Christmas greetings

We do wish you all a very Merry Christmas. May this be a time where you realise how much the Christ has fulfilled all that was needed in order to reconcile us with our Father God and to open the way for us to be fully what God intended us to be.

 It's not usual for Evangelical churches to hold a service on Christmas Day. Churches here are so small and the members join their often non-Christian families for the Christmas Eve meal. So it's not worth it to organise a service. It's always seemed very strange to me brought up as I was on Christmas Day services followed by drinks and presents while waiting for the final touches to the turkey dinner.
Thank God, the French Reformed Church has kept it's tradition of Christmas Day service. Pascal and I attended it here in Lamastre. We were nearly the youngest there!
The Catholic Church holds a midnight mass, usually at around 9 pm! And families eat their Christmas Eve festive meal around it. The priest told us that in fact Catholics are usually supposed to have Holy Communion while fasting, so don't eat before the service. After Mass, they go home to feast and to open presents.
Anyway, I got my Christmas morning service and was very thankful for it. JESUS IS THE REASON FOR THE SEASON: and amongst all the preparation and the excitement of having family to share Christmas with us, it was a very necessary part of my day.

Overseas guests

Forgot to mention that my parents arrived safely inbetween snow falls. All our snow melted just before their arrival so we didn't have a White Christmas after all.

Here they are catching up with Marc, our second son, whom they had not seen when we were in Australia in July and August.

Ambiance Noël

"A table!" is the French expression to call everyone to the table

 Claire is our interior decorator now. A very artistic young lady at 10 and 3/4 years old.

 Here is our Christmas tree (we didn't cut it ourselves this year, but we could have - it's all very special for an Aussie to be able to do these things.)

Antilope casserole for Christmas!

A typical French "bûche de Noël" - Christmas cake in the form of a log representing the warmth of the fire at the Winter solstice. Traditionally, a huge log was placed in the fire place and was supposed to burn for 12 hours. The head of the family said prayers over it and the tradition was mixed with superstitions and predictions. Since in the 20th Century, most households lost their open fire places, the tradition was transformed into an edible one, but it is still decorated with an axe, a saw and little gnome woodcutters.

 Another tradition, the Christmas tree, was taken on by Christians to represent the wooden cross that the baby Jesus was destined to die upon. Decorated by real candles even today, the tree represents the light of Christ come into the world.

We kept to the Anglo-Saxon tradition the next day and had home-made Christmas pudding. Thanks to mixed fruits bought in England in February! and to the Australian Women's Weekly recipe books! And to some Napoleon Brandy we flamed to pour over it:

Making music

Cold outside and a remnant of snow.

Philippe, Claire's flute teacher, decided to add to the Christmas spirit by having "his girls" play in the cafés of Lamastre! As a practising buddhist, he is not into Christmas Carols (!), but he did teach them to sing an Ardéchois blessing on the owners of the cafés.

Since there were not that many clients in the cafés, Philippe decided to knock at other doors! So here we are in the local chemist : 

Reminds me of a story I heard about there being no room in a hotel for a special couple of which the young woman was pregnant ...

Christmas plays

So you must all be into them now. We just had our first one and it was a resounding success! Full church, good sketches, smooth technical operations and very competent kids!

Our kids are rather wonderful actually! Here's a glimpse of the Sunday School group and of the girls after one of their dances (they make them up themselves!)

Claire and friend discuss the real meaning of Christmas with the tree!

Zacharia receives word from Gabriel!

The shepherds are confronted by angelic presence!

The girls after the dance.

The answer to the enigma

Tell me if you got it right!

The photo a couple of posts ago is of a stove-top chestnut oven. If you don't have a fireplace where you roast your chestnuts in a holey frying pan, then you can put them into this portable oven and cook the chestnuts slowly over an electric or gas stove. A lovely winter's activity at the end of a cold day!

Bon appetit!

A window into the Christian faith ...

Last week 3 churches from Lamastre joined together to run a book stall - a Christian book stall !!! This is a noteworthy event in secular France.

