Why should we pray for revival for France!

Why should you pray for revival?Specifically, we invite you to pray for revival! Make this day, 28 May a day of prayer and fasting for revival. Pray and fast as the Lord and His Spirit leads you. Make it the beginning of your committed prayers and fasting for Revival!

Why should you pray for revival?

Revival is an in-breaking of God’s kingdom into our broken and suffering world with the grace, mercy and love of God and reorders our lives, reorders our church, and transforms the world so it will be never the same again! Revival humbles many and saves many! That’s why you should pray for revival! Here are some suggestions how to pray and what to pray for. These are only a few, add your owns as the Spirit leads you.

• Pray for revival, pray for God’s power to be manifest around us and in us, making us faithful witnesses of Jesus Christ (Acts 1:8)! We, humans have got power and ability to do great things, achieve amazing feats, but our power and abilities have been corrupted by sinfulness and we can never achieve and do what God can do in the world! Pray for Holy Spirit to be poured out in greater measure into your life, into our church family!
• Pray for revival, pray for a great awakening (Acts 3:19-20). We have become so sleepy towards God, not just towards sermons! Pray to be awakened, refreshed to the full majesty and glory of God, as Isaiah did (Isaiah 6:1-8)!
• Pray for revival, pray for the salvation of people around you, in your home, workplace, in our schools, hospitals, police stations, shops, neighbourhood, and not forgetting the church! A revived church is noticed by others, and they will ask the questions: What does this mean? What shall we do? (Acts 2:12; 2:37), which brings them to faith in Jesus! Pray that Jesus will be lifted up in our lives as a church family, He will be honoured, and people will be drawn to him!

Revival is an in-breaking of God’s kingdom into our broken and suffering world with the grace, mercy and love of God and reorders our lives, reorders our church, and transforms the world so it will be never the same again! Revival humbles many and saves many! That’s why you should pray for revival! Here are some suggestions how to pray and what to pray for. These are only a few, add your owns as the Spirit leads you.

• Pray for revival, pray for God’s power to be manifest around us and in us, making us faithful witnesses of Jesus Christ (Acts 1:8)! We, humans have got power and ability to do great things, achieve amazing feats, but our power and abilities have been corrupted by sinfulness and we can never achieve and do what God can do in the world! Pray for Holy Spirit to be poured out in greater measure into your life, into our church family!
• Pray for revival, pray for a great awakening (Acts 3:19-20). We have become so sleepy towards God, not just towards sermons! Pray to be awakened, refreshed to the full majesty and glory of God, as Isaiah did (Isaiah 6:1-8)!
• Pray for revival, pray for the salvation of people around you, in your home, workplace, in our schools, hospitals, police stations, shops, neighbourhood, and not forgetting the church! A revived church is noticed by others, and they will ask the questions: What does this mean? What shall we do? (Acts 2:12; 2:37), which brings them to faith in Jesus! Pray that Jesus will be lifted up in our lives as a church family, He will be honoured, and people will be drawn to him!

In praise of small churches!

Dear friends, after enjoying 'my' zoom, I thought I would research things about small churches, and I found a very interesting article, I would like to share a few ideas with you! We moved to a small town in France, Civray (south of Poitiers) in 2016. We attend a small church that counts about 50 English people and a handful of French people. We have two retired pastors, my hubby who is English, and our friend who is Scottish. 

A small church puts everyone to work

The larger the organization of any kind, the smaller the percentage that will handle the actual work. In a small church, everyone is needed to work and, if it's a "great small church," everyone is put to work.

A small church uses volunteers everywhere--in the office, cleaning the buildings, mowing the lawn, teaching children, leading choirs, playing the piano. A small church will not hire a painting contractor to refurbish the buildings; it will have a "work day" and the members will do it all on a Saturday. A small church, one that does it right, will come closer than most to fulfilling Romans 12:3-8 where each member uses his/her spiritual gifts to do the work God gives to them.

A small church can excel at fellowship

My personal prescription for Christian fellowship is: each member of the church loves the Lord, likes each other, and welcomes the newcomer to their midst. When they work together, they have fun doing it. If a newcomer feels intimidated on walking into a huge religious edifice, he will feel more comfortable entering a small, humbler church building. A small church can take advantage of this.

Instead of bemoaning the absence of stained glass windows and pipe organs and vaulted ceilings, the members of a small church will recognize that those can be negatives to an unchurched fellow entering for the first time. He is far more likely to feel at home in New Home Church No. 2 than the First-Metro Church. The danger with small churches, of course, is that they will have great fellowship within their own membership but freeze out the newcomer. The members have known each other for so long, they may function more like a large Sunday School class than a Church of the Lord Jesus Christ.

At the invitation of the pastor, I was visiting Bridgeton Baptist Church a few miles from my house. The church sits in a lovely middle-class neighborhood but has not grown in years. The pastor was trying to find the key to bringing in new people. "If we don't," he said, "this church is going to die within one generation." The forty or fifty members seemed to average 60 in age. That morning, I met several of them and enjoyed their fellowship. Later, I told the pastor, "What your people see as its problem, you should turn to an advantage."The problem, most of them felt, was the age of the members. 

Bearing in mind the Lord is faithful and He will look after His flock. In Matthew 16, 13-26 we read: 

Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He was asking His disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" 14 And they said, "Some say John the Baptist; and others, Elijah; but still others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets." 15 He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" 16 Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." 17 And Jesus said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. 18 I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. 19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven." 20 Then He warned the disciples that they should tell no one that He was the Christ. 

Inspired by this article: In praise of Small Churches! by JOE MCKEEVER - Original publication date: February 23, 2010

What about you, my dear readers, it would be lovely to hear from you !

Living in France!

I'm settling down in France slowly but surely. In September I started teaching in a secondary school in Angouleme and I love it. What is demanding is driving there from where we live in Civray (Vienne) because I need to be there just before 8 a.m. three days a week. I need to live our house at 6:30 to get there for 7:30 and I usually find a parking place in the Parking blanc. 

So I welcome the holidays! I am going to be able to sleep a little more in the  morning instead of getting up at 6 a.m. I might also go to bed later than 11 p.m. without feeling exhausted in the morning. 

The last day of term at our school was great. We were all gathered in the court yard at 11 and listened to every year presentation on different themes. Students expressed what they felt about the main Christian themes: Joy, Love, Hope, Peace in different ways. The most poignant was the Year 7 call to stop the persecution of Christian in Aleppo and to help the Syrian refugees.

At lunch time I went in town for lunch with four colleagues and had a cheesy omelette with Gruyere.   

On the Thursday, it is customary for the English teachers to set up a Christmas market in the préau. It was well attended. The kids loved it, they could buy two different kins of mince pies, small and normal size, crackers, and plenty of other artefacts that my colleagues managed to order a month ago!

Wednesday afternoon, Steven and I managed to have some quiet time in St Macoux. There is a restaurant by the side of a étang and we had a drink and a place of chips. Not many birds in sight though because it was cold!