Another Surprise

The boys in brown.

Arianna giving hugs.



Sisters.



It is Satuday already.  The last few days have continued on the theme of surprises (see last blog).  Saturday when I took Lilia to swimming I  met an Irish family that had just moved to France.  I was able to help them with translating.  I then took the boys to basketball practice.   Caleb begged until I allowed him to stay.  He was suppose to be taking it easy since he fell on his knee on Tuesday.  Wednesday night basketball practice for me went good.   There have been a few new players this year. Thursday,  we had everything ready for the Bible study when. . . surprise!. . .the plumbing stopped up again.  We quickly cancelled the study.   I got the problem fixed a few minutes before the time our Bible Study would have started.  I changed real fast in case someone came which was good because we did have one person show up.  We just had a good visit.  Friday, the market went slow, I did give away one Bible in Arabic. Thursday we turned in our paperwork to renew our visa, and afterwards went to pick Lilia up. She did not come out however. The gate was closed and she never came. Angie had to go in and get her. Turns out that she had left her jacket inside and had to go back for it.  Friday Lilia had swimming again, she goes three times a week because she is in competition level this year.  Angie met the Irish family again and invited them over for lunch today.  Friday evening I had basketball practice and went out for a soda afterwards with some of my teamates.  I am considering inviting them over for the Thanksgiving meal that we have.  Our lunch with the Irish family went well.  They have five kids as well. Needless to say, our kids had a great time together! God bless, JASON

"Government Organization"

This is one of my favorite oxymorons.  This weeks has been spent mainly dealing with the government.  Tuesday morning we made our trip to Marseille, a pretty place by the way.  Everything went good, we had a little trouble finding the Embassy and it took a while to get throught security, but finally we handed off our paperwork and in a few months, Arianna will have an American birth certificate, social security number, and her passport.  We then decided to swing back by the immigration office in Montpellier because we never got the appointment for Angie and we can't reach them by phone.  (turns out they said they don't answer the phone while they are there - frustrating to say the least)  We had to act French a little.  They said that we should have already received the letter for the meeting and that since it was passed there was nothing they could do, Angie would have to return to the states. We were not going to take that as an answer.  We had to show signs of being real upset and explain that it was their fault, they didn't notive her paperwork in the folder with mine, they sayed they would mail the letter for a meeting for her.  We complained enought that they said we could see the boss.  After the boss arrived, they said they could do the medical visit and interview right away.  Sometimes you have to throw a fake fit (learned that from my dad :)  Angie started waiting for the interview and I had to buy the government stamps to pay.  They are usually sold in Tobaco stores.  The fifth store had some and so Arianna and I returned and we finally finished up there.  Thursday we had one couple come for the bible study, he had just got in from work so we just visited a few minutes, shared some prayer requests and dismissed.  Friday morning we prepared the paperwork for the next step in our visa process.  We took a pause to watch some dances that Micah's class put on.  Arianna had a doctors appointment as well, which is why I didn't go to the market.  Her doctors appointment ended up being cancelled.  We turned on the paperwork that afternoon, found out all that we were missing and will finish it up, hopefully, on Monday.  It is frustrating at times all the paperwork and getting all that they want and need, but that is part of life living in any foreign country.  Picture is of Andrew putting together a puzzle, feels liks what we have done this week.  God bless, JASON

Rain has come and gone.

