The First Thanksgiving

Maybe these are my people!

Separation Anxiety

While walking home from my bus on Thursday, I passed the Jimenez bakery on Fullerton. I smell the goodies all the time but as I looked in the window, I was mesmerized not only by the scents but of the idea that I could enjoy fresh bread and some wonderful French cheese at home. So I entered and bought a croissant for breakfast and bread for dinner.

How sorely disappointed was I to break my bread only to discover crumbly Mexican cheese and a jalapeno slice filling the inside. “This is what I get for not reading Spanish!” I yelled at the rejected bread as I slumped dejectedly in my chair. My roommates looked on. “I just needed a French moment and they don’t even have jalapenos!!! This is so not what I needed.” Having both grown up for parts of their lives in Germany, they sympathetically looked on and offered stories of the baked goods they can’t find in America.

My unreasonable outburst at otherwise really good bread manifested a larger disturbance occurring this past week. I am experiencing France withdrawal and turmoil. One good thing, one sad thing, one hard thing, and several other things have set this off.

The good thing—I saw pictures of a GBU Weekend de Rentree (“back to school” loosely translated) that was hosted by GBU Compiegne for the GBU North region!!! This was exciting to me for so many reasons. This group is just awesome and God is raising them up to be his people in France and to the ends of the world. It showed as well partnership with the local church I attended in Compiegne, which was a major prayer request and burden on my heart that with a short year’s time I was not able to “do” anything concretely about other than plant bugs in people’s ears and encourage church attendance. And pray. So yet again here God shows up to be faithful to his people and their prayers. I like him quite a bit, really.

The sad thing—One of my French tutors Margarite Chipy passed away this week. I received an email from L’Arche with the information and I was a bit stunned. Madame Chipy was older but spry and would walk and bike everywhere, a wonderful witness too of Jesus and an open door of hospitality. We met for an hour on Friday afternoons January through March to speak in French. In a different post I will detail my favorite story of hers from the World War II era. I will always cherish it and the memory of her.

The hard thing—I was invited to attend GEM France’s annual retreat and church planting training which is occurring this week. While I wanted to go, wisdom said, Be a student and don’t bomb your first semester. I am currently determining if this was truly wisdom. My seminary and France friend Noelle headed out on plane Thursday for the retreat, and as we giggled on the bus ride to Trinity over her inability to stand up straight due to 24 hours of no sleep, and as I prayed for her before we parted ways, my eyes welled with tears. In one of those moments when you think you might lose control of every ounce of yourself, I planted myself with resolve not to cry. I never did cry on Thursday, a minor miracle. I wanted so badly to be getting on the flight too and the restraint I have shown in not tossing studies out the window for this opportunity is, well, if I do say so myself, commendable.

Several other things—If I hear French anywhere in my near vicinity, I truly feel sorry for the speakers…just before I tackle them in a verbal onslaught. Two weeks ago I spoke with a Quebecois couple visiting Oak Park, the suburb where I work. Last weekend, I met a French family at my local Starbucks. This week while waiting for my train from Trinity back to Chicago, I overheard a group of three women and two teens speaking French, so I stood nearby listening for the opportune moment to break in. God in his grace ☺ allowed the train platform to be changed for those going to Chicago. Remembering how difficult it was to catch this information during my first few months in France, I most selflessly began in French letting the group know what had occurred. They were grateful for my kindness, not knowing the great pleasure it gave me of course. We continued to talk until the train arrived…all in French. It was glorious.

We can see then the logical progression toward my bread outburst as my week passed, making me hunger for France, for my people there, for life there, and all else. I miss the Prevotes greatly, I want to hang out with students, and I miss the rhythms of life L’Arche taught me. I love my life now. Seminary is full and challenging and what I expected, both good and interesting. My roommates are great. Chicago is fantastic. God yet again is proving his faithfulness and I am humbled.

But it’s not Compiegne. It’s not Paris. Not Lille. Not France. Not the people woven into me.

I’ve been asking God recently to teach me who I am to be loving intentionally. In a quiet moment, his answer has come and as it has pulled me outward, it has also set me to asking questions.

I am to learn how to love generally, in the way that “for God so loved the world he sent his own son…,” that all encompassing love that hungers for each to know him personally and walk in life in his Body. He has no one particular before me other than people who need to be loved. But he also showed me that he has placed in me a love “for the elect,” akin to what we read in Ephesians 2:4-5, for the French. And I will never be rid of this. My questions then range and are too personal and unformed to be divulged here. But there that is.

Pray for me if you will. Pray for the GBU students. Continue to pray for the Prevotes. Pray for God’s Church in France. Please love them with your prayers.

Pray for Europe...and France!

Join Greater Europe Mission in praying strategically for Europe tomorrow, October 23, 2008.

Please visit this website for more information.

The Pope is Coming

I am sipping hot Ricore, the warm beverage of choice for breakfast or afternoon snack time in France. It's a light caffeine fix at 9:30pm as I dive into my first Hebrew lesson. What an appropriate moment then to post the following:

Pope Benedict XVI (Ratzinger) will pay his first visit to Paris and Lourdes, France this weekend, with mass and other events to ensue. For more information, check out this site.

Exciting Stuff!

I do hope you are still occasionally checking back in with the blog. I hope its contents are a testimony to the work God, not Jennifer, is doing! The God I believe is good and faithful and his works run the course of history, before and after anyone is privileged to participate.

With that intro, must share! It's been touch and go all spring and summer...will Corine get to go to GBU's summer camp, which serves to train, equip, and encourage students from all over France to go back and be servants and lights for him in the midst of their campuses and GBU? Here's the drama in nutshell version.

Heard via email that Corine had talked to her mother and father. Mother said okay.
Talked with Natacha (for 2 hours!) and she said that Corine's mother and father had decided in the end, No.
Nari called Corine to convince her to some how go.
I emailed Corine encouraging her in the midst of this disappointment.
30something hours before camp departure, I receive a two sentence email from Corine--Will write more later, but I'm going to camp. Mother changed her mind and father is now ambivalent.
JUST received an email from Corine, returned from camp, ON FIRE! She was encouraged, ready to step into leadership with Compiegne GBU, and has lots of ideas for outreach.
Yay God!

Ladies and gentlemen, these are the prayers of SO many on this globe at work. I came across the title of a book, Following Jesus Without Dishonoring Your Parents. While I have yet to read this, for a good part of this year in France, this has been my discipleship question with Corine--how do I encourage her to wholeheartedly run after Jesus without dishonoring her parents? I am still learning what the answer in practice looks like to this question, but I know this...God is the best parent ever, working all things to his kids' good...and one of his daughters on one side of the Atlantic is praising him for his kindness to a daughter on the other.

In a word, I am "giddy."

More in the next entry on discipleship but this was a piece of the whole.

Tecktonik

If you're thinking about going to France any time soon, in any capacity--missions, vacation, whatever--you need to know about tecktonik. It's all the rage and why it hasn't made the blog sooner, I don't know. Maybe because my tecktonik skills are less than stellar. Chloe Prevote tried to teach me best she could, but it's the electronic part of the dance that is lost on me. However, you will see youths with old-school boom boxes or their small MP3 players cranked up to louder than I can believe dancing this together in town squares, on the streets, or in clubs (as I never made it to one of these, I can only assume). It's a cultural phenomenon originating out of Paris some years ago of which you should be aware so you don't search out emergency personnel thinking the individuals have entered into seizures. In fact, this is merely dancing.

If you are familiar with hip hop, you will be able to identity some similarities. If you are as well familiar with electronic (techno) music, you will inevitably see the influences of the music on the broken movements that combine to create a rather distinct whole. While there exists a unique form to tecktonik, in each example you will see dancers take creative license, which of course in the end is what dance is all about.

May I also add that the fashion styles you see in this video are also the current styles, especially of the men. In a word, Ew.

My Personal Favorite Example
Best of Techtonik

Stay tuned. Next post will include thoughts and methods concerning discipleship developed over the past handful of years with lingering questions that cross-cultural discipleship in France raises. As well, I'll throw in a little, "So, how are your French friends doing?" update.

Re-entry 101

Timidly I clicked the sign in tab. I have not written in a bit, and so much has passed in relation to France since my return that I feel I have treated you unfairly by not inviting you into what has been a rather trying month of re-entry. I would like to tell you what will pour forth onto this screen from my fingers...but I truly have no idea. Let us begin, shall we?

