Yard Sale: Next Friday & Saturday

Get excited because Ryan and I are selling a lot of our stuff August 24 & 25, next Friday and Saturday, from 8am–1pm (and you know how great our taste in stuff is right?). But in all seriousness, we need to do some purging before we go to Ohio and definitely before heading to France, so in a way, by buying some of our things, you are helping us get one step closer. So if you are local, come on over to the church parsonage yard (italicizing "yard" to emphasize the Boston accent) next Friday and Saturday!

In Christ's perfect timing

We shared this in our July newsletter but I thought it made sense to share it on the blog as well so here goes. Through much thought, prayer, and discussion we have decided to transition back to Ohio in mid-November to complete the rest of our partnership development for France there. We see this as the logical next step for several reasons, a couple reasons being:

• We want to have time to say goodbye to family and friends in Ohio.
• We have numerous opportunities available to us for partnership development in Ohio as well because we have more years invested in relationships there.

It is going to be very sad to say goodbye to so many people who have become dear to us over the course of time that we have been in Massachusetts. Our entire marriage has taken place here and we have grown so much, through Ryan’s two degrees, my work at the Harvard School of Public Health, our involvement at church, and the amazing friendships we’ve made, it feels strange to wrap up what has been an amazing season of our lives. But we are confident that this is the Lord’s leading and that it is the next step on our way to serving Him in France. The first stop before France just happens to be Ohio. So with this news, our timeline of getting to France has adjusted slightly and this is the new plan. 

Our hope is to arrive in France by August 2013. Once there, our first year will be devoted to language learning and immersing ourselves in the culture, and then we will take part in an internship with an established French church. With the guidance of World Team leaders in France, we will research locations and begin working with a team to establish a new community of believers. In this new church community, we will disciple and train French nationals to be leaders themselves with the goal that the church we plant will multiply itself in years to come under the initiative of French Christians. This will happen as we share the Gospel, build relationships, and demonstrate the love of Christ in our community. It is our prayer that the Holy Spirit will work through our efforts to yield a vibrant body of believers grounded in the truth of Scripture.

And we can’t wait to get started!

A thought on the Olympics

I really enjoy watching the Olympics, and I love the excitement of the opening ceremonies. The host country always puts on an elaborate show followed by all the athletes marching in dressed in styles and costumes that represent their countries. It’s such an amazing spectacle. But it struck me as I watched the opening ceremony this year that this is just the smallest taste of what Heaven will be like. People from all over the world gathered together in excitement and celebration, diverse but united at the same time. We won’t be celebrating sports, but Jesus our Lord who gave his life for every single one of us.

I like thinking about it.

“After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice: ‘Salvation belongs to our God, 
who sits on the throne, 
and to the Lamb’” — Revelation 7:9-10

Vacation Bible School

Recently I had the privilege to share about our ministry with a Vacation Bible School at one of our partnering churches. I got to tell them about how God calls all of us to be a part of his mission, and that He wants people everywhere to know Him. It was fun and the kids had a bunch of questions about what it means to be a missionary and about France. My favorite question though was, “What’s the deal with mimes?” If you’re wondering that now, I don’t have an answer, but I do have some pictures from the time.

June 2012: What, when and where

As you may have noticed, we didn’t have any blog posts in June or so far in July. This wasn’t intentional, we have been so busy we’ve only had time to think or daydream about blog posts rather than actually bring them into reality. But, a lot of great things have happened that I thought I would share. 

• Memorial Day Weekend: We enjoyed a visit with our friends, the Wailes, who came to Marblehead.
• June 1st: We met with our World Team coach Becky, who gave us encouragement and direction for the month.
• June 2nd: Our dear friends hosted the first ever French Night for us in Marblehead, MA and it went great.
• June 4th: Our small group began studying the book of Matthew.
• June 7th: I attended our church’s bi-weekly Pastoral Search Committee meeting as we continue to seek the next leader God has for Grace Community Church in Marblehead, MA.
• June 14–25th: We went to Ohio and had the privilege of sharing our vision for France with 2 church pastors and 10 individual families.
• June 17th: We spent the weekend with my parents and had a fun Fathers day at the Cincinnati Zoo.
• June 18th: The second French Night was hosted in Springfield, OH!
• June 19–22nd: Ryan got a fever and lost his voice for 3 days (sad).
• June 23rd: We attended a Bennett family cookout and had a great visit with some of Ryan’s immediate and extended family.
• June 26th: I caught the cold Ryan had and fought it for a while.
• June 29th: We made the last payment EVER for our college debt, we are now completely debt free!
• July 4th: We spent the birthday of America with our great friends, the Albertsons, in East Boston. We had to dodge a few of God’s fireworks (lightning) but it was a great time. 

Our zoo fun! 

French Night in Springfield, Ohio

It has been such a great summer, filled with many visits with our families and dear dear friends. 

