Something different.

Today was different than expected. I woke up with a fever, sore throat, and headache. There was a "greve" (strike) of the teachers at Micah's school so Angie had planned to stay home with Micah and another child whose parents go to the language school. We had to make some changes. I do not like to miss school, never had. But I am sure all the others in the class are glad that I am not there getting them sick. I was scheduled to lead the music during chapel today, but had to pass that off as well. I have an idea as to why I am sick. I prayed last night for God to make it to where I could have more time with him. And here I am! A whole day off. I have enjoyed some study time today.

Yesterday Angie and Lilia went into Paris on a guided tour of several sites. They learned a lot of interesting stuff and had a good day. They spent one hour just standing and looking at the outside of Notre Dame. Every statue and item has a significance. Attached is a picture representing the final judgement. See if you can catch what everything means. Back at home, I took the boys to the language school and let them play in the yard for a while and had a good daddy/son time. God bless, JASON

Beautiful Day

The weather was beautiful today. It got up to about 60 and there was sunshine. Reminded me of winters in Texas. The weekend went real well. We had some good play time with the kids on Saturday and good services Sunday morning. The preacher spoke about the qualifications of a pastor and he did a great job, in my opinion. The church here in Massy is voting soon on a new pastor soon. I missed the services at our church. Usually they are done by Skype, but this time the sound system guy who usually sets it up was absent, so I was going to listen on the Radio online, but the Skype call serves as a reminder that time is near and so I didn't notice until it was too late. School started well this morning. It is interesting to see how everyone kind of drags on Mondays. This afternoon we had Biblical French. We are doing forming lessons at that is going well. It happened again that we found a doctrinal disagreement with our teacher, but that happens. I have been talking with another student who purchased a car recently about the process. In a month or so, we will, Lord willing, do the same. Right now, I am going to go make my favorite meal for the family - hot dogs. Attached is a picture of Lilia "wowed" at the hat museum outside of Limoux. God bless, JASON

Two Fridays a week.

Wednesday has arrived, which means no school and a chance to catch up on all other things. We were talking with other students after school finished Tuesday about how it feels like we have two Fridays a week. Lilia is doing fine. She showed no more symptoms or signs of having any troubles. Last night we had a babysitter and Angie and I went to Paris. We planned on visiting the Bible book store, but found out it was closed when we got there. We did some window shopping which was fun. We ate at McDonalds (which was great!) and did a little shopping at Cora. Today we get homework finished up for us and the kids and housework. I would like to get a summary done of a study of Job I did recently. I will include below a poem that we were assigned to write in class on the subject of "Le Chant des Villes". I thought of our small town of Henderson and Limoux as I was writing it. God bless, JASON

Comment ça va, le chant des villes?
Est-ce que c'est doux comme la musique classique?
Ou plus chaotique que la musique électronique?
Chaque ville a-t-elle une unique pièce musicale?
Comment on trouve la partition locale?
Est-ce qu'on demande aux habitants?
Ou est-ce qu'il faut qu'on y vive depuis longtemps?
C'est le lieu qui est le concertiste?
Ou plutôt les gens qui jouent le rôle-titre?
Qui choisit les instruments?
Qui fournit cette ambiance?
Pourrait-elle être changée?
Dès-que les notes ont été créées?

Mondays.

I spoke yesterday to one of our supporting churches before their morning worship. Pretty amazing technology now a days. We finished our homework last night, that's always a good accomplishment. After school we got a call that Lilia hit heads with another kid while playing tag, and after getting back in was complaining about not seeing some letters when she was reading. We picked her up and took her to a language school student who is a Pediatrician. He said she might have a mild concussion. She was a little nauseous and lethargic. She came home and rested and then got up and started playing. Mark (the pediatrician) came by and checked on her again a couple of hours later and she seemed to doing fine. He told us to wake her up a couple of times tonight and make sure she was okay. In other news, we have two tests this week, but we have a friend babysitting for us tomorrow, Angie and I are going to make a trip to the little Bible book store in Paris. I have never been and look forward to picking up a few things and mainly looking around. Angie and I have always enjoyed music and worship, I will attach a video that we have enjoyed several times the last few months (just as i am - David Phelps). Thanks for the prayers and God bless, JASON

Rapide (french spelling).