Texas was my official re-entry point. And, while it was wonderful, memorable, and all the other superlatives I can imagine, Texas was not ideal. For what reasons?

One, everything is extremely spread out and you have to use your car to do anything. My soul rebels. I have been living in cities and compact spaces, such as Compiegne, for three years, and I have grown accustomed to the ease of life in such settings. Bike, foot, or bus, perhaps the occasional train, and you're there--at lunch with a student or friend, at the boulangerie, over at the church, down into Paris, at the university, working at L'Arche. It's just so easy. Dallas for one overwhelms and I nearly pass out maneuvering through the Jetson-like sky high tollways of Houston. Texas, you can have your massive concrete creations for the too big, too loud contraptions commonly referred to as "monster trucks" and their smaller companions called extended cab Ford F-150s. I'll take my elops B'twin bike any day.

Two, literally my first day back in Waco I stumbled across the city magazine Wacoan, which since I watched the editor honest to God intentionally not photograph my fellow black dance team members for their coverage of Waco High homecoming I have not been a fan. July 2008's cover sealed the deal. A nameless woman's arms spread open in what I translated to be worship asked me to read "Profiles, p. 20." I found on this page a lead-in to several ads of Christian merchandise, services, etc. I returned home, waving it vehemently in my mother's face yelling, "WHAT is wrong with THIS?!" Stunned, she looked on as her distraught daughter explained, "MARKETING! This is not Jesus, these are goods which can be exchanged, a culture created, and we feel Christian about it!" An article later in the magazine, a discussion between four Waco-area pastors, started off with the statistic that Waco houses over 250 religious establishments. (The article asked a great question--With all these institutions, is Waco a community of faith?) Waco and surrounding areas top out around 130,000-150,00 population depending on what developments you include. L'Oise Valley houses approximately 1 Protestant church per 60,000 inhabitants. We see quickly the gross disparities and points which might lead a recently returned French missionary into hysteria. I have been overwhelmed to say the least at the market-driven, brand-conscious nature of Christianity in the states and in Texas. And I am implicated and convicted by it, knowing that my habits of church selection are formed in great part by this reality. It has not been easy.

Third, I have had moments where I simply blank out and in the midst of whatever I'm doing simply forget, feel lost, or walk back and forth trying to accomplish anything, something. The best I was able to articulate this phenomenon is captured by the following: Generally I function fine and in fact well in physical or relational chaos. I tend to see potential in chaos and ways to organize it, solve it, fix it. However, upon re-entry, I experienced a new one--mental and emotional chaos further complicated by physical chaos and relational loss. While I ran hard and busy during the three weeks of the Texas tour seeing supporters, loving on family, traveling the roads, packing and repacking, I felt at all times teetering over some unseen edge. I am still waiting in a sense for the major breakdown of tears and emotions. We shall see when and if it arrives.

I believe the hardest point of removal from France has been this: While I had "tasks" at hand each day, so much of my life there was about entering into the lives and stories of others and journeying together toward God. Lives and stories are not easily replicated, because they are bound to particulars, moments, heartbeats, and laughs...and even tears. None of us have the privilege to return to moments which were, and lives go on. They have and they will. And that is a hard reality. My particular philosophy of ministry per se has become this: That we are granted moments in which our life intersects with an other's. And it is in this intersection that we are privileged to ask together our questions of it, in the great hope of finding God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit working in our midst. May God grant me the grace and peace to continue this at a distance. May I be as well a pliant spirit in a place which has come to resemble not home to me, but some far away land in which all the people wear crosses, the billboards tell me to repent in the name of Jesus, and the God I read of in Isaiah seems a far cry away from the God we have placed on the puppet stick.

Going (not so) Gently

Couple of "business" items to attend to--

I still owe you 1) a discipleship update, 2) my study of John, and 3) something else but I can't remember. It is all coming in due time but my internet access is limited and my time is packed at the moment.

And, this blog will remain and transition from a "day in the life of" sort to "clearinghouse of France-related information", pertaining to ministry, culture, politics, etc. The sky is the limit but you could probably check back once a month for something.

Here's the latest--My dad asked me how I was doing the other day. I said, "Well, I'm not in France," which is pretty much my standard response and thought. I have mini-meltdowns, beginning in O'Hare where I locked myself in a bathroom and wept for who knows how long. Airports are just a really rude way to re-enter America--it all smells of greasy, yucky food and I want to literally throw up. And people are loud. Two rather symbolic moments occurred yesterday which also threatened to push me over an edge. They sound VERY silly, nonetheless--I changed my facebook profile, deleting my French cell, my GEM contact info...like it never existed. And life has gone on here back in America, further complicating this reality. I also got a cell phone and the salesman ended the transaction by saying, "You're back." I nearly ran out of the store shrieking, "DON'T TELL ME!!!" When I returned with a headset problem, I approached the counter, began my business, then he asked, "How are you today?" Oh, right, American friendliness/superficiality. Hell if he really cares or that I really care to tell. Let's keep it to bonjour/au revoir and reality shall we? Then, I demonstrated for my mother what I felt like doing in the travel section of Barnes and Noble--I laid down on the kitchen floor, face down, and pretended to have a meltdown. She responded, "Get up!" So I relocated to the cleaner, carpeted hall floorway and lay down again. Then she told me a VERY funny story [context:we're sharing a bed while I'm home for two weeks]--Two nights ago, in the middle of the night, I woke up, sat straight up, grabbed my mouth with my hand, and said, "MOTHER?!" She responded, "Yes?" To which I said, "I just didn't know where I was, or what time it was, or who you were."

Folks, it just doesn't get any better than this. To top it off, I can't speak French within anyone in my immediate surrounding. BUT, I've been in contact with some of the GBU women and other friends via email and I found a boulangerie near my sister's house that makes real deal croissants.

But the words of an email from Valerie keep resurfacing--"Go gently." I didn't really know what that meant, but I am learning. Go gently. It is a lesson in and of itself to take those words in...and to live them.

Final Night in Compiegne

I shouldn't have worn mascara today for two reasons. One, it rained ALL day between tiny glorious bouts of golden sun and I was on my bike for a majority of it. My feet are still wet. Two, I cried a lot very randomly but not really until after 7pm.

One of my friends tells me I am very dramatic and perhaps this evening showcases this. After dinner at the L'Arche foyer (house) L'Isba along with Natacha who I invited, I biked over to my church gardens for a silent moment and tears I wasn't expecting. Next, I met Xue out front and gave her a Watchman Nee guide to the Christian life, prayed for her, and left her with an image of God's love for her that I pray he works into her heart. Lastly I returned my bike to my neighbor Vincent, but not before taking 20 or so minutes just to ride around. As I turned up a street to head toward the apartments, I about lost it crying so circled back around and just putzed down the street until I could get my act together. I left him with bike lock keys and a copy of the book of John, a further aid in responding to a great question he posed last week at lunch--"If someone says they are 'croyant' [believing] what does that mean? What distinguishes them from others?" Hello open door. So I shared about Jesus, the chasm between the messed up inhabitants of this world and God, the grace, love, and joy and selflessness that should be present at the heart of every disciple of Jesus' actions. I thought John would be a great follow up, as Vincent is working on a book and seems to be a reader. He was touched by the gesture and asked if I signed it. "Yes," I said. "Bon, a souvenir of Jennifer." :)

Then I left him and turned down the street I take everyday on my way to Le Moulin or Madame Bataille's and again felt helplessly tearful as I walked toward Valerie's, where I've stayed on and off since moving out of my place. I told Jesus I needed him to do this because I am not up for it--my last night in Compiegne. I just stood at one point on the sidewalk crying, willing myself to go toward the door out of which I will exit tomorrow to leave this beloved place and people.

It's very difficult to imagine that in 24-48 hours time I will be in Texas, and that I won't be coming back here for a bit. Whoops, shouldn't have written that down. Started tears...

Today has felt surreal quite often and I find myself glancing over my shoulder constantly to remember. Hugging Natacha goodbye was difficult and we just stood there for a moment looking out over the street, neither willing to part.