The big news Sunday and Monday was the rain. We got about 6 inches in two days. This may not sound like much compared to some other countries, but that is the equivalent to 4 months worth here. Our driveway started washing away, but thankfully there was enough to still drive by. Monday was shopping day and paperwork. Tuesday was getting my lesson ready. Tuesday night Basketball practice went well. I acutally had a couple of mini-conversations with some of the guys. Wednesday, I took the kids to their swimming class, and finished working on my sermon. Thursday, I took our car to the dealership for its 40,000 km check-up. It had a few filters replaced and the oil changed. I left directly from there to go to Montpellier for my appointment with the French Office of Imigration and Integration (OFII). It took about 2 hours to get their and then 45 minutes to find the place. The streets were horrible. There was construction going on as they are expanding the Tram. Some streets were closed and some streets that were once one direction, were now the other direction. My GPS actually started to yell at one point. I finally parked and took off walking. It still was a 45 mintue walk. After asking 4 people for directions it ended up being right across from the train station. The appointment went well, I had x-rays taken, met with the doctor and then with the "Visa lady". I also found out about Angie's visa. Normally they schedule husband and wife together so I was thinking there was a problem. You cannot get in touch with them by phone or email so I had to wait til my appointment. Come to find out that Angie's paper was stuck to the back of mine and they did not notice it. Wow. They said they would hurry and try to get her an appointment in a couple of weeks. I met a couple of people there, an american couple with a young baby, and a newly married couple from Chili. I actually gave the Chiliean couple a ride home because they missed their train because of the strike. That is another subjet all together. President Sarkozy is trying to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62. This has made many people upset. College and high school kids are striking because there will be less jobs if people work two extra years. Others are striking because their work conditions are hard and they don't want to endure it for two more years. Transportation has been slow as there are a lot less trains running. All but one Total refinery has been closed (hoping that there are not any gas shortages). Anyways it is nice to have the visa paperwork done (at least for me). I made it back home 30 minutes before the Bible study. We took a break from the sermon on the mount to look at the healing of the man born blind. There were three present not including us. Today I need to get gas (done), look at a friends computer (done), work on getting a bill paid (done), blog (doing), make a trip to the dump, move some furniture, and not forget to get the kids. Basketball practice is tonight and tomorrow there is a conference at a church in Toulouse on Homiletics that I will be attending. Enjoy some rainy day pictures and God bless, JASON

 

World Missions Seminar

We have arrived in Arkansas for the World Missions Seminar. Last Sunday services went well. I spoke in two churches and was well received. We love sharing about what God has done for us. In the evening service the kids even sang a special in French. We have enjoyed staying with my grandparents and helping them out the last few weekends as well. I feel like I am making up for lost time. I have a question I would like to pose to the readers. I mentioned that we were needed some additional paperwork to receive our visa's. Some of the items needed would have cost a consideral amount of money. I was still in the process of gathering all this information when to our surprise our Visa's arrived in the mail. Now what should I do? Should I get the needed things and send them in, call and ask if we need to send anything in, or just not send anything and count this as a blessing? We have them in hand and so there will not be a problem getting into France. This is an interesting situation to say the least. Meanwhile, I am going to get ready for the services tonight, we have already enjoyed being with some missionary friends of ours as well as meeting some new missionary families. Attached picture is of the kids playing in the snow at my parents house, in Texas, what a surprise! We pray God's blessings on you all. JASON

The Consulate

Last week went well. We stayed busy with visiting family early on. Wednesday, Angie and I had Dentists appointments. Thursday we headed down to Houston. We stayed with our friends, and former missionary to France, now helping plant a church in Houston. We visited the consulate Friday morning. All in all, it was a good visit. It was a little tense having the kids there in the little room for two hours. We were missing some documentation that we will have to fax to them, but other than that, no big problems. We needed to have open ended airline tickets for each of us so that in case we do not get approved an extension in France we hasve proof that we can make it back to the states. It seems to be a hassle and a lot of money just to have sitting in airline tickets, but it's required. We paid $136 per visa (6 total). Saturday we visited some more friends. Sunday I shared in the Sunday morning services at a church in Brownwood, Texas. The Pastor and his family were our neighbors in Seminary and still remain close friends of ours. Monday I sent in all our tax information, hopefully that is done. This morning I visited my missions treasurer in the hospital as he is awaiting gall bladder surgery. There are two inches of snow on the ground outside. This has been a record year for snowfall in Texas, the most on record. We plan on heading to Henderson this weekend. I will be helping my father replace my grandparents hot water heater, as well as visiting some friends in sharing with two churches in Sunday. Attached pictures are one we took this past Sunday and one we took just before we left over two years ago. Thank you for the prayers on our behalf. God bless, JASON

