le Tour de France of the Bible

Another sponsor who threw out packs of sausages to the crowd.

Part of the caravane of sponsors.

The official starting point (man in center with white hat
spoke with me for a while about what we were doing).

Here I am wearing the banner.

The crowd waiting for the racers to exit their buses.

Their personalized car.

This weekend we enjoyed the tour de France.  We hosted a group called "le Tour de France de la Bible" that goes to the starting and finishing points of each stage of the tour de France and does outreach usually in participation with a local church. Limoux was selected this year as the starting point for the 15th stage of the race. There were activities all weekend long. We prepared as a family by putting personalized labels on all the tracts, Bibles, magazines, cds and everthing else that we were handing out.  The group arrived Saturday evening and we had supper together. One couple stayed with us, while the three others stayed with our friends down the hill.  We enjoyed a good time of fellowship.  The couple left early in the morning to work at Montpellier, the finishing point.  We started out at 9 in the morning and arrived at 9:30 at Limoux were we started handing out tracts.  I volunteered to wear the banner, which attracted a lot of attention.  It was not as easy as you would expect, with wind gusts, and obstacles overhead.  Several people, thinking that we were part of the Tour would even came and ask us questions about the race.  We mingled in the crowd and looked at some of the activities. Lilia, who went with some friends ended up being on Television, you can see it by clicking here.  She is 15'16" into the video on the far right with a pom-pom.  We did pause and enjoy the caravane (a parade of sponsor vehicules that are decorated and give away free stuff ) that was a little bigger this year than last year.  Afterwards we walked some more and made a tour around the charter buses and even saw a few races preparing.  They had expected a crowd of 50,000 but I dont think that many came.  We did distribute 2,000 tracts, and several Bibles, cds, magazines, and balloons.  There was one member of the church in Carcassonne who was coming to help, he ended up not making it in time because of road closures. He did make it in time for lunch afterwards.  The cyclists departed at 12:50 and soon afterwards we walked back to the car.  We enjoyed a lunch together at our house and then I ran them to the train station in Carcassonne.  I think it went real well.  God bless, JASON

The team that helped us, from Congo, Holland, & France.

The family, preparing the tracts.

End of the month alarm.

Me, holding Arianna

Once again the end of the month has snuck up on me.  I need an end of the month alarm.  Monday I helped Angie out around the house.  She didn't get much sleep the night before so I cleaned around the house and kept watch over Arianna between feedings.  Angie took a good nap in the morning and one in the afternoon.  Thankfully Arianna slept a little better the following nights.  I was also able to finish my project for Angie's birthday, a DVD compilation of all the videos that we have of the kids.  Tuesday, I got all our finances worked out.  It really has been nice getting paid once a month.  At all my previous jobs I was paid every week or every two weeks.  Getting paid monthly helps out because most of the bills you pay come out monthly and it makes it easier to set a budget.  I would reccommend it, if you have the option.  I was also able to get some shopping done, while Angie visited with a friend from Magrie.  Wednesday morning, I took Lilia and Micah to their swimming class, while Angie met with a nurse that came by the house for a one month check-up.  Arianna is doing good and has gained over two pounds.  Tuesday evening, I went to my first basketball practice.  It went well, I actually remembered how to shoot the ball and made the majority of my shots.  I hope that I can continue to build relationships with the other guys.  They all seemed nice and outgoing. I was sore the next day, but I made it through without appearing too exhausted.  Wednesday afternoon, Angie and Arianna went to visit with a friend in Carcassonne.  The kids and I moved a water tank from the neighbors house over to ours.  This 1000 liter tank catches rain water off the roof and will help the water bill, and keep the yard and garden looking greener.  I had a good time teaching the kids how to move heavy items, it was a good hands-on physics lesson.  Today, I need to call the office of Imigration and found out if they received our paper work.  I sent it to them by registered letter, meaning I was supposed to receive a letter back from the post saying that it had been delivered.  I never received it.  I am now in the process of complaining to the post office about it.  I just sent out the written complaint to their service department.  I emailed the immigration office Friday and have not got a response back, so I will call today.  I really would rather not talk on the phone, but I have no other option.  This is the beginning step to getting out carte de sejour (visa) and it needs to get started soon.  I also need to look into what is needed to get Arianna's passport.  This afternoon I will go pick up what is needed for our booth for the market tomorrow.  I hope that the weather will be nice and that we will be able to make some good contacts.  Also pray for us this weekend.  There is a big art festival in Magrie.  We hope to make several trips to it and meet some more of the people in the town.  In Church Growth class at Seminary they told us that you need to touch people an average of seven times to be effective.  Hopefully this will make the third time to meet some people in the town that we have run into before and met doing door to door work.  Angie is going to call a homeschooling family in the town and invite them over as well.  God bless, JASON 

Outreach, Shopping, Hiking, & the Accident

Thursday I went to help out the church in Carcassonne with outreach. They had a door to door outreach in the morning. We paired up and went into the North African section of town and visited several apartment buildings. Things went well, we used as an opener and Bible Exposition that is being held at the church in Carcassonne during the week. Many were not home, several were clearly not interested, some did not speak French, some took some tracts and literature, some seemed real interested. Thursday afternoon I worked on finances. Our church has decided to help pay off the rest of our language school expenses and so I was working on getting the money into the account. It ended up not working out. Thursday night I went back to Carcassonne to an open air preaching they were having at the entrance to the walled city, a very popular tourist attraction year around. It was neat to watch the reaction of everyone to the preaching and singing. Many whispers about us being a kind of sect, most ignored us, some looked for a little bit, a few paid attention and stayed, some even talked with us (some foreigners).
Friday, I took Caleb for a father/son hike. We had a great time, we hiked up to the top of the hill behind our house. It was a difficult course considering our house is at 800 ft and the hill tops out at 1300 ft but he had no problems. He really enjoyed spending the time with daddy. Near the top he asked the ultimate question. “Dad, what happens to me if you die up here?” Friday afternoon we went to IKEA and got a few more things for the house.
Saturday – I cleaned up a lot in the yard today. Angie went and got the kids some school clothes. The exciting even happened while we were preparing for supper. Lilia walked into the living room with her cup of water. Suddenly she walks back in the saddest crying voice says, “I'm so dead.” I walked around to see that she had spilled water onto my laptop. I got it dryed up as best as I could while Lilia went to her room crying. Angie said, “I'll get my hairdryer to dry it out.” I held the laptop while she ran the hair dryer. Suddenly I smelt something burning, sure enough she had melted a half dozen of the keys to the keyboard. Evidently I am typing this on the keyboard so everything worked okay. I trimmed the melted edges off the keys and everything seems to be running fine. Keyboard just looks a little different. I had to assure Lilia that everything was okay and I was not mad before she would finally calm down. I will probably order a new keyboard just to be safe because the “ctrl” key is getting stuck even though it is not being pushed.
Services went good on Sunday. We enjoyed a visiting speaker who had been a missionary in France for 50 years. In the afternoon he gave a conference on Jean (John) Calvin that was very informative. We met a couple at the Church in Carcassonne this morning who had just moved to Magrie, the same town that we live in. Amazing. God bless, JASON