I still occasionally think, I could stay. Maybe I just won't take the flight after all. I know in the end I am called to be faithful elsewhere in the season to come. But I keep saying aloud, "Mais je n'ai pas envie." [I don't want to.]

So I will see some of you tomorrow, others this week, a lot on Sunday, some in the weeks and two months to come. And forgive me if at times I might look lost or confused, teary-eyed and off somewhere else. I will try hard to be present to the moment...but perhaps the souvenirs of other moments will also be pressing on me, calling me into prayer, listening to God's voice, and recalling a people and persons that I inexplicably love.

Ministry Wrap-ups

Group Biblique Universitaire—Count it a Privilege

As opposed to other areas of ministry and life here, I hope and think I’ve provided a good glimpse into GBU. But for a final wrap, here’s a go at it:

The Students: GBU met weekly throughout the school year, never gaining official club status at UTC but nonetheless able to use a room every week for our Bible studies. Throughout the semester, students participated in weekly studies, received Bible study facilitation training, traveled to regional and national events, and gathered for various non-official events in Compiegne. We saw our numbers grow from roughly 7-10 to approximately 18-20 every study!!! That’s big folks! We also saw increased participation from a variety of Christian and other expressions of faith, namely Catholic, Protestant, and Muslim students. This is indeed a huge praise! All of these students as well as the core group leaders were present for the end of year picnic, which of all the other end of year student bashes taking place, was quite impressive to have their presence well-accounted for.

GBU next year will undergo some transitions. Namely, Armel will be moving into a regional leadership role (hooray!) and less responsible on the whole for Compiegne. Nari as well will be moving to Laos for her final internship then out into the working world, for which we praise God but see as well an administrative and energy vacuum being created. These two have been faithful however to pass the baton to four students—Clement, Sylvain, Natacha, and Corine with a strong participating core at their back. Armel, Natacha, and Corine will all be headed to GBU camp in August, the same place I began my time here, for further training and equipping for the year ahead.

Prayers and Praises:
Praises all around for the formation of this group and for the depth and sincerity in the heart of students. They are on the whole an impressive, engaged, and thoughtful group and we can continue to pray God’s covering over their presence on UTC campus.
Pray for continued shared responsibility among students and increased fervor, not just in the organization but in their faith.
Pray for those in our midst who are searching, asking first questions of their systems of belief, or are simply curious. Pray for a solid and loving testimony.

My Role: I have not facilitated Bible studies this year but have served as encouragement and support for various GBU and outside initiatives. It has been my great delight to serve alongside these students, speak when asked, and at all times, seeking how God would have me serve them. Whether it was through community building, worldview education, one-on-one discipleship, prayer, or being a resource of questions and connections, it has been my utmost privilege to encounter these precious lives.

(I will follow up with a specific women’s discipleship post at some point.)

Les Jeunes Adultes D’Oise—Learning as You Go

This ministry has had its ups and downs for me personally and as a team member, mainly ups until the very end. Throughout the year since the end of November and the Hemmerle’s relocation to the states, I have worked with two French people Francois and Joel to serve as JAO leadership transition. We continued as Dave begun, assembling young adults from the region in January, March, and June for teaching, worship, and prayer. As a team we met 6 weeks in advance to plan and divvy up responsibilities, and it is only in hindsight that I can say we should have assigned each person the same tasks for each gathering according to gifting. As a team we were determining those gifts as we went in our context and by the end, it was apparent that Francois and I shared teaching and administration while Joel offered his sensitive people skills and prayerful heart.

After a meeting with Francois last week, the future of JAO is in question. From the beginning Joel said he could not carry it on his own, and as Francois became a newly-wed in May, his attentions are admittedly needing to shift elsewhere for the coming year. I will be leaving, as you know, July 8th so can no longer offer my role. That said, Francois will be contacting Dave for wisdom on how to move forward or curtail the effort.

In some ways, this is a “ministry disappointment” if you can call it that. “Learning situation” perhaps is less harsh. Understandably Francois cannot carry the leadership baton alone, and is better acquainted with who would be a fit to replace me on the team. Joel is a kind man who is ready and willing, but recognizes his limits in terms of leadership and so does require a team.

From this, I have the following request for you. As a participant in a local French church and being involved with both students and young adults here, I ask you to pray for specific church-connected young adult ministries to be birthed here. The Oise is much more oriented toward families and senior citizens than young adults compared to, say, Paris. However, the need exists for good teaching, spiritual direction, discipleship, and overall Christian faith development for this segment of the population, as Dave and Virginia readily saw and responded to with JAO. For next steps depending on the direction Francois’s conversation with Dave goes, I pray for leaders to rise up in churches that can help respond as well to this need. Pray for specific church young adult ministry.

Le Moulin—A Lesson in Courage

From day one at Le Moulin, an adult workshop for handicapped residents of the Compiegne area, I have been asking, what am I supposed to do here? What am I to learn? How am I to serve? It came daily, in being assigned to various activities, at first always accompanied and then taking groups all my own. Then it came through community events, where I began learning and seeing the larger role of L’Arche in Compiegne, as a Christian witness to love and belonging. I felt so many times at L’Arche incapable of providing thorough and professional service, as I have no training in anything remotely connected to L’Arche community needs except what falls under the broad label of “Christian ministry.” With time, however, I began to see that while training helps, it is more often knowing a person than a technique that creates a situation into which I might enter and serve.

But another reality arose from my time at Le Moulin. I began to be braver, both there and in France. I sang more out loud, and invited others to join with me. I acted goofy and made jokes and took great pleasure when our kitchen group was rendered incapable of work due to our volumes of laughter. I confidently filled in for Martine during women’s gym class, always spicing it up a little bit with African drums and some cha-cha. And in other areas of ministry, while never being the fully bold American Jennifer I am, I nonetheless stopped being so careful and became me again. In a country that collectively stares if you do anything outside of the box, which I am prone to do, it can be hard and frustrating to not take chances.

As my departure from Le Moulin was announced, I took a moment to share a few words. And this is roughly a part of what I said—You have taught me the lesson of courage, found in the text of Joshua. “Have I not commanded you be strong and courageous? Do not be terrified, do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will go with you wherever you go.” In a land of the terrified and timid, L’Arche stands as a hopeful witness to courage that only God can give as we choose to not live in fear. More often than not, I have said, I needed Le Moulin more than they needed me. And while I was able to serve there, it was them who reminded me that the testimony of God’s love through Jesus can never be dimmed when we are living in the fullness of the his embrace.

Heading Out

Wish I could write more. Checking out of my apartment in an hour. Agh!

Will post more definitive ministry wrap-ups for GBU, JAO, and L'Arche in the next two weeks.

The rundown--
June 29-July 3--Going to London for Poet's Corner and Indian cuisine. And tea. Granddaddy says it's my going away present to myself. :)
July 3--Compiegne
July 4-6--Chantilly/Gouvieux and Apremont with missionary and French families
July 6-7--Compiegne
July 8--Arrive on American soil (at least this is the plan)

July 8-30--Texas Tour
July 30-August 2--Drive and move to Chicago

And here's a picture or two to tied you over until the stories.

Sunset ride out by the chateau tracks

Picnic with Mahina and JoJo

GBU End of Year Picnic on the Oise

Boat tour in Amiens with Le Moulin

L'Arche Staff BBQ in the woods

Horizons Evangeliques

Interested in reading more about the pulse of Christianity in France? Want to grow in your French comprehension? Looking for a current resource for students, your personal library, or research?

May I introduce you to Horizons Evangeliques, France's new Christian magazine which promises to be an excellent theological, practical, and intellectual engagement between faith and the French, and hopefully you!

Visit the website for subscription information.

Personal note: The pastor of the Compiegne church is part of the writing/editing team!

As a Christian

I came across the following as I read on the way back from a Le Moulin outing to Amiens (pictures to follow at some point). It comes from an Epistle to Diognetus, a respected pagan some speculate may have been a Greek emperor in the 1st century:

Christians do not distinguish themselves from others by their country, their language or their dress.
They do not belong to any particular city, they do not make use of special dialects, their way of life has nothing particular about it.
They do not set themselves up, as many others do, as champions of a human doctrine.
They do not distribute themselves in Greek or barbaric cities according to pre-arranged divisions.
They conform to local customs as regards clothes, food and life-style while bearing witness to the extraordinary and truly paradoxical laws of the spiritual republic to which they belong.
They live each in their own country but like strangers in the house.
They fulfill all their duties as citizens, and put up with all their tasks, but like strangers.
Every strange land is their country and every country is for them a strange land.
In the same way they are in the flesh but they do not live according to the flesh.

