Laughter.

Saturday we had a good visit from a church member in Carcassonne. He looked at some plumbing issues we had and we talked for a while afterwards while his two daughters played with our kids. Sunday services went well. Monday I finished my monthly report. Tuesday was mostly dealing with finances. I received an e-mail stating that our old internet provider has not received the equipment that we were supposed to (and did) send back after our cancellation with them. I called to try to get the situation worked out before they charge us. After wading through the option I was told it would be a ten minute wait. After about 5 minutes and automated message came on and said that in fact the call volume was too long so I would need to call back later. No problem.

We have been having a lot of laughter recently. A lot of it is due to our sudden inability to speak proper english. During supper last night, I was instructing Caleb, that we should not ask for "dirt" before the meal is finished. Lilia said she could write with her "gauche" hand. Andrew mentioned that he was Lightning McQueen, to which Micah replied, "Well I'm a queen." It all made for a lot of laughs. It has been like that at supper time for about a week now. A couple of nights ago, one of the kids was talking in their sleep in French. Andrew walked in the kitchen one day while Angie was cutting up a red bell pepper and said loudly, "Bob!". Veggietales fans will understand that one.

Angie is not feeling well, a little achy and fever, but so far I do not think it is the "Grippe A". The weather has been cold, windy, and rainy for the last few days, so maybe she is just "under the weather". Tomorrow will be mainly the kids swimming class and in the evening, we will have Yelena over for supper and maybe even some singing. It is hard to believe that December is already here. The attached picture is one we took of Andrew at a church we visited while raising support. He had fallen asleed in his high chair. They are still so cute, especially when they are sleeping. God bless, JASON

Thanksgiving in France.

Our Thanksgiving meal went good. It was definitely unique. I can't remember ever working so hard to prepare for a Thanksgiving and I know that I have never had an order of services written before. Our British friends from Carcassonne came early to help out. Everyone else arrived between 10 to 30 minutes late, which is the French custom. I started out with the history of Thanksgiving. I said, "Thanksgiving; ça veut dire « l'action de grâce » historiquement est un jour de fête chrétienne durant lequel on remerciait Dieu par des prières et des réjouissances pour les bonheurs que l’on avait pu recevoir pendant l’année avec nos familles. Notre famille ne peuvent pas venir, donc pour ce soir, vous êtes notre famille. En 1620, 120 de pèlerins Puritains britanniques ont quitté l'Angleterre à cause de la persécution, ils sont arrivés septembre 1620 à la Baie de Plymouth au Massachusetts. Ils y fondent la Colonie de Plymouth et la ville homonyme. Mais les débuts de la colonisation furent difficiles et la moitié des arrivants périrent. Ces derniers ne durent leur salut qu'à l'intervention des amérindiens en particulière un autochtone nommé Squanto qui avec l'aide de sa tribu, offrit aux anglais de la nourriture; il leur montrât des nouvelles plats comme le pop-corn, puis leur apprirent à pêcher, chasser des animaux comme les dinde sauvage, et cultiver du maïs.
Afin de célébrer la première récolte, à l’automne 1621, le gouverneur décréta trois jours d'action de grâce. Les colons invitèrent alors le chef de la tribu et ses hommes à venir partager leur repas, en guise de remerciement pour l'aide apportée. Durant ce festin, des dindes sauvages furent offerts. Y compris les 47 pèlerins dont 4 femme et 90 amérindiens. En 1941 la fête est devenu officiel par le gouvernement; les administrations et la plupart des entreprises étant fermées ce jour-là. Cela reste un temps pour . . . manger avec la famille, remercier Dieu, donner nourriture aux sans abri, regarder des grands matchs du football américain, voyager, commencement de Noël. . . cette célébration est désormais plutôt laïque en Amérique du Nord." Our kids acted out the parts. Lilia and Caleb where the pilgrims, Micah was the indian and Andrew was the Turkey. When the indian meet the Pilgrims, they shook hands and "fait la bise", kiss on each check. The kids came up with that on their own. When Andrew came in as a turkey, everyone "aweeed" and he got a little shy. He was supposed to run out when I mentioned that they ate the turkey but he was clinging to mom instead. Afterwards Angie introduced the dishes, which was a chore in itself. Dressing = la farce, which also means a practical joke, cranberry sauce = la sauce de canneberge, sweet potatoes = patates douce, buttermilk pie = a pie made from buttermilk (doesn't sound very good once you think about it), pumpkin pie = tarte à la citrouille (pie made from an orange vegetable?). We went around and everyone gave something that they were thankful for, and then I led in prayer. The food was well received and we had many good remarks. Converstation was good. I announced as well our Bible study starting The kids were well behaved. Ending up having 20 people including our family. The party broke up around 10:30. Today we are recovering and resting and eating leftovers. A friend from the church in Carcassonne is coming over to look at some plumbing issues this afternoon. Afterwards I was considering taking the kids to a Rugby match in Limoux. The first picture was Andrew helping to make the dressing, others were taking during the evening. We pray your Thanksgiving were all a wonderful and that you took time to give thanks to God. JASON

A forkful of medicine.