We set up in a vacant shop (Catholic owners)and visitors could see an oecumenical display of books about Christmas, the environment and ecology from a Christian point of view, calendars and cards, Bibles, Children's books ... 

Well, that was the week that snowed, so we didn't get crowds in but parishioners from the 3 churches took turns to man the stalls and each evening at 5 pm after the children get out of school, there was story telling based on the Bible (by a Reformed church minister - a dynamic lady who could imitate a wonderful Cameroon accent!)

When I returned the unsold books to the depot in Montélimar (I had to go there for a Femmes 2000 meeting), Heidi was impressed that we sold €1000 worth of goods!

So thank God that people still read, that our churches appreciate working together, that Christian literature is developping here in France, although still quite expensive to buy given the much smaller market. And pray that all that was bought will stimulate people's faith in the living God. May this Christmas be the one where people finally understand that Jesus is Lord and Saviour. And pray that all the churches will be faithful to the Gospel message.

GUESS WHAT THIS IS !

So, all you Aussies out there ... what do you think this item is ?  The card on top indicates that it is an early Christmas present for Pascal. He got it early because of the time of year. And that's all the clues you are going to get!!!

Our first snow! December 1st.

View of our balcony from Claire's bedroom

Claire and I built a snowman in our garden

It's now 13th December and none of this is left. A reminder of how ephemeral life can be. A reminder to make the most of each day and to be child-like in our appreciation of life.

Le Centre Evangélique

Sunday 21st November, Pascal and I played "chassé-croisé" (the French version of "passing each other like ships in the night!) along the Rhône Valley! He was returning from Lyon where he had spent 4 days with the other church he pastors, and I was taking the train from Valence to go to Paris for the Centre Evangélique. I left the car in the car park and SMSed him as I sped away in theTGV (the Very Fast Train!)

The kids are old enough to cope for a couple of hours, but it is reassuring to have mobile phones to keep in touch. 

So what is the Centre Evangélique??

3 days of conferences, round table discussions, AGMs for different clubs including our Former Students Association from our Bible Institute. It's bumping into people with whom you studied, worshipped or worked; names you have heard of; people you have admired. It's walking down aisles of stands representing editors, all sorts of Missions, Christian organisations and ministries, Free trade merchandise ... In short, it allows a global view of what's happening in Evangelical circles in France and French-speaking countries.

This year the theme was "Missions - what priorities ?"

My aim was to find answers to 3 questions :
 * Do the French churches still need input from foreign missionaries (as you will no doubt understand, this is a vital question for me!)?
*  Where are the French churches at in terms of their own understanding of mission?
*  What happens if Christian churches from other countries want to send missionaries into France?

In answer to the first : yes, because there are still not enough Christians being trained to work in full-time ministry or in lay ministries. But it is vital that those coming to France to work, come along side French local churches to build them up and to train them to evolve missionally. Ideas from the Emerging Church movement, the incarnational church, are filtering through. Many French Christians see the need to be more outward looking and to review their church life in order to be accessible to the Post-Modern world, and they realise that people aren't going to just walk into their church searching for God, so they have to be out there being salt and light. However, they lack experience and, perhaps, confidence to make the necessary changes. Plus, let's be fair, France is a very hard country when it comes to being open about your Christian beliefs.


As for the second question :
For most traditional evangelical churches, mission means going overseas evangelising the natives!! Although in the last 15 years, this has translated into non-governmental organisations helping the Two-Thirds World countries and organising humanitarian projects. So two main ideas came through in the presentations : Christians involved in humanitarian projects need to remember that the sharing the Gospel is our priority, and, that France is as much in need of the Gospel as any other country. In fact many immigrants are bringing the Gospel to France and there is a big increase in the number of ethnic Christian groups in France, which is changing the face of Evangelicalism here!