And so we find that as citizens of the city of Zion to come, we are particularly crafted in our being and faith to be the most mobile of human creatures. Our attachments to "home," land, and nation rank far below second place as we hear the call to go and make disciples and go and love our neighbors, those who become our neighbors. We see too that within enclaves composed of ourselves, "the paradoxical laws of the spiritual republic" lose meaning and indeed, lose existence. So we find it strange to return home. We find it unsettling to speak only of "Christian" subjects in "Christian" settings--thus Gospel, justice, love, and grace should once and always be on the tips of our tongues and in the reach of our hands in how we live and for what our blood courses. And we find that a place and people can become in many senses as our own, adopted through our citizenship which claims the globe and our loyalties which disregard all that would keep us nationally and spiritually secure.

News Bytes

Below I've linked you to some interesting resources and articles as of late. I'm not stirring any political pot, because that's not my job. Nonetheless, for an American living in France, these articles have served me well to understand some conversations I've had here concerning U.S. elections, namely that I've noted the French don't realize Republicans exist, which has amused me to no end. I have repeatedly had to clarify for people, "It's not just about Obama and Clinton." Oh? they say. Oui...oh.

I would like to add this as well. Americans could learn a thing or two concerning environment care from the French. While a popular trend here and a growing trend of concern in the states, I personally find I recycle more, waste less, always carry a re-usable bag in my purse, am addicted to my bicycle or feet, and think about energy use increasingly more since living in France. If you ask for a plastic sack, they'll say, "Tsk, tsk, l'environnement." And if you don't turn out lights, they will come behind and do it for you. Needless to say, one learns quickly to be mindful of the small things which add up to make a difference.

CNN's Eye on France
I have not watched or read much of this CNN Special, but I recommend it nonetheless if you're looking for the latest coverage on France's shifting cultural and political role in Europe and the world.

Race, France, and U.S. Elections

Maureen Dowd's latest op-ed concerning Carla Sarkozy and her surprisingly positive effect on Sarko's popularity.

Roger Cohen on Obama and France

Week in Review

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, today, you get lucky. I'm posting pictures from various events, etc. of the last 1-2 weeks. I have little mental capacity to write anything lucid nor the physical energy to keep my eyes open long enough to do so. This week has been full of late nights and early mornings, days full of so much moving that at their end my feet are numb. Literally numb. I've planned only a picnic lunch and a L'Arche foyer dinner tomorrow, so it is my off day to pack, organize, and make my apartment look like I'm moving out in...5 days!!!!!!!!!!!

Without further ado...(btw, these are out of order b/c I'm a tech idiot and not taking the time to sort them all around)

6/20--Set-up for the American party at Le Moulin

Setting up with staff

They surprised me with gifts that participants created, this painting by Gerard
being a particular favorite of mine.

My friend Mahina and her friend Martin provided our live entertainment!!!

The music drew quite the crowd, a big hit!

Teaching the natives line-dancing.

Attempting Texas two-step

6/22--Baptism at Compiegne Baptist Church

Pastor Pierre is the bearded long-haired on the left.

6/22--Fete de la Musique (Music party) later in the day

BBQ following the Fete de la Musique,
i.e., minus 2 hours I was at church from 10:30am until 8:30pm

6/17--Madame Bataille correcting my French for my goodbye words at L'Arche.

6/17--GBU Prayer and Worship Night

Passing the leadership baton

6/21--7a.m. bike ride along the Oise River and into the fields

6/14--7a.m. 30 km bike ride in the forest to Pierrefonds, local castle town

6/14--Jean-Stephane and Chloe headed to tennis lessons

Later in the day, football lessons with Chloe and Loick.

J-Cool

My first strawberry clafoutis for a L'Arche foyer dinner

Saturday morning market, a habit I will miss greatly in America.

6/16--Monday morning Le Moulin planning meeting
Valerie, Martine, Francis, Benedicte (L to R)

6/12--Dinner at the foyer Le Demeure

"Mentioned in Passing"

Mentioned in Passing
In Memory of Anne-Marie Osborne Aycock Posey
June 14, 1914-June 17, 2008

It comes in waves, almost steadily
Mimicking morning sun’s rhythm
Surprisingly yet surely
The ebb and flow
Of life and death
Of what was and shall not be again

Hands that mixed and made with deftness
Pie shells for family and neighbors
Packed peas for the winter months
Canned tomatoes and stored up jams
Whipped up the only pies I’ve ever liked
Tickled my ears while I laid on her lap

She woke me at 7am on many a weekend morning for fresh bacon and eggs
Gathered family year after year into her home for every holiday
Held up dress after dress for me to try on
Let me nervously drive her car before I was old enough to do so legally
(the same car I still drive today)
Told story upon story of life on the farm
From World War I to Depression to II to Korea to Vietnam
Cared for and buried a father, a mother, a husband, my Poppy, her sister

Now she too joins them
And in this we find cause to rejoice
That generation after generation gather round a Throne

We’re not sure,
But the Bible says maybe we won’t have our families and spouses after passing
But my sister says, “Well……”
And I respond, “Yeah, there’s that too…”
The ambiguity
But we can hope

Jesus will be enough for her we know
But wouldn’t it be sweet
For Mamaw and Poppy to worship Jesus together
I think they would like that
And most of all, I think God would too


"I like to think of heaven as the holding place until
We’re released back onto this earth made New
As it was meant to be
As we were meant to be"

It Has Begun

Between 24-48 hours ago, It began. "It" may hereafter be defined for this post as "the total loss and control of emotions, specifically that of tears." It is, in a word, rough. I have taken extra precautions. I am beginning to let people know this will happen sporadically and I will be unable to do anything about It. I have stopped wearing mascara on my bottom lashes and may stop wearing it altogether, depending on how the next 48 hours of diagnostic testing go. It connects to very little logic other than what is going on in my head and heart, which if you can figure the logic out of those two, you get a prize. It happens when I realize I'm doing something for the last time--like swimming with Moulin participants, enjoying a firework spectacle with the Prevotes, encouraging again the JAO leadership transition team, getting with students for what may very well be final goodbyes, bike rides to places that in a couple weeks time will no longer be in the my life, eating betterave rouge (red beet) salad that I once detested but I now long for, going to dinners in L'Arche foyers, etc, etc. It happens most pointedly when I'm all alone, sitting on my favorite church garden bench to savor my holy space or washing my face in the bathroom. Without warning, as It's definition suggests, I am all apart.

I've had visions too of chaining myself to something grounded and inanimate and pitching an "I don't wanna fit," which I rarely did as a child but now the moment appropriately seems to call for it, to protest my departure. People keep bringing up what date it is, and this does not help. At all.

Yes, yes, as I go, I am doing so in peace. But that doesn't mean every now and then I can't just be a human and grieve and lose it and pitch a fit. I just hope they can drag me out of the car July 8. We have no idea how that day will go.

Not One for the Dinner Table

Islam, Virginity, and French Law

This article raises so many issues on so many levels I won't even attempt to articulate my thoughts. Read it all please.

It is Time

Final GBU Bible Study at UTC

The ladies (sans Natacha)

I finally looked at the calendar today and promptly fell into a panic attack. I've been putting if off for a while now, counting specifics days and weeks and all, and was only made aware of it being a month away from my July departure on June 8th when someone told me. That was not a happy moment, and I can't remember who you are but you shouldn't have done that. Oddly, I am not weepy but stalwart, resolute in pressing forward with my various calls which brought me here until the very end. It's what one has to do, or at least I have to do, to not do the following...