The last few days have been mainly spent preparing for Thanksgiving. Angie has decided that she needs to prepare all the dishes in advance, just to make sure that they are good. We found a turke, or rather pieces of a Turkey. The butcher said that a whole turkey would not be available until the 10th of December, so we took the pieces. We have received several replies of people that will be coming. I have attached a picture of what the invitations looked like. There was a map on the reverse side. We plan on borrowing a table from the church in Carcassonne and have already borrowed some chairs from friends. We had a couple of visitors over yesterday. Angie's friend from Carcassonne came over in the morning and in the afternoon we had a visit from the pastor in Carcassonne. Today I will finish preparing my lesson for the prayer meeting in Carcassonne tomorrow. I will also get my thoughts arranged for the Thanksgiving explanation on Friday night. We plan to have the kids act the story as I narrate. It should be fun.

I have not included any sayings recently from Micah. Don't think that he has stopped coming out with all there intersting remarks. He has been waking up in the middle of the nights to go to the bathroom. He always does some funny things in his sleepy state. Once he walked in to the living room and glanced at the TV where Angie and I were watching a cartoon. He then remarked, "This is not a mommy and daddy movie." Yesterday morning as I was giving him a spoonfull of his cold medicine, he said, "Why don't you give me my medicine with a fork?" Yesterday evening we were able to get on Skype and let them talk to their cousins, which was interesting. Conversation seemed to center on movies, guns, dinosaurs, school, and football. Well I am about to head out to get the kids ready for their swimming class. I am praying that this class will permit us to get to know people in the community. Pray with us that we can use this as an outreach. God bless, JASON

Turkey?

Thursday and Friday, I got the invitations finished, and also finished all my research on Thanksgiving. All that is left is to write it out in. My former language school teacher gave me the idea to use the kids in a kind of play. I think that is a good idea and will see if we can get them to act out the Thanksgiving story. The only snag we may run into is the Turkey. Turkey here is not widely eaten until Christmas, we may not be able to find one for Thanksgiving. We will try though.
I am getting excited as the day approaches for us to start a Bible Study. I am also humbled, realizing what a great job I have to do for God. Summed up the job is to make disciples. Followers of Christ. It involves teaching, modeling, encouraging, leading, praying, enpowering, etc. . . To make disciples, is such a great privelege and responsibility. I pray that God gives me the strength and wisdom to do things His way and I pray that He will get glory and honor from it. Of course thinking back, every one who is a Christian, should be about that same purpose - making disciples. It is a position I should have held since my "rebirth", since I was born into His family. I have failed in regards to that for many years. If I had been making disciples since my salvation as I should, I would already have over 25 solid years of experience. Now I must just strive to be a better disciple maker in the future. Please pray for the future of our work here, that we will have disciples made who will then make disciples themselves. God bless, JASON

Thanksgiving preparation.

I have never started preparing for Thanksgiving this early before. Angie has gone shopping to make sure that we can find everything we will need. I have done some research on the history of Thanksgiving and started working on the invitations that we will mail out. Bible study went well last night and we had a lot of good discussion. We are studying the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith. It is interesting the see the ideas that have remained the same and those that have changed over the years. Lilia and Caleb were excited to have swimming again this morning. The few days will be busy with getting all the preparations underway for our meal. It will take place Friday evening, the 27th. Please be in prayer for this event.

This day is also the 10th anniversary of the Texas A&M University bonfire collapse. The annual event had been a tradition for 90 years. In the early morning hours of Nov. 18th the 40 ft (12m) structure collapsed killing 12 students and injuring 27 others who were working on the structure. One of the victims, Jamie Hand, was Angie's friend in high school and they had played on the softball team together for years. Our prayers go out to the families of the victims on this day. Pictured is the bonfire event from 1993. God bless, JASON

From flowers to hair.