And for the third question : There was no direct answer to this because it wasn't discussed as such, however, I spoke with a number of people and we hope that with the advent of a new federative body (CNEF - Conseil National des Evangéliques de France - the National Council for French Evangelicals) mission organisations will contact this Council and be directed into areas which need missionary input. It's too early to say if the CNEF will produce a national strategy, but it can already present an up-to-date picture of the Christian situation here.


I must admit that I was taken aback at the lack of mission vision apparent in our churches here! My overall reaction was "There is still an enormous amount of work to be done" and, of course, I was comparing France with our Anglo-Saxon culture. 


One highlight : hearing Ivory Coast and Haitian Christians talking about recent events in their countries and humbly accepting responsibility for certain errors committed on a national level! They explained how God's refining fire is renewing and maturing the Christian witness in their countries. God bless them and help us to pray for them and to help them as God directs.

Advent Calendars

Advent calendars are more of a German and Anglo-Saxon tradition, but because so many missionaries have worked in France, the tradition has been created here. It's also a good way of encouraging families to have daily readings, and another means to witnessing about our faith to non-believers. The Catholics put out a number of calendars or manger scenes to construct each day with the Nativity story to read. 

Our church ladies combined with the Reformed Church ladies to sew 27 of these calendars for our families. It helps wait for Christmas ! "Mum, when is Christmas going to be here???"

It was a lot of work - not quite up to Patchwork standard - but needed a concentrated effort. Our ladies were wonderfully industrious and it was a great way to get our two communities together in a different way.

What is inside? Almost every day there is a part of a story with pictures to colour in. The theme is "LIGHT". All I have read so far is about a little shepherd boy who loses a lamb and has to go to look for it. So far he has met a giant man - a thief- to whom he gave one of his candles, and a wolf with a damaged paw which he cleaned and wrapped up.

Each Sunday a small candle appears to make up a miniature advent wreath.

So we are waiting to celebrate the arrival of the Light of the God; the end of the shadows is nigh!

Exhilarating!!

Monday morning I took Luc to his Senior High School 'down in the Valley'. It was raining and dark. Then I headed out to visit one of our church members. We are studying Neil Anderson's "Freedom in Christ" course. It's a privilege to get to know someone better and to grow in our understanding of our identity in Christ as expressed in Galatians 5:1:

"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery."

When I left I had to hightail it up to Lamastre again because we had an older couple coming for lunch. However, it was raining really hard and I was tired. Solution: put Amici in the CD player and speed through the rain hoping that snow tyres are good for road grip in heavy rain!

Actually, it was exhilarating! What a sense of freedom!

This is the feeling when we are set free in Christ.

(But I thank God for His protection in all our travelling. Pascal has as much as me to do.)

I've been everywhere, man!!!

Tight schedule!

Our retreat ended after breakfast Saturday morning and I had to get up to Le Riou by lunchtime in order to join our Teens group. Our leaders had organised a combined youth group day up in snow country with 2 other churches of our Union.

Four hours it took me! When I was young and living in Australia, it was nothing!!

Thank God for the French motorways. Perhaps not very environmentally conscious, but they are great for getting you from A to B.

And it was worth it because instead of snow, we had the most glorious autumn day with a view right to the French Alpes. The 23 kids didn't get to ride on dog sleds, but they were hooked up to the dogs and learned to control them and especially how to run behind them!

Luc is learning to put the harness on himself, then on the dog. He had the leader of the pack, because we figured that being a rugbyman, he'd control the situation!

He did a lot of running!! But to be honest, he controlled the dog well.

Should we make the parallel between being yoked up to Jesus?

I couldn't help thinking about parenting being a little like this exercise!

But what I particularly believe in is mentoring, accompanying and discipling. And for that you walk with a person and are linked to them for part of your and their journey. You learn to work with them, how to anticipate their needs, how to transmit your understanding.

Or it's like letting the Holy Spirit lead you...

Sometimes you are waiting,

Sometimes you run.

What a view!

Overlooking Tain l'Hermitage (on the left of the river) and
Tournon (on the right). Great wine country!