This week has passed rapidly. We are excited about our move to Limoux. There are many things that we need to do to prepare. We have to get language school finished of course. We will need to purchase a car, find a home in Limoux, and get it furnished. School passed well. We have more homework than usual but we have already got a start on getting it done. We have enjoyed spending time with the other language school students. Friday night we spent the day with a family who has 5 kids. Us dads took the kids to the park while the moms prepared the meal. While there I got into conversation with a Muslim lady that was playing with her daughter. After a little small talk she asked, "Are all these kids ya'lls?" I made a video of Caleb. He was telling a story of when he was in school last year. He said one of the other students was reading a book to Caleb. They came across the word "cheval" which means horse, but they told Caleb it was a cow. Caleb tried to tell them it was a "horsy" but they kept saying "cow". It is cute hearing Caleb say "Cow" with a French accent. Enjoy and God bless, JASON

Back to work.

The weekend finished well again. It is nice to be able to understand the services here. Those first few months are difficult for new students (like we were). It is weird to go to church and not understand what is being said. Like some friends of ours said this weekend. "It is work just to go to church and listen". We started school again today. We have moved to another classroom. It is the classroom that we started in and we like it because there are large windows that allow a lot of sun in. We have started new books and in 9 weeks we will be finished with them, so we seem to be moving along quickly. I will attach some pictures of the kids that we made while in Limoux. They are such a blessing. Though I must admit, sometimes I have prayed for God to give me strength to survive my blessing :) God bless, JASON

Limoux.

We had a great trip to Limoux. We picked up the rental car (an Opel Zafira - 7 passenger) Friday evening. We took the chance to take a couple of language school mothers shopping. Almost all the language school students do not own a car so when one of us have one everyone likes to be able to pick up some stuff from the store that you don't want to have to haul back. We left Saturday morning for Limoux. It only took us about nine hours to make the drive. Andrew got car sick twice (his expressions is - "I'm hot"). Other than that the trip went real well. The car got excellent gas mileage, it was diesel and cruising at 75 MPH (130 km /h) it got 42 miles to the gallon (5.5 liters per 100 km). The rental house was wonderful. About 5 km outside of Limoux, it had a nice yard with a creek running behind it, it was spacious inside with 4 bedrooms and a fireplace. Sunday we went to church in Carcassonne (about 25 km away) at the Èglise Évangélique Baptiste. We gave a ride to one of the members who lived in Limoux. The services went well and we had a meal afterwards. Lilia was excited because there were two girls there about her age. The meal was excellent, we ate salad, soup, rice, quiche, bread, cheese, dessert. The conversation was excellent and very informative. We made it home and rested the rest of the evening. Monday we went back to Carcassonne to get some more minutes for our cell phone, but they were closed. We stopped by McDonald's and got the kids lunch and checked the e-mail. Back in Limoux we went to the office of tourism and got a lot of good information. Tuesday we went shopping and checked out prices and picked up some things. The prices are significantly lower than in Paris and they have a good foreign foods section which sells Dr. Pepper among other things. Tuesday afternoon I visited with another pastor from Carcassonne and one of his members from Limoux. Keep in mind all of these conversations were in French, good practice but exhausting. Wednesday, Angie went out with the young lady we picked up for Church. They had a good visit and afterwards Angie stopped by a couple of Realtors and found out among other things that the rent is about half of what we are paying in Paris. While Angie was gone I was playing outside with the kids enjoying the southern France weather, when a couple stopped by, Jehovah Witnesses, what are the odds. I visited with them for about 20 minutes and learned some good information. Wednesday night we had a couple that we met last July over for Supper. They are a really nice couple, retired from Belgium. We had a really good visit with them, we picked up some new words for sure. Thursday, we took the kids to see a dinosaur and hat museum. We had a really good time, the kids loved all the dinosaurs. Some of the dinosaur bones came from Texas. That afternoon we visited with the young lady and her roommate at our home. They are musicians and we had a good visit and stressed the need for more workers in Limoux. Talking from the other pastors, I learned that they work several small villages in the area during the week as well. One pastor had a Bible study in a different village every day of the week, all started by word of mouth. Angie and I both fell sure that this is were God wants us to work. We came back Friday without problems other then Caleb who was car sick (his key word "my mouth hurts"). Thanks for the prayers for us during this trip. Enjoy the pictures (1- our car, 2- T-rex, 3-giant scorpion, 4-the road into Limoux), I will post more in the Future. God Bless, JASON