Misconception: We’re going to be living the high life

I really like the idea of having a Monthly Misconception spotlight because frequently a lot of people will express and have similar questions and concerns. It is important when people are honest and bring these questions and concerns to light. It’s a great opportunity to thoughtfully and prayerfully correct false assumptions, whether those false assumptions are other peoples or our own. I am confident that others have similar questions or concerns and either don’t want to ask or don’t have the chance to ask us personally, so my hope is that this monthly spotlight will answer some questions and encourage people to come to us with others. So let’s do this. 

Love that this photo is complicated AND similar to the layout of Paris

First Misconception: We’re going to be living the high life in France

A lot of people look through our finance post or the finance page in our ministry overview and they kind of gasp or sometimes laugh out loud. We need to raise close to $8,000 in ongoing monthly support in order to live in France and start new communities of believers there. Instantly, a lot of people multiply this figure by 12 and think… these kids are going to be living on $96,000 a year, that’s close to -or- more than what I make. We understand the shock, we experienced a similar reaction when first seeing these figures. But what we learned, and what you need to realize, is that it's not that simple. 

Out of the $8,000 we need to raise each month, Ryan and I will actually be living on around 3,250 euro per month (similar to what we live on in dollars now actually). And considering we are hoping to be living in Paris, probably in a modest two bedroom apartment, rent could realistically be around 1,500–2,000 euro per month. Some of you may be concerned about this now, how will we live on this in one of the most expensive cities in the world? The answer is simple, we will aim to live simply and responsibly. 

The other question you may be wondering now is, what happens to the rest of the money? Well, a lot actually. 

• First a small chunk is set aside for the currency conversion from dollars to euros (this is changing almost daily and a complicated matter in itself, we'll just leave it at that for now) 
• A substantial chunk goes to cover our health insurance (both in the U.S. and in France so we’re covered both places) 
• A small chunk is put into a separate account for our retirement someday (I'm very thankful World Team requires us to do this)  
• Another small chunk is set aside for ministry expenses above and beyond our basic living expenses (this helps us better serve the French whether we’re hosting them in our home, purchasing bibles or other resources for them, etc)
• And lastly another chunk (14.5%) goes back to World Team, our sending organization, so they can continue to support and train missionaries like us

So that is pretty much it. If you still have questions, both Ryan and I are happy to talk about it more. We want to be as open and humble as possible with you about our finances and continually express our thankfulness for the many financial partners we have. Ryan wrote a series a while ago about why we raise financial support and why we believe it's a biblical thing to do, I won’t re-hash that but you are welcome to check that out if you haven't yet.  

Why France? Why Paris?

We’ve written before about why we feel lead to do church-planting in Paris, France but we’re asked these questions often. Sometimes we’re asked in a sincere and interested way and sometimes we’re asked in a “do you really expect me to believe that France needs missionaries” sort of way. However we’re asked though, I want to try to sum up our answer as succinctly as possible. It comes down to four things:

“All nations” — Need — Strategy — Call

1. All Nations: Jesus said to make disciples of all nations. Frankly, that’s enough for me, but this means that every group of people is a field in which to sow the Gospel. Every single one. No nation is exempt, no matter how wealthy or poor or democratized or whatever. Jesus said all nations, and France is a nation. Therefore, France needs people going there and making disciples.

2. Need: There are different kinds of need. There are physical needs like poverty, malnutrition, lack of education, and the list goes on. These things are serious, and God’s people must address them. However, there is also spiritual need. God told Jonah that the enormous cosmopolitan city of Nineveh was full of people who didn’t know their right hand from their left, meaning they were spiritually blind. They needed someone to help them see the truth. Spiritual need can only be addressed by God’s people. In fact, I would argue that if you wanted to do something about the physical needs of the world, then there needs to be multiplying communities of people following Jesus to have a greater impact on addressing those needs. Don’t think that I’m saying that addressing the often staggering amount of physical suffering in the world is something that followers of Jesus can put off for the time being, but what I am saying is that we’ll have a much greater impact if we see physical need and spiritual need as two sides of the same coin. France has staggering spiritual need.

3. Strategy: I’ve been general thus far, but now more specifically let’s talk about Paris. Historically, economically, politically, any way you want to slice it, Paris is one of the most important cities in Western Europe and the world for that matter. Paris is to France what Washington D.C., New York, and L.A. are to America. It has the politicians, the business people, the thinkers, the creative people, and more. When Paul planted churches he went to all the major cities of the ancient world; Ephesus, Corinth, Rome, because he knew that if you can start a movement of people following Jesus in a major city, then it will have the greatest impact on the area around it. Influence often works from the top down. If Paris had thriving and multiplying churches, then the impact on France as a whole would be enormous. Paris is extremely strategic. 

4. Call: Interwoven through all of this is our personal call. God has worked in us in such a way that over the past six or more years He has given us a heart for the country of France and its people. We feel personally burdened by this people’s darkness, and we want to get involved. God has brought this about through varied and different ways, but we feel more convinced than ever that this is where he is calling us. Call can be hard to define, but you know it when you feel it. We’ve felt it for a while, and we are attempting to do our best to follow God’s call.