The weekend went well. Friday morning at the large market in Limoux, I picked up Angie some flowers (pictured) to go in a new vase that she had bought. The market in Limoux is very well attended and there are at least a hundred venders selling all kinds of things from food to clothes. Friday night family night went good, attached is a picture of the kids settling in for a movie. Saturday Andrew did not have any fever. It is nice to have him somewhat back to normal. Sunday services went good at Carcassonne, they were some visitors. Sunday afternoon, Angie planned on cutting the boys hair. After Andrew she proclaimed that she would not be cutting the boys hair anymore and that we would take them to a professional. Son Andrew ended up being the only one getting his cut (pictured) We have been having wonderful weather this weekend and today. We had planned to have visitors over tomorrow. A couple that we met when we first came to Limoux we invited over but they had to cancel because a family member of theirs is gravely ill and they are staying home awaiting a phone call. This morning besides doing a little grocery shopping, mailing, finances. e-mails and the such, we stopped by a place to get a quote for the price of installing cabinets in our home. The owner of the home said that they would reimburse us half the cost if we decided to have permanent cabinets installed. As of right now we are using several cardboard boxesm and though they work well, they are not very economic or long-lasting. This week I will need to get our invitations to our Thanksgiving meal prepared and do some research on getting a web site set up here in France. I have been picking up a lot of vocabulary recently. A couple of times I have seen new words that I thought were just mispellings. For example I saw "las" in the hymn book at church which I thought was a mispelling of "là", an adverb meaning "here" or "there", but it actually is a word meaning "weary". Also I found saw "çà" which I thought was a mispelling of "ça" which means "this" or "that", but it is actually another word meaning "hither". Ahh, the joys of language learning. God bless, JASON

La Prière de Yaebets

I Chroniques 4. 9-10
"Yaebets était plus considéré que ses frères, sa mère l'appela du nom de Yaebets en disant : C'est parce que je l'ai enfanté dans la douleur. Yaebets invoqua le Dieu d'Israël, en disant : Si tu ,e combles de bénédiction et que tu m'étends mes limites, si ta main est avec moi, et si tu fais que, loin du malheur, j'échappe à la douleur!...Et Dieu accorda ce qu'il avait demandé."

Connaissez-vous des noms qui donne un mauvais sentiment? Comme Hitler, Sadaam Hussein, Judas l'Iscariot. Les premier neuf chapitre de Chroniques est une généalogie très longe. C'est difficile de le lire. Mais n'oubliez pas que 2 Tim 3.16 « Toute Écriture est inspirée de Dieu, et utile pour enseigner, pour convaincre, pour corriger, pour instruire dans la justice, »
Au milieu de ces neuf chapitres de la généalogie d'Israël, on trouve une oasis. Au milieu d'une grande liste des noms, la personne Yaebets prends l'attention du écrivain. Il fait une pause pour donner plus d'attention sur cet homme. Ces deux versets sont le seul lieu où il est mentionné dans la bible. 1 Ch 2:55- le nom d'une ville. C'est une ville où les scribes habitaient.

