Living on rue Yves Guyader

The part of the estate we live on is quite recent, about 5 years old. The street is quiet, with little traffic. There are a lot of families, with young children from our children’s age to 12-13, and a few teenagers. The children often cycle around together, the older include the younger quite easily in their group. They’ve accepted Jean-Baptiste quite quickly, some of them practicing their English with him. We wonder sometimes if he is not too young, but we keep an eye on what is going on, and they usually hang around in front of our house, or on a nearby car park, which mean we can easily see them.

As I am writing, our children and a few others are making the most of the dry weather to play football on the street in front of the house. We pray that somehow we will have the opportunity to witness to these kids and their families. The house is ideally situated since they often gather right in front of it.

Overall, the street is quiet. people work long hours, and keep to themselves. But they are getting used to see us around.

Classical TV series

The advantage with digital television is that you get to see some classical television series. When I was growing up, I was quite a fan of tv series like the A-team (l’agence tout risque), Macgyver… These two are everyday on one of the television channels so we’ve been having some great time watching them.

I also used to like Magnum, but no haven’t seen it yet. The best of all was the Avengers, a British TV series in Black and white.

Our Irish visitors

Today, two Irish missionaries came to visit us. Malcom has been working in Nantes for over 20 years. We met a few years ago in the “colloque biblique”, a French speaking ministers conference. Andrew is still training in Belfast and, God willing, will join Malcom in a year. It was good to catch up, and to discuss about our various situations, and the situation of the church in France. We were joined for coffee by Emmanuel Hartiel who had met Malcom 24 years ago (or maybe more) when Malcom was learning French in Massy, and Emmanuel working in the Language school there.

Thoughts on preaching

Reading through Stuart Olyott’s book: “Preaching pure and simple” (Bryntition Press), I came accross this quote: “Just as preaching is the chief means by which sinners are convinced of gospel truth and are converted, in the same way it is God’s chief way of building up his people in holiness, of comforting them, and of keeping them believing until the end of their lives. No Christian can grow as he should without listening to lots of preaching. It is an impossibility.”

In France, people get one sermon on the Sunday, and if they go to the Bible study in the week, they will have a bit more input. That’s if they make it to the meetings.

Talking with my fellow MPEF missionaries in Bordeaux recently, we agreed that French Christians get very little preaching in the week. The challenge for us is: How can they grow in holiness and knowledge of our Lord then? Thank you for your prayers.