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.

Bugarach

We saw this pretty view at the
horse show last week.

Another week behind us.  This was the kids last week of school.  It ended well.  Micah ended with all A's on his report card.  Caleb had more of an average grade.  Andrew had a lot of compliments from his teacher as did Lilia.  We are looking forward to a good summer.  Bible Study went well Thursday evening, we are still in the first chapter of John.  Several people stopped by the market on Friday morning, I did give away one Bible after assuring the person several times that it was free.  Recently in the news there has been a lot of talk about a cult that has moved its way into the area.  The are a New Age group believing that the world will end in 2012 and that a local peak (Bugarach) will be a place of safety.  You can read the wikipedia article by clicking here.  I hope that this will not affect our credibilty any.  The French organization for cults has already issued a proclamation warning people about his groups and will attempt to limit their growth.  They are worried about the posibilty for mass suicides and also swindling. Hopefully we have already distinguished ourselves in the area well enough.  We rearranged the house a little this month.  My office is now in our bedroom to give me a quiet place to work during summer.  As a result Arianna found a new place to play (pictured).  Last night I attended a meeting for our basketball association.  They are planning on growing next year and expanding into other cities as well.  It was a good occasion to meet some new people and to get to know my team members better.  Arianna surprised us by sleeping all night a couple of nights ago.  She made up for it the next night by waking up four times. We have a little pool for her in the backyard and she enjoys playing in it and watching the boys splash in their pool.  I received a call from the director for the Tour de France de la Bible.  I am excited about this opportunity.  God bless, JASON

Let's go fly a kite

The problem with not blogging for a few days is that when you do get the chance to blog you have a lot to say. My language session was good and we discussed misconceptions about the United States. He thought that there were Tornados and floods everywhere and violence on every street. It was good to get some of those cleared up. The bible study went well Thursday night. Only one came but we had a good lesson and good discussiong afterwards. Friday we did shopping, we had some guests over that evening, and Pastor and his wife from Scotland to fill in for the pastor in Carcassonne during his vacation. We had a really good visit with them. Saturday was a beautiful day. The high temperature was only 78 degrees. There was also a nice breeze blowing. Angie and Lilia went shopping. I stayed and worked on watering the plants and cleaning up around the yard and house. After lunch we went and flew a kite. It was a lot of fun. The wind was perfect and the kids caught on quick about how the keep it in the air and even manipulate it. Sunday we enjoyed the services at Carcassonne and stayed talking afterwards for a while. I was glad that we were able to catch the services at our sending church Sunday evening. We had missed the last couple of weeks. After the services were finished and we were finishing supper Andrew fell asleep at the dinner table (pictured). Monday we left the house at 7:30 and met soem friends to go watch the tour de France. We found a nice spot on at a corner were we could see them coming from a long way off. We really enjoy the Caravan, a line of supporters and sponsors of the race that follow the trail a couple of hours before the racers. They hand out a lot of free merchandise, including hats, candy, sausage, water, newspapers, laundry detergent, key rings, etc. Afterwards we stayed at our friends house and let the kids swim and have supper together. We got back home around midnight. Today I am working on the bible study lesson, finishing up a brochure for handing out about our bible study, and I hope to stop by the prefecture this evening to see about our visa paperwork. God bless, JASON