The Bug

This past weekend Lilia and Andrew had a cold and now Angie seems to have caught it. As heard a lot in Texas, there is a "bug" going around. She felt pretty tired and congested all day yesterday and today. So I have been trying to run things, which means the kids are really praying that mom gets better faster. Angie's birthday is Saturday as well. Yesterday I took the kids on a little hike in the hills near our house to give Angie a little quiet time. Caleb enjoyed it. Micah enjoyed it. Lilia . . .not so much. I plan on stopping by the sous-prefecture tomorrow to see about our visa status. We would like to stay in France until June to give the kids a chance to finish the school year. Our visas, however, expire in February and since we are own student visas for this term, but not in school we hope they can extend them. At the office in Massy they said that this would not be a problem, let's hope they say the same thing here. We have learned a little about time differences in France. We ordered Lilia a desk two weeks ago and it said it would arrive the 20th. We went the 2oth to check on it and they said it would be two more weeks. We are still waiting for our internet stuff to come in as well. So a warning to all who are praying for patience, God may call you to France. Attached picture is one of my favorite recent picture of Lilia, she is holding another missionary kid, Samuel Taylor, while we were in Greece. Now I need to go and by some more Kleenex for Angie. God bless, JASON

Carte de Sejour.

That is the name for the visa you receive for an extended stay in France. We renewed our student visa today. It is good for another year. Thankfully we didn't have to go through the whole process again. We only had to wait about 35 minutes, which is not bad. We showed our paperwork and paid and received our new carte de sejour. It is amazing how busy they are. The Paris area has a lot of immigrants and foreign students. The kids went over to a friends house and played, which made the process a lot better for Angie and I. It only took about 45 minutes to get to the Sousprefecture - where government business like Carte de Sejours are done. A bus, a train, and a 10 minute walk. We are both looking forward to getting out of the city where life is a little slower. We have enjoyed our time here. We will find out tomorrow how we did on our tests. I have no idea how well I did. Like I tell the other students when they get worried about the grades, we paid so they won't kick us out if we fail, and what is more important is learning to speak French. The thought of being able to share my faith in French has helped me to persevere. God bless, JASON

Another week has passed.

It has been over a week since my last blog. My apologies. This week has been packed full it seems like. Saturday we got our Visa renewal paperwork filled out and sent off. Services went good last Sunday, we volunteered to keep the nursery, which we will be doing tomorrow. We have had a lot of homework this week from school, which has kept us busy in the evenings. Wednesday morning, I had a meeting with my teacher to look over my sermon for Friday, Angie went shopping, Lilia had a dentists appointment and I had a phone call with a member of Greater Europe Mission for over an hour, and all that was before noon. Afterwards I went to Paris and met Chad, his wife and two kids. He is a pastor who is going to Kenya to visit their Missionaries - the Taylors, who are good friends of ours. We had a good time in Paris and then headed to our place to eat. On the way here there was an announcement that there had been an accident at the train station nearest our house. We excited one stop earlier and walked. Come to found out someone had jumped in front of the coming train and committed suicide. We enjoyed a good meal and visit with them. Thursday night, I finished the last touches on my sermon and went to bed early. Friday we had some language school friends over for lunch. The sermon went well. This was the first sermon in French that Angie has heard me preach. It is the fourth one I have given at the language school but Angie has never been able to make it for various reasons. I will post the sermon soon. Friday night, several couples and individuals volunteered to watch all the kids so the parents could go out. The ended up watching 14 kids. Angie and I and another couple, took a train to Antony (next town up, about a mile up the road) and ate at a restaurant there and took the bus back. We had a good time and visit and really appreciate those who gave us this opportunity by watching our kids from 6 to 10. Brave. This morning I got our finances all straightened out for the month and got a door hung in the bathroom. Caleb lost one of his bottom teeth this morning as well. I am thankful because it had been annoying him. I will attache a picture that Chad drew of Lilia while he was here. It only took about 20 minutes and he did a good job. God bless, JASON

That's how it is.