This was my view as I left our eldest son at a friend's house on my way to the Women's Retreat. What a spectacular country, yet look at how everything is ordered.

What strikes an Aussie, is how controlled nature is in Europe and in France in particular. The French love to control their surroundings and if they have to cope with too many trees in their yard, they cut them down. And to keep it all clean they tile over their front garden. Where does the rain go? Flooding incidents are on the increase as roads and concrete and tiling create order!

Makes us realise how close we are to Adam and Eve! We want to control everything and to know everything. And by 'taming' our surroundings we are under the impression that we do control everything. We just forgot that God asked us to manage His Creation.

Then again, our population is growing so much and our level of materialism is so high now that we are asking an awful lot of this Creation.

How to find the happy medium ? How to respect what God has provided for us ?

Femmes 2000

Eliane, Edith and Arla blowing out the candles

Transitions ...

10 years ago, 2 women, Edith (French) and Eliane (Swiss), were inspired to start a French-speaking Christian Women's movement. They called it "Femmes 2000" - "Women 2000" as in the year 2000. They had been very impressed by the Women in Leadership congress during Hope for Europe.

Their vision was quickly taken up by a number of women particularly around the Paris Region and by Arla, a Belgian woman. They made up the first team which organised a big conference for women in leadership in 2001. It was a first in French terms. Not only was the conference ministering to women, it was drawing women from different church families, and they invited a couple of women from French-speaking Africa and from the Eastern European countries. 180 women were able to participate over 3 days (one of those women was me!!! and what a God-send that conference was for me at a time when I needed spiritual mothering and time out with God.) The 4th day was a big gathering catering for 2000 women! These ladies started out with a vision, a conviction, a heart to encourage Christian leaders and NO budget. And God provided!

This event was such an encouragement that other groups sprang up and organised half or full day events on a much smaller scale. And each time there have been many blessings. It's like a ripple effect...

Last week 30 of us met together at a special retreat to talk about leadership, to change over leadership and to celebrate our 10th anniversary.

 The 'old guard' prayed over 'the new guard':

Left to right: Anne, Anne (Vice-President), Cécile (Président), Chantal (Vice-President), Mama Leke, Véronique (others were  out of photo).

I am now part of the National Committee and am active (inspite of the distance) with the South-East regional group which meets at Montélimar.

My aim is to see women encouraged in the ministries God has called them to, for them to be a blessing to others and to help their church grow spiritually.

I particularly appreciate the fact that Femmes 2000 is building up a list of gifted women speakers from French-speaking countries. We are weaning ourselves off Anglo-Saxons!!

Of Gods and Men

Last night, at our local municipal hall which serves as a cinema every other week, Pascal and I watched the film : Of Gods and Men (or About men and gods) - Des hommes et des dieux. It tells the tale of 7 Trappist monks living in Tibhirine, Algeria, serving the local community in the 1990s. Islamic fundamentalist soldiers/terrorists were sowing terror all around, killing men, women and children and attacking foreigners. The monks decided to stay on inspite of recommendations to leave. Their community wanted them to stay; the leaders told them "You are like the branches of a tree. We are the birds. If you leave, where can we perch ?" We accompany these men of peace in their realisation that they will probably die, murdered by these soldiers. As they were in 1996- firstly taken as hostages, but when the French Government refused to release imprisonned terrorists, they were beheaded.

It's a very fine film, nuanced,  where so much is portrayed by close-ups of faces expressing emotions, debating, petitioning God, the journey of accepting one's inevitable violent death, the sense of intimate community and wider community, sense of responsibility and refusal to enter into a violent, non-Christian approach to one's aggressors, even a celebration of life and love over evil and death. It's a story of courage and selflessness, and of following Christ's example.

A beautiful, challenging film, full of the Gospel. And you know what was so great about last night ? The hall was full - around 100 people were there! It's the first time since we have been watching films there that we have seen so many people. My guess is that many came because they are nominally Catholic, interested in understanding Christian monastic faith, and in recognising different forms of expression of the Islamic faith. Everyone in France remembers this episode and the audience was probably searching for some explanation.