I'm canceling my ticket home. I have mulled it over for multiple evening conversations with myself and honestly, it's not that I don't trust God to be faithful to continue his work here without me. But it feels, I think, quite selfish to leave. Christian Americans who read this blog (and any others of course), I would like to say this to you (and myself as well)--you've got it good. In fact, easy. Pick a corner of a town and you've got a church before you. I recently read an excellent book which records the following: "For a religious marketplace to exist, a society cannot have state-established, supported, and regulated churches." The authors follow with this a few paragraphs down: "...when religion becomes disestablished, it opens the doors for creative religious entrepreneurs to market their alternative faiths to religious consumers. The general public, likewise, is freed--at least in ideal--to choose among options. Disestablishment in the context of a new, pluralistic nation [America] led to a religious marketplace."* I will be the first to admit I am guilty of this on many levels and deciding on where to attend church is a very serious question for me. But, welcome to America. On the other side of the Atlantic, however, welcome to France, where there is no marketplace but rather a population cynical of church due to a sordid Church-State past (among other reasons) and maybe oh, 4-5 Protestant churches within my town or an hour+ beyond. My wrestlings with selfishness become clear. I also leave behind this--

Yesterday Corine and I plopped down on the grass next to the Oise River. We began to talk and she shared what she was learning from her quiet times, how it's "bizarre" that the particular questions she is asking every day continue to be met with response in her Scripture reading and meditations, encouraged by a Lecteur de la Bible her grandmother sent her from Cameroun! She began unfolding to me the story of Job and this was not my time to ask questions but to simply listen. To have this young, sincere, tender woman of Jesus teach me from her heart what God has been teaching her through Scripture of himself.

Earlier in the day, during lunch with Natacha, Corine, and Marie-Pierre, Natacha delivered as promised the teaching and worship of Passion: Paris. With great gusto and laughter, for which she is now in my mind famous, she covered all the points taught and again, this was not my time to talk. It was my time to listen and encounter this dear, fervent young woman teach her sisters of how God would use them.

So you see. I am leaving a lot. And it is selfish. But maybe you also see that it is time. A year is too short, and I struggle with a bit of jealousy reading of a brother leaving an Asian country after 3 years. Three years, I thought, what a dream! Time to really sink into a place, a people, to know the rhythms of the lives of those we love far deeper than I can within a year. This week, however, the same moments that made me want to cancel my ticket also told me, You can go. You can go.

In peace, then, I will go. And leave in the hands of my most capable God the lives, the hearts, the unfolding stories of those whom he said before time, I have knit them into your skin Jennifer to love but I have knit them into my hand to keep always.

In love, I came. In peace, I go. And for this I am a most grateful woman.

*Divided by Faith:Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America; Michael O. Emerson and Christian Smith

GBU Update--Whoo-hoo!!!

Tonight GBU students gather for the last Bible study of the year. We are beginning the great spring wind down, followed next week with a night of worship and prayer and the week after with a big end of year, invite your friends party. God has been good this year, has made us numerous, has equipped students, and has begun galvanizing an identity for them together.

Praise be to God as well for the following. Natacha has decided, after the Passion worship conference, that she wants to go the GBU camp, the very same one I started out at last August. Over sandwiches on the yard today with her, Corine, and Marie-Pierre, Corine softly interjected as I told Natacha I would get her all the sign-up information, "Me too, I want to go." Hooray!!!!! Pray that the two of them will definitely sign up and go and that we can figure out some help financing their participation. (If you're interested, don't hesitate to contact me.)

This all is indeed good news. Pray that as I work with Nari and Armel to call out leaders for next year they would come together and continue the vision and work of GBU at Compiegne.

Please pray for us. This can't be done without the prayers of the people!!!

And the Wall Came Tumbling Down

This morning after church Nari and I were walking to join Natacha for sandwiches down by the river. Natacha was in charge of an information display for Mozaik at an all-city garage sale wherein students were invited to participate. To the point, on the way Nari and I passed by an entry to a cyber cafe next to UTC that I pass all the time. Today, however, I heard loud “hallelujahs” and worship echoing out into the street from within. Nari kept walking, on the phone with Natacha and not having heard the praises. “Nari!” I called, “listen.” She came running back and then we just turned to one another, quickly forgetting our sandwiches and waiting Natacha, “Tu veux voir?” [do you want to see] A simultaneous, “Yes.”

It was a gathering of no more than 10-15 adults and children in what would be labeled a small ethnic church. A handful of the women were dressed in traditional African wear, which we later found out was more specifically Congolese. We were welcomed in and took our places at the plastic porch chairs, standing and praising. As the pastor powerfully began speak of the Father God, in whom we have victory, and by whom the disobedient devil was banished from heaven, and because of whom we have hope and joy because of the death and LIFE of Jesus Christ, I began to cry then weep. The pastor was loud and powerful, then at other moments tender and inviting, and I realized. I realized I have forgotten what a powerful God we serve. I wept profusely as Nari laid her hand on my back then I, mine on hers, and I saw Xue. I saw the walls of Jericho. I saw crumbling unbelief. And I saw a God who is capable. Who is powerful. Who has the victory and it is my great sin to not believe and follow obediently in the great conviction that he is tearing down walls. As worship continued, we were invited to take the hand of our neighbor or place our hand on the person in front of us, something I haven’t done in church since I left America. A member of the church prayed and again, more profuse weeping as I heard so much of God’s joy and love in his prayer to a God who is glorious, worthy, powerful. Forgive me, for I have sinned and forgotten.

I love church. And even though I’ve gone through rough spells, I always have and will need church in a way I can’t explain. Today I was reminded of the place wherein God has established the Church in the living out of Christian faith, of identifying with a people and learning of a God corporately. Church affects ministry. In its timidity, church teaches us as well timidity. In its carefulness, it teaches us to be careful. In its boldness, it teaches us proclamation. In its teaching emphases, be it stoic intellectual recitations, inspired and informed textual exegesis, proclamations of Gospel through spoken and sung word, it teaches something about the person of God beyond what is simply stated. Through the implicit curriculum of form and function and method of Sunday mornings, or Saturday nights or Friday evenings or whatever, we as members of a church and ministers of the Gospel are equipped, or ill-equipped, to know how to go about our weeks of living with others in his name.

While my job here is to support and not criticize, this morning I realized the French church has as many walls up to a powerful and liberating God as the culture. God is moving in the church, there is no doubt. Nonetheless, values and identities such as homogeneity in form, fear, safety, carefulness, not thinking outside the box, are just as much at work in churches here as they are in the culture. And both church and culture are bound here in a way that saddens and teaches me how to direct my prayers and encouragements. I am not basing this realization off of one morning’s experience in an ethnic church, for there are other instances, and one this week at Passion has led me to see God’s hand in placing these pieces of comprehension before me. Knowing Americans as I do, knowing the energy-expectations of Passion as I do, I realized this by reading the body language and encouragements of the Passion stage—France was and is a tough crowd, even the passionate Christians. Because of so many national wounds, they have learned to play it safe. And sadly, I think, this life becomes best lived with a safe God.

This morning, as Nari and I walked out of this small little church gathering, jaws to the ground with how awesome God’s presence was there, I told her, “I forgot that we serve a powerful God who can tear down walls.” And in further reflection I am reminded of the oft-quoted because it’s SO true line of C.S. Lewis in The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe concerning Aslan, the lion who symbolizes in this series Jesus. “Safe? Of course [Aslan] isn’t safe. But he’s good.” I serve a good God, who is not safe, who is not timid, who demands that I shout and pray that walls come down.

Note: It is a known fact amongst French national Christians, mission workers, and ethnic Christians (in France this normally means of African origin) that ethnic churches may at times not always have the clearest theologies, namely that there can be incorporated into their beliefs and practices remnants of spiritism and animism. Another visit will help me in discerning, but this morning I heard three in one preached--Father, Son, and Spirit--and did not hear nor discern worship, praise, or pastoral direction that would place me ill-at-ease. Several points in fact confirmed a sincerity and Spirit-led gathering.

Foyer Evangelique Universitaire

This morning Joy and I headed north to Lille, France, to visit a university ministry called Foyer Evangelique Protestante, or FEU which means “fire” in French. I am now familiar with GBU and through the states and some contacts here aware of Agape, European Campus Crusade. (try inviting a Muslim to a “Crusade” event : /) FEU was the latest on the list of ministries to check out. To say Joy and I were excited and overwhelmed by our time there would be an understatement. Two young couples with three kids between them welcomed us into their home for a morning discussion of their vision and ministry. Next we were invited to stay for a home-cooked lunch, to which a college student ran down from upstairs to join. Another student ran in from her morning on campus to eat up dessert and play with the kids. One of young wives toured me and Joy around Lille for the afternoon, during which we spent most of the time talking while walking, and not necessarily touring. Great fun! En bref, here is what I would like to share.

