great connection between them and the church congregation.
Bro. Brainos, brought out some incredible information on France:
- There are currently 20 United Pentecostal Churches or preaching points in France… meaning that there is one for every 3,000,000 people in the country. Compare that to roughly- one church per 90,000 in North America or
– one church per 12,000 in New Brunswick.- Statistics in France tell us that there are some 700 people who attempt to take their own lives each year. I don’t know about you… but that’s a lotta hope that’s missin’.
As of the publishing date for this post, they will have been travelling for just under 1 year (having begun in May 2013.) and they may have to be on the road for another year before they are able to get back to France. If you would like to contribute to the Brainos family’s missionary support, send them an email by clicking here where you’ll see the Email Us button.
One of the things that I’ve begun working on recently are stats for the city of Châtellerault itself. I want to be able to understand the city when we get there. I realize that numbers do not tell the whole story… but they are part of the story.
Already I can tell you that Liz and I fit right into the average age of adults in Châtellerault, which – I think – is a good thing. It means that there will undoubtedly be a good number of families similar to ours in terms of age and age of children… allowing us to connect – at least in theory – with them.
Keep an eye out for that in coming weeks.
(I mention this only because it’s in the picture that I’d thrown on Instagram and which I’m using for this post.)
I’m not typically a bowtie type of guy, however Bro. Brainos is and it just so happened that the afternoon of their arrival, I was in the mall and found this purple-ish bowtie at RW & Co. I was in a rare “buying mood” and thought I’d pick it up and wear it as a tribute to my good brother!
I’ll end this post on a not so serious, but oh-so funny note which, in order to understand, you must know that Bro. Brainos’ father was French (from France) and his mother American (from Illinois) and the family made no fewer than six trans-Atlantic moves during his school-years.
“I’m half-French and half-American…
so basically I hate myself!”
I know it’s not truly as bad as all that… but I do get the idea of cultural duality.
Thank you for sharing your burden Bro. & Sis. Brainos… we look forward to working together, for the sake of God’s Kingdom, in France!
Going back to France’s Youth Convention, in November, for today’s post. In his Sunday morning message, Bro. Robert Tisdale spoke on “The Currency of Eternity,” taking his text from Paul’s writings in 2 Corinthians 12.15
“…and I will very gladly spend and be spent for you, though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved.”
His basic tenet was that we are the currency of eternity and God desires to spend us in order to transact his business. The question is… what will we allow ourselves to be spent on?
A coin does not tell its owner to spend or not to spend it, nor does it tell him what it can be spent on. Likewise, we are ill-placed to tell God how he may or may not use us. If we try we are not wholly surrendered to him in the first place.
oin TossThroughout the whole message, he and Bro. Nowacki tossed 20-cent coins over their shoulders or out onto the stage and floor area, constantly reiterating the question… How will we be spent? How will we allow ourselves to be spent?
Q: What if Luke, because he never really preached any life changing sermons, deccided not to allow himself to be spent?
A: We’d have neither the books of Luke or Acts (which, combined, have more verses than Paul’s writings).
Q: What if Barnabas, because he was never seen as either a great apostle, preacher or writer, refused to allow himself to be spent?
A: Perhaps there’d have been no apostle Paul and we be missing a great part of the New Testament?
We may not find ourselves being used in the capacity that we’d like or expect, but as long as we allow ourselves to be spent for God’s purposes, we’ll leave something worthwhile for the next generation. Our ministry may not be necessarily characterized by “greatness” according to man’s standard, but if we are the one to reach the “Paul” of the next generation, we will have reason to rejoice and will have been well-spent.
While we were there listening, our anticipated AIM term was, of course, quite present in our mind. How would we allow ourselves to be spent?
At the end of the message and at one point during the altar, I picked up 5 of those coins off of the floor. One coin to represent each member or my family (Myself, Liz, Sophie, Dominic and Timo) and I had in mind what I wanted to do…
I would take them home and have them framed in such a way so as to be reminded on a regular basis… our 5 lives represent the currency of eternity and God would like to use us to transact his business.
The question “How do I spend my time, my energy, my life?” must constantly be carefully considered… for I am not my own, I am bought with a price. (1 Cor. 6.19-20) I am the currency of Eternity and God wants to use me, my wife… and my children to transact His business. Will my choices concerning use of time, talent and energy best benefit His business?
Below you’ll see a photo of all 5 coins… meticulously framed by Mario’s Framing in Saint John. You’ll perhaps notice that 4 of the 5 coins have the monetary denomination facing up (20 cents). However the one in the center is different… the side showing depicts a sower in a field with a rising sun behind her, accompanied by the letters RF (République Française – see detailed picture above).
Having the RF facing up was intentional (as France was the center of where we wanted to allow God to spend us). What was even more incredible (and this we didn’t realize until afterward) was that the woman depicted, was a sower. That is our purpose in France… to sow the seed of God’s word into the hearts of hungry men, women and children. Lord, let it be so, let us be spent sowing, for the transacting of your business in France!
It’s not very often that this happens, but we have been able to spend two weekends in a row with the Brochus… what a treat!
Last weekend we attended the French Youth Convention in Melun, France and this weekend we ministered together in St. Laurent, Quebec and the local French Evangelism Conference, Hosted by Pastor Dieudonné Kahozi. This was the 8th local conference, and although it is not an international conference per sé, Pastor Kahozi typically likes to have a representative from the church in France and this year, for the first time, Bro. Brochu was able to come.
Hosted by the church in Saint Laurent, there were some 18 services to coordinate (about half of which took place on Sunday among the main services and various daughter works around the city). Bro. Brochu was the main speaker and Pastor Raymond Woodward was responsible for the day sessions. I spoke, for the first time, in St. Laurent’s English language morning service as well as at the daughter work in Notre-Dame-de-Grâce.
Aside from some informal moments in passing during the convention last week, this was really the first time that Liz had a chance to sit down and talk with / get to know the Brochus, other than from what she’d heard from me. We had some valuable time to begin discussing details all four of us together.
We thank the Lord for the opportunity to spend time together. The idea of uprooting oneself, either as a single individual or a couple represents a challenge as it is. We are looking at uprooting a family of 5 in order to follow God’s plan, and while there is no doubt in our mind as to whether or not it is God’s plan, times like this allow opportunities to discuss, ask questions, get reassurances, gain understanding etc.
This is a phenomenal missionary couple and we are so happy for the opportunity to carry some of their responsibilities, in France, during their 2015-2016 deputation. If you would like to support us, click here to find out how you can help.
AIM Long 