My question to our church is : did you realise so many people are interested in spirituality? Were you there last night and did you know anyone? Did you notice how Christian spirituality is faithfully portrayed in  this commercial film? How can we get a 100 people coming to our activities searching for answers?

It comes back to the emerging missional church discussion - people are not going to come to us - we have to meet them on their home ground and develop bridges between their culture and our faith.

Please pray for Pascal and I as we share this concept with our parishioners through our different activities and discussions. Pray that they will so want to share their understanding of God that they will accept to step out of  their own church culture in order to meet others.

To read more in French : http://www.algerie360.com/divertissement/les-7-moines-de-tibhirine-assassines-en-algerie-canonises-a-cannes/

http://www.lejourduseigneur.com/Emissions/Les-veilleurs-de-l-Atlas?gclid=CNfwibXGiaUCFVBc4wodmntgMw

In English : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_the_monks_of_Tibhirine

It's Autumn...

The background of my blog mirrors what we see from our windows. A natural living picture in every direction full of dark greens, orange, yellow, light green and some lovely burgundy red from vines. The Lord of Creation is giving us a wonderful eye-full.

In our attic we are stocking freshly picked chestnuts that some of our parishioners gave us, pumpkins from our own garden, big courgettes from our neighbour's garden and home-grown apples. Our appartment is in a big house that fed a family of 7 from its garden. We are privileged to be able to benefit from the past.

Can you guess what all those hooks were used for ? Answer in the next posting.

Having criticized St Tropez for its materialism (as for much of the Western world), I'm challenged to make the most of our resources here in Lamastre. Our parishioners all have vegie gardens! Can't conceive of a house without one. Not only do we gain good organic fruit & veg from their labours, they actually created a vegie patch for us last year! So we have a modest garden. It's a challenge to be grateful for what we have because I'm definitely NOT a natural gardener; Pascal only a little more than me. I prefer the kitchen part and over the years (because we had a similar situation in Béziers, our first pastoral position) have learned to do bottling, jams, chutneys and all sorts of meals. This is the fun side of living in France! All that emphasis on fine food!

The way to my missionary heart is through my stomach ???!!!

Time out!

Mid-term break in France around the All Saints' Day public holiday. 10 days off school!

The Girards went south - together for a whole 6 days (well, of course we didn't take the Sundays off! Too many commitments!! Before you write to us about BURNOUT - it's ok.)

Thank God for Christian brothers and sisters. One such couple has decided to rent out their little holiday home to Christian workers for whatever we can afford to pay. So we had a lovely sunny autumnal time at Collobrières, near Toulon.

 No TV! No computer connection! Lots of sleep, family games and READING! Yes, all 5 of us finished at least one book!!! Jokes, conversation, one meal out, eating yummy chestnut and cognac ice-cream (it's an area which produces chestnuts and has a processing plant there in the village).

The boys slept out in a tent - best solution against snoring and smelly socks!

We even visited Saint Tropez, playground of the rich and famous. Pretty village, but everyone was there to be seen and we weren't inspired by the materialistic climate there.

We didn't get a sun tan, but we returned refreshed and ready to attack Christmas preparations and winter. 

Thank you, Lord, for holidays!

Think before you speak!

Mid-October, Pascal and I attended a seminar organised by the Evangelisation Committee of our Church Union (Free Evangelical Church of France - Union des églises évangéliques libres de France).

 Here we are with Dietrich Schindler, the guest speaker, Head of the Church Planting Department of the German Free Church. The man on the right is another pastoral colleague. Pascal is on the left and Mr Schindler between us. 

I arrived at that meeting spouting off about "why do we always rely on having foreigners coming in to speak to us and to teach us ???" forgetting the irony of me being a foreigner!! I do get frustrated by the continuing reliance on outside help in our French churches. I've already been in the country for 20 years, and when I first arrived I felt it was time the French Church took responsibility for itself. 