Vision
FEU exists to serve the Church, encouraging students who know Jesus and those who come to know him to plug into their local churches. While they offer a regular weekly line-up of events as well, they carefully work to balance and not overlap nor overextend students between their programming and the churches’. In Lille, they work with 4-7 partner churches to connect students with congregations, needs, and church life. FEU sees their role as a part of the Church to build the Church and seeks to cultivate in students habits which will carry them beyond university parachurch activities after receiving their diplomas.

What it Looks Like
FEU’s exist in Grenoble, Lille, Marseille, and Chambery, and take on a variety of forms. Most are facilitated either out of someone’s home, which is bought with the space and intent to rent rooms to students engaged with FEU such as in Lille, or a larger building such as in Grenoble. As we experienced today, in a house or building welcoming students, the front door is always open and someone is always in the home. On Thursdays the team meets together and stays together for a good part of the day, thus contributing to the community sense of the ministry. FEU is a part of France pour Christ’s mission and is a relatively new ministry as far as mission history goes. It is also a France-born ministry.

Weekly Ministries
FEU Lille’s weekly ministries begin on Sunday, transporting students to church in a large vehicle. For the afternoon, they gather students for football (soccer), which provides an excellent opportunity to connect with students outside of FEU. Sunday evenings they often organize a culture-themed party replete with food, music, maybe dancing, and hanging out. Mondays are prayer. Tuesdays are prayer and days on campus engaging in evangelization by giving 12-question Bible knowledge tests to passing students. This year they have been able to connect with 600-900 students through these questionnaires, many leading to more significant conversations and invitations to FEU. Thursday they offer a Bible study and are looking to begin next year shuffling students to churches for studies there instead depending on local church activity. Saturdays they organize tourist outings, beach trips, and other fun gatherings for students, many of whom they shared don’t get out and see much if it isn’t organized for them. Alongside regular activities, each member of the couples is actively engaged in meeting with students one-on-one for discipleship, prayer, and Bible study. Each couple and students involved in leadership are significantly involved in local churches so as to fuel FEU’s vision and model church participation for other students.

Personal Note
If you’ve been keeping up this year, church attendance has been a huge prayer request this year with students. Having seen increased faithfulness in attendance I am encouraged but also have needed wisdom in how to further connect these students with a church I’m myself learning. Being at FEU today provided a great source of encouragement, vision, and resources, seeing that here exists a ministry feeding into the life of the local church. Being there as well with Joy was excellent because I asked questions from the student ministry perspective and she asked from both local French church needs perspective as well as potential placement for short-termers with GEM such as myself (to which they are VERY open). Our different sets of questions were able to fuel a broader discussion and garner more well-rounded, useful information.

Before we headed out, we stopped by the “Catho,” the Catholic university and one of many Lille universities. According to Wikipedia, with over 97,000 students, this city is considered “one of the first student cities in France.” Let me add, nothing gets my blood pumping like a college campus. Nothing. And nothing gets it pumping more than one attracting national and international populations, such as Lille and such as Compiegne here, yet on a much smaller scale. Today my blood was really pumping.

Ah, feels like home...in front of the Catholic university main hall

On the way out of town, we drove through Roubaix, keeping our eyes out for potential mosques, which we know exist but for which I was unable to find addresses. Shocker. If you google Roubaix, you will pull up many articles on Muslim-civic interactions. This is considered one of the most heavily Muslim-populated cities in France and has attracted significant research attention in France and internationally.

Although we didn’t see much of Lille, if you are interested in checking out academic life, ministry opportunities, or want to visit a place not Paris (which I recommend), this is a great spot. Please feel free to leave a comment if you would like more information concerning FEU or other opportunities in Lille.

Passion: Paris

Just got in from Passion: Paris. Forgot my camera. Whoops. Students and young adults from my church had a blast!

Following is the song that brought me to weeping tears.

God of this City

I include the brief clips from Kampala, because it was their Ugandan prayers and financial gifts that covered us in Paris this night. As Louie Giglio shared, "When we asked leaders in Uganda if it would be weird for them to give money to the Paris event, they said, 'Uh, yeah.'" France and the Western World is always giving to African countries. But tonight as Louie proclaimed, "But tonight, you are receiving from Uganda, which is how God's Kingdom works. It all gets turned upside down." Amen.

Passion in Kampala
Worship in Kampala

Not My Day

Yesterday did not go at all as planned. In fact, everything I had written on my calendar didn't happen. I have a bike tire problem and since I'm a biking idiot cannot fix it myself. This has taken some time. I ended up going to back to L'Arche in the afternoon to see Sabine at the hospital with others, since I am delinquent and have not done so yet. I was also fielding calls a good part of the afternoon and evening concerning Passion: Paris details, which I was of course happy and equipped to do but had not realized would take so much time. Some items, albeit extra, like buying a birthday card for a friend and flowers for Sabine and groceries, were scrapped due to limited time and no wheels. A few other items rearranged my day and when I walked in at 6pm I felt a little overwhelmed to think about my unaccomplished to do list, yet all that I had done within the day was "supposed" to happen and there was nothing that I would have changed. Except my transportation issues...and to clarify, having my bike out of commission is a little like having your car out of commission. What I can accomplish in 30 minutes becomes 2 hours. You see the difference.

As well, transitioning to life back in the states requires some effort on this end and working according to stateside office hours. So when your day begins at 9am, my second day is beginning then too, around 4pm, if I'm here. And if not, which is often the case, my 6pm til about 10pmish. Fun times.

I fell asleep decompressing and processing the day with God as I looked out my lightly curtained windows at the dark sky. "Well, that just didn't go as planned, did it?" To which I promptly, with some Spirit help, responded, "Guess it wasn't your day after all?!" God and I had a nice laugh and chat about that before I cruised into sleepyville.

You would think yesterday would have situated me well for this morning but it didn't. I forgot to prep the coffee last night so didn't have any this morning. My bike which I thought was okay I discovered was flat again, a slow internal leak. So I called L'Arche while rolling down the street, aware that the cuisine group was all mine today, and said, I'm on my way but coming slowly on my bike. Now, I know it is not good for the frame to use a flat tire...but I could have cared less. I entered five minutes late still on the phone with my neighbor asking if he could help me take care of this problem. He and his friend would come by and pick it up and take it to get fixed. So while juggling a decreased number of cuisine participants, bike phone calls, etc, I glanced at an email which told me an email announcement about the June 7th JAO had not been sent. I wanted to throw ice at a fence (my mother's anger management plan for me as a child). On top of this I felt like a complete failure at L'Arche because while accomplishing the task, I was not fully present to the moment and needs of others and had to keep running out of the prayer and share time on the phone coordinating my bike pick up. Then it started to rain. I had not brought an umbrella and had determined I should not have woken up for this day. Pretty sure an English expletive came out. I called Marie-Pierre who I was meeting for lunch to say I would be late because I was on foot rather than bike. She understood. No worries. As well I was trying to get hold of colleagues to determine how to handle this JAO situation--was it a cultural timing/calendar issue I had to swallow? Should I suggest another date? Could we find one? Why wasn't this done earlier?!

Before I left L'Arche, three things happened. Valerie asked if we could grab coffee next week. Jordane, an assistant, asked if I wanted to eat at her foyer next week or two. Dalila who comes daily to Moulin invited me to dinner next Thursday, which is a big "validated" act to be able to invite someone into your foyer not as an assistant but as a "personne accuilli", handicapped person or literally "welcomed person."

Then when I met Marie-Pierre, she had met Natacha who was headed to the cafeteria alone. Can we eat together? Um, yeah! So we all three headed to the creperie nearby in centre ville and shared an absolutely wonderful time together. Marie-Pierre is eager to get together next week and it was wonderful to see Natacha and catch up a a bit. She's headed to Passion tonight with Nari, Clement, Sylvaine, and myself, all of GBU, and was pumped.