I went this morning to get our driver's license exchanged. Thankfully a former student gave me a ride. It would have been a much longer trip. We got their early and didn't have to wait in line long. It went well, however I did not leave with a French license. They explained that the date of the Driver's license must be before the date of the Visa. So I must wait until we get a new visa (it expires Feb. 11). At least that is the idea now. You do not realize how easy you have it in the US until you move to a foreign country. The official Internet site gave no such information and no phone number to call to ask. I did find out that students can drive in the country while they are in school with their US driver's license. So we try again in a couple of months.
Micah is still coughing so Angie missed school all week. She was able to keep up with her homework and so there is not a lot of catch up work to do. Tonight a friend offered us a coupon for a free meal and free babysitting, so Angie and I are going to go out on a date. Finish off with a Micah quote. Yesterday morning, Micah's first words were, "Is it today?" God bless, JASON

School break.

Angie went to a concert Thursday night with some of the teachers and students from school, She had a wonderful time.

School has finished for the rest of this year. Angie beat me by several points again, but I am used to it. We said "goodbye" to several students that will not be returning the new year. Our prayers go out to them and their various mission points and ventures. We have reached level B1. I will have to find the paper that describes exactly what that means.

At three this afternoon, I meet with man who is the works closely with many Christians organizations in France. I found out from talking with him which organization would line up with our goals and beliefs so that I can pursue getting our invitation for a residence visa through them.

As Angie and I where on the way to school to pick up the kids we were passing a building where there are usually several mentally handicapped people. Angie had crossed this way before when a girl had asked to go home with her and when Angie said "no thanks". The young lady burst into crying and tears. I have seen the girl several times always crying, loudly. Today as we were just about to walk by, Angie saw this same girl approaching. She mentioned for us to cross to the other side of the street but it was too late. Suddenly this voice shouts out next to me in French (loud enough to make me jump), "I must go home!" She repeated this several times when her attention was draw away by another person we crossed the street. After giving this person the same demanding statement she started crying and continued down the road. Then I hear her say, "Monsieur, Madame?" And I see her crossing the street and she makes the same statement to us again. I was just going to say "No", when Angie spoke in her sweet voice, "Be careful walking in the road, are you ready for Christmas?". The lady made a few brief remarks that I couldn't make out and then crossed back to her side of the street. And she started singing her phrase, "I must go home." over and over again, in a completely happy and content voice. What a change can be made by just a few kind words.

I was blessed yesterday with two occasions to help others, one elderly women to climb some stairs and another lady move her trashcan off the street. I feel really good when I have the opportunity to help others. The elderly women's entire countenance changed and she was happily talking to us and telling how nice it was of me (I did have all the kids with me, they probably were the reason for the nice comments).

Attached is a picture of Caleb on his birthday, Wednesday, with the cake he picked out for himself. God bless, JASON

A sigh of relief.

We breathe a sigh of relief now. We finished our first semester finals today. Glad that it is over. After Friday we get off for two weeks. Tommorrow we have an appointment to have our visa's looked over (carte de sejour). They claim that we left some paperwork out. Angie and I found a couple of babysitters and will travel to the suburb south of us tommorrow. Pray that it all goes well. There are some students that moved here in August that have still not received their carte de sejour and they are leaving in June. That is the way with the French government they seem to take their time with things. It is okay with me. I just walked Lilia and her friend back to her friends house. They took turns saying different French words the whole way. They have an extensive vocabulary and they both have the accent "parfait". It will take a long time for me to acquire I imagine. Above are a couple of pictures of our kids getting caught. Lilia's trash can full of candy wrappers, and we were wondering how all the candy was disappearing. And Andrew getting into Momma's purse at a friends house. God bless, JASON