Well - I should not have spoken so quickly, because Mr Schindler was a real inspiration and a blessing to us all. He has so much practical experience in church planting in Germany. He had tried and proven ideas, he had analysed situations, had empirical evidence, lots of good old common sense and some surprising advice! Like - don't accept all-comers to help with a new church plant - choose your team wisely. Some people are more of a hindrance inspite of their good will! This advice in a country where churches are so small that any volunteers are gladly accepted!

And -  listing the criteria of a church which should 'die'. Then suggesting that some of the leaders pray about it for 6 months before starting the church up again but with renewed objectives, a united team and WITHOUT half the people who made up the church before!! The scary thing is that at least a quarter of our Union's churches qualified for the 'dying' bit!!

To conclude in a more positive manner : our Rhône-Alpes regional pastors meeting followed the next week and we determined to set up training and information sessions for our Church Councils. There is a real need for clarifying the rôle of our Counsellors, especially if we are looking for church growth. We absolutely MUST put into place leadership training and mentoring. 

Look at your church life in Australia. A lot of your structures and programmes seem so obvious to you. Here in France, in our Union in any case, it's not at all common practice.

Please pray for our Region as we organise the training sessions, and pray for our Union that we can work on building leadership and unity of purpose.

POST SCRIPTUM: Can't resist mentioning that Mr Schindler is closely related to Schindler of Schindler's List fame. I'm impressed because the faithfulness and God-honouring behaviour of that family is being passed on down the generations and being a blessing so many people. It's the amazing way in which God's Kingdom grows inexorably through people like Mr. Schindler, and people like ... you and me! We are one with the Holy Spirit and, with God, all things are possible! We all have our part to play.

Looking back with pride

Last June the Femmes 2000 organisation I belong to, organised a seminar for Christian women of all denominations. The theme was : "The Christian Life : A Quietly Flowing River ???" (In French : "La vie chrétienne : un long fleuve tranquil ??").

I was on the welcoming team at the door. What a thrill to see over 500 women come through ! It was a wonderful expectant atmosphere and we had worked hard on the decoration and welcome, with various groups presenting their ministries adding to the overall effect.

My biggest thrill, however, was noting that there were women from each church Pascal and I had ministered in. It kind of represented our 15 years of pastoral ministry.

St Fons Church members (Lyon)

On left - Catherine from our Lamastre church

On left, Anne-Marie from Béziers

Francine (Left) from St Genis Laval

Claire from Ardèche (centre)

With 2 other organisers at the welcome desk

Tanya of our Lamastre church (right) with one of her friends. 

 The conference by Linda Oyer was excellent and we had very positive feedback from many women. She went through 5 stages in our Christian walk towards maturity, explaining how it was cyclical and how to recognise the different stages and to learn from them. May the "fall out" from this teaching continue to encourage women in their walk with the Lord and be a blessing to their local Christian community.

Home in France

Bonjour!

After a packed 59 days in Australia, we arrived home (late!) in time to sleep (what a relief to be finally horizontal!) and to prepare for the French school year. This means that all school and extra-curricular activities and church activities start up. So no time to reflect on the time in Oz ....

A big thank you to all who welcomed us and took care of us. That was such a blessing to us and was every bit as good as a holiday.

We have had some lovely sunny days here and trying to catch up on the summer we missed.

The ladies' Bible study group launched our new year with the theme "I and my house, we will serve the LORD" and with a couple of ways in which we want to serve the LORD this year. We are committed to praying for each other and see how God guides us in these wishes.

Why don't you pray with your friends about their desire to serve the LORD and pray for us as well !

God bless and keep you.

Lamastre, Ardèche, France

SIM Australia

This is me! In front of the beautiful landscape of Ardèche.
C'est moi devant le beau paysage de l'Ardèche!

Welcome

Bonjour!

I  love living in France and I love being a Christian so this blog is combining the two and sharing it with you. So welcome.

Je vous embrasse!