As I started my walk home after taking care of my yesterday's scrapped to do's out--post office, birthday card, grocery store--which is quick and easy to do if you are in centre ville, I breathed the cool windy spring air here that is constantly perfumed with fresh blooms. Since I'm always flying on my bike somewhere, sometimes the pace of walking and breathing is lost on me. I laughed as I hopped down a little side street. Well, God, I prayed in thought, you're using this morning to put me in a great spot for worship tonight are you not? You see, I've been a little cynical at times about Passion, not because I don't think it's great and that students will be refreshed. But here is this great big American event in English for French Christians, and I don't know enough to know how to personally sort through all my hang-ups about it. God repeatedly brought me back to my hardened heart and reminded me, You let me use what I will from this and just worship me. This morning, along with yesterday, was no different and it humbled me to realize it took a frustrating, out of it morning to ready me to enter the throne room. Shouldn't I always be softened and readied?

I was thinking as well on the way home on the question someone from my church posed for a bulletin insert upon my return, how has God used you? I wonder at the question and answer. Have I been used? Have I been useful? Have I been ready and willing? What would I look back over this year and believe God might have, in an odd moment of deciding to look on me as a daughter he could do something with for his purposes, seen for me. I think he saw Natacha's smile, Marie-Pierre's eagerness, Xue's sincerity, Sabine's pain, Dalila's invitation, Valerie's encouragement and peace, and my great brokenness. Then he did this--Plunk! Off you go, to Compiegne, do my bidding, and when you have a bad day or morning, I'll be there to give you a reason why you needed it.

Yesterday it was to be reminded my days are not my own. Today it was to prepare my heart for coming before him in my native tongue. And tomorrow, well, I hope tomorrow is better.

Famous Last Words

While home, I was able to engage in a personal study of “Famous Last Words” as I like to call it. I studied over the texts of Deuteronomy 29-33 (34), Matthew 28:16-20, Mark 16:9-20, Luke 24:13-53 & Acts 1:1-11, John 20:11-21:25, and gave a cursory glance to II Timothy, having followed much of a II Timothy sermon series back home. I wanted to learn from the examples of Moses, Jesus, and Paul principles of exiting ministry through what has been recorded in Scripture. While we can find all sorts of examples in history, which should not be disregarded, my personal preference is to begin with the Biblical texts and move out from there.

What I found in this study does not amount to a perfectly strung together prescriptive for leaving a place of ministry. Rather each text offers contextualized principles that we can today study and use as our contexts allow and need. If it is disconcerting to you that the Synoptic Gospels record for the most part similar material but some leave out (Mark) details others find necessary to gather (Luke), it will be important to realize two points. 1) Each book is written with a specific literary emphasis and their content aligns thus. 2) Common themes run throughout these Gospels, as we will find in this study—that of “doubt” or “disbelief.” So, while each ending of these books is not perfectly matched to the other, we can see now that even in their being written apart from one another, God then was crafting a most brilliant handbook (among other uses) for us today.

I would like to add this caveat—I am not a Biblical scholar nor am I an Old or New Testament historian, so my study and cultural understanding of the texts will be limited at best. If you want to go further with this study, I suggest grabbing a good commentary. However, the beauty of Scripture study as understood through a key Reformation point is that I a commoner may have access to reading and study of the Bible just as much as the most learned person, believing the Holy Spirit is at work to reveal truth as I go.

With all that then, here we go:

Deuteronomy 29-33 (34)—Trusting in the Passing

I want to spend most of the time looking at chapters 32-33, but a few things happen beforehand which are necessary to mention. One, God used Moses as his instrument to renew his covenant with the nation of Israel and all others gathered into their midst. Secondly, Moses knew his days on earth were numbered and so took the opportunity to name publicly his successor Joshua. He also reminded the people that while Joshua would be their leader, God would be going with them. We seem to always need both, do we not—a physical leader but a pointer that it is God in which all things hang together? Thirdly, Moses establishes a law for the express purpose of it teaching the generations to come to “hear and learn to fear the Lord.” At the end of his life, Moses does not take lightly nor easily forget the many times the people of Israel have turned their backs on God, and so takes the preemptive measure to establish a code, a system for bringing them to remembrance. And lastly, Moses, Joshua, and Yahweh took specific set aside time as three alone for Joshua’s commissioning. Despite what is to come with entering their promised land and despite how the Israelites will turn from God, Joshua holds as personal testimony that God will be going with him as he takes the leadership reigns.

Now that we have considered what comes before, let us look at chapters 32 and 33. Chapter 32 records Moses’ next to last words for Israel—a song. As I read, I saw that this song sees the works and person of God through the lens of his presence in the midst of his people. It is both warning and a reminding to the Israelites, but most definitively it is a naming of who God has been in their midst. Moses does not sing his own praises but rather the nearness of his God. Moses’ identity is not his own but is inextricably linked to a people who serve a particular God. He is not some wild individual wandering loose in the hot deserts but is a servant of God to a specific people. We cannot understand Moses as a leader without understanding who he was in the midst of the nation of Israel.

When we arrive at chapter 33, Moses no longer thinks his end is near but knows with certainty his life will end soon. He also understands this as a result of a lack of faith in the wilderness and will not enter into the land to which he has lead Israel, a hard way to go out if there ever was one. It seems that Moses does not fight but accepts and faithfully completes the work at hand. This faithfulness warrants that he bless the tribes of Israel. I do not have the knowledge to work specifically through the each blessing of chapter 33, but we can see this pattern:

1) Moses reminds them of whom God was as Israel initially gathered.
2) He gives specific blessings and prayers for each tribe.
3) He reminds Israel of who God is and remains because of what God did.
4) He continues to establish Israel’s identity in the person and work of Yahweh God.

What principles do we gain throughout this text and Moses’ example, which have not already been mentioned? We see that Moses is able to see the Promised Land, but dies having to trust God’s faithfulness to take the Israelites into it. Applied this means we are at times able to look into the good that is coming but must leave positions of ministry or leadership having our faith established in God’s ability to accomplish what he purposes, not our own. This is the ultimate test of leadership for Moses and for us—can we trust? Have we come to know and understand a God who is faithful? We also see in 34:7 that after 120 years of life and leadership, his eyes were undimmed and his vigor unabated (ESV translation). How are we leaving a ministry position? Are we dimmed with lessened vigor or are leaving as alive as we entered? Depending on our state, this may require we reevaluate how we engaged ministry and what was or became our source so that we leave as full as we came.

There is so much more to consider within this text—historically, culturally, theologically. I have only attempted a brush at the surface. But I hope we can look to Moses as a model of healthy closing leadership and ministry. He had his moments of faltering (don’t we all?!) during his years of being Israel’s leader, and in fact one of these provides the reason he dies this side of the promise. Nonetheless, as we read the text, we encounter much learned wisdom and gain practical principles for how we too can exit ministry roles and leadership positions.

Primary Principle—We are to trust God to fulfill his promises even if we don’t see them fulfilled.

Questions to Consider—Where are we placing our trust in our position of ministry? How have we/are we ordering ourselves in the work of ministering the Gospel and/or leading? What is our place and what is God’s? How do we need to be challenged to trust?

The Synoptic Gospels
While I pointedly handled issues of transferring leadership and ministry transition with Moses, with the following texts I simply want to consider their records and lift out principles for ministry transitions we find in the interactions between Jesus and the disciples. I do not necessarily name any of them as specific “what to do’s” when exiting ministry roles but rather consider these interactions key for our both sympathizing with and learning from how Jesus left a place he learned to call home for 33 years. As I read and studied, I was asking—what can I learn from Jesus’ words here and what can I learn from the disciples’ responses, presence, and records?

Matthew 28:16-20—Obedience Despite Doubt

This text includes the oft-quoted “Great Commission” yet it is also the text which, for me, leaves the most to be questioned and filled in. Wonderfully ordered, Mark and Luke follow Matthew spelling out in more detail how exactly the presence of doubt among the disciples was responded to by Jesus. However, to consider this text alone, I find the following two principles to be at work:

1) Doubt initially has a place. The eleven left were not all convinced either of Jesus’ resurrection or of Jesus’ appearing himself. And while we may read in other texts that Jesus responds to this, for Matthew’s record, we do not, which bears out significantly for both ministers of the Gospel and our understanding of Gospel. Does this passage indicate that we must have all of our questions resolved to be of use? Is there no room for doubt in the ministry of the Gospel? I believe the other passages will support the following—Jesus’ rebuke of their doubt does not discount its presence. In fact, it is in stages and according to very specific ministerial purposes that reasons for this doubt are alleviated. Matthew does not allow doubt to win out over belief and obedience, but he allows the reader to recognize it as a part of the minister’s process of spiritual growth and understanding. As a principle, the disciples are thus equipped to respond to doubt and false teaching among members of the Early Church, as many of the epistles will further recount.