I.Il était plus considéré que ses frères.
A. Donc il avait des frères.
B. Il était plus considéré qu'eux. Ça ne nous dit pas que ses frères n'étaient pas considéré, mais qu'il était considéré plus.
C. Voilà, la raison que l'écrivain donne plus de détails sur lui.
II.Sa mère l'appela du nom de Yaebets en disant : c'est parce que je l'ai enfanté dans la douleur.
A. Son nom signifie « la douleur ».
B. Pourquoi ce nom? On ne sait pas pourquoi précisément. Il y avait qqch concernant cet homme qui lui a rappelé de la douleur.
1. Sa naissance – Peut-être sa naissance était très dure. C'est possible, mais normalement, ils nommaient l'enfant le huitième jour. Je crois que dans le plupart des cas, il n'y a plus de douleur après huit jours.
2. Une problème avec le père. Le nom du Père n'est pas donné. C'est bizarre. Et puis le nom était donné par la mère. Peut-être le père est mort. Peut-être il les a abandonné.
3. En tout cas. Chaque fois que cet homme entendait son nom, c'était un rappel de la douleur. Je pense que ce soit difficile pour un enfant.
III.Il invoqua le Dieu d'Israël
A. Invoquer – c'est plus fort que « demander ». C'est qqch qui s'est tenu à cœur.
B.Il priait le Dieu d'Israël – Il a reconnu le vrai Dieu.
IV. Si tu me combles de bénédiction
A. A première vue, cette partie a l'aire d'être égoïste. Yaebets voulait être plein de bénédictions. B. En fait, Dieu veut nous bénir. Souvent nous faisons obstacle à nous.
i.Mettez-moi de la sorte à l'épreuve, Dit l'Éternel des armées. Et vous verrez si je n'ouvre pas pour vous les écluses des cieux, Si je ne répands pas sur vous la bénédiction en abondance (Malachie 3.10)
ii.Luc 6:38 Donnez, et il vous sera donné: on versera dans votre sein une bonne mesure, serrée, secouée et qui déborde
iii.mais il use de patience envers vous, ne voulant pas qu'aucun périsse, mais voulant que tous arrivent à la repentance. ( 2 Pierre 3.9)
iv.(Deut 28:8) L'Éternel ordonnera à la bénédiction d'être avec toi dans tes greniers et dans toutes tes entreprises. Il te bénira dans le pays que l'Éternel, ton Dieu, te donne.
v.ce sera une pluie de bénédiction. ( eze 34.26)
C.C'est possible que l'on n'ait pas parce que l'on ne demande pas
i.Jacques 4.2 vous ne possédez pas parce que vous ne demandez pas
ii.Jean 4.10 Jésus lui répondit: Si tu connaissais le don de Dieu et qui est celui qui te dit: Donne-moi à boire! tu lui aurais toi-même demandé à boire, et il t'aurait donné de l'eau vive.
V.Et que tu étendes mes limites
A.agrandir, prolonger, élargir mes limites
B.Cela peut parler au sujet de sa famille, ou ses affaires, ou son entreprises.
C.Yaebets veut que ses bénédictions bénissent ceux qui sont autour de lui
VI. si ta main est avec moi
A.Les main des Dieu est pour la protection.
i.(psa 44:3) De ta main tu as chassé des nations pour les établir, Tu as frappé des peuples pour les étendre.
ii. (psa 20:7) Je sais déjà que l'Éternel sauve son oint; Il l'exaucera des cieux, de sa sainte demeure, Par le secours puissant de sa droite.
B.Les main des Dieu est pour le confort.
i.Job 22:30 Il délivrera même le coupable, Qui devra son salut à la pureté de tes mains.
ii.Psa 16:11 Tu me feras connaître le sentier de la vie; Il y a d'abondantes joies devant ta face, Des délices éternelles à ta droite.
C.Pour l'aide.
i. (psa 18:36) Tu me donnes le bouclier de ton salut, Ta droite me soutient, Et je deviens grand par ta bonté.
ii.(psa 63:9) Mon âme est attachée à toi; Ta droite me soutient.
D.Pour la correction.
i.Psa 32:4 Car nuit et jour ta main s'appesantissait sur moi, Ma vigueur n'était plus que sécheresse, comme celle de l'été. -Pause.
ii.Psa 38.2
E.pour nous guider
i.Psa 139:10 Là aussi ta main me conduira, Et ta droite me saisira.
F.Pour nous enseigner
i.Psa 45:4 Et, prospérant dans ta magnificence, mène en avant ton char, à cause de la vérité et de la débonnaireté et de la justice; et ta droite t'enseignera des choses terribles
G.Pour nous sauver
i. (psa 108:7) Afin que tes bien-aimés soient délivrés, Sauve par ta droite, et exauce-nous!
VII.Si tu fais que, loin du malheur, j'échappe à la douleur (si tu me préserves du malheur, en sorte que je ne sois pas dans la souffrance ( segond 1910))
A.Il veut changer son homonyme. C'est importante pour cieux qui n'ont pas un bon héritage. Le pomme peut tomber loin du pommier avec Dieu.
B.Délivre nous du mal (le Notre Père)
C.Dieu peut faire des grandes choses avec rien de spécial. Comme le miracle « la multiplication du pain et du poisson ». Il a fait beacoup avec un peu de pain et des poissons.
VIII.Dieu accorda ce qu'il avait demandé.
A.C'est comme il n'a finis pas la prière. Il dit, « si, si, si », mais non « puis » ou « alors », « donc » . C'est comme il laissait le reste à Dieu. On doit laisser nos vies à Dieu pour sa volonté.
B.Voilà – la preuve. Dieu l'a fait.
IX. Je crois que si on prie comme Yaebets « Dieu accorde-moi ta bénédiction , augmente mes possessions, étends sur moi ta main, et éloigne de moi le malheur et la souffrance », si on le prie, Dieu nous accorde ce que nous avons demandé aussi.