2) The disciples were obedient. In verse 16 we read that they had gone to meet Jesus at a mountain “to which Jesus had directed them.” We are not told in Matthew when exactly after Jesus’ resurrection he gave them these orders, but we know they followed them. This then sets the ground for what Jesus will next tell them to do—“go therefore and make disciples of all nations…” Between their following Jesus around during his ministry and this moment, the disciples hit a few bumps in the road—disowning, disbelieving, distancing. Their meeting him on the mountain reestablished their willingness to be obedient, despite the presence of doubt. Jesus knew through their following a simple command that he could commission them and entrust them with this larger work of going out into the world in his name.

Questions to Consider—If doubt has its place, what space are we giving it? Does it take over and paralyze or does it push us to search Scripture, prayer, the record of history, and the person of God for answers? Is how we are responding to Jesus today indicative of how we will respond when he calls next time? How or how not and what needs to change?

Mark 16:9-20—Who to Believe and Why?

Mark’s short text begins to fill out for us what Jesus did with the disbelief. In three places the disciples’ disbelief is recorded, quite the punch-packer for such a brief record. I believe we will find in the text a reason for this unbelief, as well as a response established through the words of Jesus. First, briefly, let us consider how Jesus succinctly handled his disciples’ doubt of his resurrection. “Stop it,” in a word, was his rebuke. Appearing before them and at close proximity, he was able clearly in his true bodily form to respond to their doubt. He offered no other proof than himself. But, we may be presented with doubts in ministry—of others or our own—and if we cannot conjure up a touchable Jesus, how do we so powerfully respond? Our answer is in the text!

In verse 11, the disciples would not believe Mary Magdalene. In verse 13, some would not believe two witnesses. In verse 14, we read they were rebuked because “they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen.” As the adage goes, the proof is in the pudding. What do I mean? Was Mary not trustworthy? Were the other two regular liars? No. They were simply not Jesus. In response to Jesus’ physical presence they all believed. However, as we read on, Jesus ascended to heaven…but not before both commissioning them and teaching them that signs would accompany their belief and their ministry. In verse 20 we read that the Lord “confirmed the message” by signs. While Jesus stated specific signs, I have no desire to walk into the muddy argumentative waters of charismatic versus non-charismatic understanding, nor other understandings, of accompanying signs. The overarching principle is this—While Jesus may not be physically present, doubt of Jesus encountered in ministry may be alleviated by signs in and through Christians which will confirm the message, namely Jesus’ life and death, being shared or preached. We cannot expect on any terms Biblically to accomplish sharing the Gospel if life-giving signs are not complimenting a spoken message. If we learn anything from this text, it is to be reminded that words from us, the fallen Mary’s and other disciples of this world, can only convince others so far of Jesus’ life. If our words bear no accompanying signs, they fall empty and ineffective on hardened ground with good and Biblically grounded reason.

Primary Principle—Signs accompany belief in Jesus Christ and it is through these we may offer reason for his truth and invite others to believe.

Questions to Consider—How is our belief identified—do others know we are a disciple of Jesus by our love, our accompanying works, miraculous signs and wonders? If we told someone about Jesus tomorrow, would they have reason to believe us? Why or why not? (Note: The question is not will they but would they have reason—a significant distinction between what we can do and what the Spirit accomplishes.)

Luke 24:13-53/Acts 1:1-11—To Everything a Season and Reason

I love when a doctor writes a book. It’s detailed. It’s clear. It fills in the picture. Between these two texts, we are given the most information concerning Jesus’ final moments in earthly ministry. Thank you Luke.

These texts communicate more to us concerning the stages of disbelief and doubt along with God’s lifting of those veils. Let us consider first the verses which explain to us why disbelief among disciples occurred—veiling. This passage records the famous “road to Emmaus” scenario in which Jesus walked with two unidentified disciples along the road between Jerusalem and Emmaus. We see that even in verses 25-27 as Jesus spoke all the prophetic knowledge recorded concerning himself, they could not see that he himself was the prophecies’ fulfillment. It was not until an intimate moment breaking bread together that “their eyes were opened, and they recognized him” Yet by their recorded words, something had occurred in them as Jesus spoke on the road that confirmed his presence being revealed at the table. They did not come to see Jesus as himself even while “their hearts burned,” and we can assume that this was for a reason left unrecorded. A side note I would like to add here is this—Isn’t it interesting that the way in which Jesus spent his final hours with his disciples was the same way in which he chose to reveal himself after his resurrection—while breaking bread at a table? (Makes the French consideration of mealtime as holy seem not quite so far off, huh?)

Later as Jesus appeared to all eleven, we read that he “opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.” We can then assume that although he was re-teaching all that he spoke before his death, his words had not been fully received and understand, and thus applied. It is only now, after his resurrection, that the full import of his teachings make complete sense and mean something which spurs onto action those whom he gathered to be his witnesses.

How do these stages of unveiling square with the whole of this passage? In Luke 24:49 and Acts 1:4-5; 8 we come to see that the disciples are not released to fulfill his commandments until the final preparation of the Holy Spirit being poured out on them is accomplished. We also see in Acts 1:7 further veiling of God’s timing occurs concerning the establishment of his Kingdom. Why? Ministers of the Gospel are allowed into knowledge and ministering ability according to what God knows, not what we can see. Their eyes’ being veiled, Jesus’ asking them to remain in the city, and his Kingdom’s coming all indicate stages by which they are prepared for ministry. We cannot fully understand the specific reasoning behind each, as the text does not provide them nor are we at liberty to pull them from elsewhere. But the overarching truth remains that God knows how his disciples need to be equipped for the moment of ministry and when. Many times as the unveiling is occurring, we are not even able to name it as such but know that something has occurred by which we are further equipped to be disciples of the Gospel. The question then remains for us, are we sensitive to the Spirit’s work or are we trying to push through ministry formation barriers that are not allowed to come down yet? As ministers, too, are we sensitive to the Spirit’s leading as to how he would have us pull down veils for others or are we moving at our pace, be it fast or slow, impatient or fearful?

In closing out these texts, I want to draw our attention to a small piece but one that nonetheless correlates with our earlier passages in Deuteronomy. According to Luke 24:50, as Jesus left his disciples he blessed them. Luke may not give it much space here, but nonetheless we have in Scripture that Jesus did not only leave his disciples commanded and equipped. He left them with a word of blessing, meaning that their work on his behalf would be cared for by the very hands of God. If that is not a meaningful way in which to commission those to follow, I’m not sure what is.

Primary Principle—Only God can lift veils but we may participate in stages of the revealing of Jesus. This unveiling also syncs into God’s preparation of Gospel ministers in stages as well. All understanding and wisdom is not nor can be given at once but according to our present ministry need and purpose.

Questions to Consider—Can we look back and recognize stages of unveiling and spiritual development which equipped us for a present moment of ministry? Write them out and chart them. What veils are we participating in taking down and which ones are left to God to continue without us?

II Timothy

Having listened to an incredibly excellent sermon series from my pastor at Fellowship Bible Waco, I feel I can add no more than what I have already been taught about this passage. While I recommend the entire series, his teaching on II Timothy 4:6-22 is particularly pointed when considering the “last words” of a minister to a disciple. This sermon is what started my inquiry into “famous last words,” and so to my pastor, Paul, and Timothy this study is indebted.

Sources for Study
If you’re interested in more studies in any of these passages, I recommend the following easy-to-use study aids. Unfortunately I don’t have commentaries at my disposal to recommend but as soon as I acquire some, this study will be beefed up with their aid!

Ryken’s Bible Handbook; Ryken, Ryken, and Wilhoit
How to Read the Bible for All its Worth; Fee and Stuart
What the Bible is All About; Henrietta Mears

Note: But she left out John! No, he’s coming later because I love John so much he gets his own entry. Look forward to that some time this week.