Today was our day off from Roubaix. To relax we thought it would be great to try and get into Paris to see what it was like.  Pastor A offered to drive us two hours towards Paris and then we could catch the Metro into downtown Paris. Rich was our tour guide and did awesome taking us around Paris.  He had the metro map and the map of Paris figured out before we even got there.

Our Group after the Eiffel Tower

When we arrived in Paris we went directly to the Eiffel tower.  There are four pillars (or legs) that you can go on to get up to the top. One of the legs was closed and the other two you had to take the elevator up.  Unfortunately when we arrived the very top (3^rd Stage) of the tower was closed.  Us being the manly men that we are decided we could walk up the steps and didn’t need the elevator.  It was also a bit cheaper so that was an additional bonus.  670 steps or so later we made it

all the way to the 2^nd Stage. The blessing though came as we were walking up.  Sometime between the time we left the bottom and got to the second stage they opened up the top level.  Since we had only bought walking tickets we had to wait in a line to get tickets for the third stage.  The line wasn’t bad and before long we were on our way up the elevator to the top.

It was really awesome to go all the way to the top of the tower and it is something we are all glad we did. We spent about two and a half hours all together getting to the top, looking around and then descending.  When we had finished with the tower we walked back towards the center of town where we could take some more pictures of the tower.

Notre Dame

We proceeded to go to lunch in Paris.  Needless to say, but we may have had the most expensive Coca-Cola’s ever sitting in the shadow of the Eiffel tower.  The rest of the day was filled with more sightseeing, a little shopping and lots of walking!  We visited the Arc-d’triomph (arch of triumph), which was built, by Napoleon and sits at the top of the Champs-Elysees, which is one of the most famous roads in Paris (think where the Tour de France finishes). After this we walked to the Louvre.  Although we did not go in this is where the Mona Lisa is housed. Finally, we walked down to Notre Dame

.

We would have loved to go inside but the line to get in was way to long and we would not have made it back to meet Ali in time.  While we walked a lot and were all tired it was well worth it and it will be something that we remember forever.We got back to our apartment around 9:30 pm.  Dan and I walked down to KFC which is about 10-15 minutes away and picked up two buckets of chicken, Ryan and Hun went and picked up some baguettes, soda and juice and we had a good old fashioned American dinner to finish off the day.

Before bed we got to have some more time sharing with one another and praying.  All together it was a great day.

SixTen,

Thank you for your prayers for our trip.  I will be posting one more time.  The next post will be from the United States, Lord-willing. The post for Sunday will not go on most likely until we return home. The post for Saturday will go up around 5:00 pm (U.S. time).  Thanks for your prayers and we hope that you will lift us up in prayer as we travel and please also continue to pray for the hearts of those in Roubaix.

Today was a good day.  We started off the day with our normal morning routine.  We woke up sometime around 8:00-8:30 am.  After we had all rolled our aching bodies out of bed we had a light breakfast of French baguettes, cereal, yogurt and/or Clif bars. After breakfast the three brothers met us at our apartment and walked us down to the church.  We had devotions with Pastor P and spent some time praying and talking through Acts 8. The time was good, the discussion was good and the prayer was good.  It will be tough to not have these devotion times in the morning as a group when we return to the states.

After devotions we spent the next few hours in our morning routine, playing games with the youth, drinking coffee and helping Francois prepare the lunchtime meal.  I had the opportunity to peel potatoes that had already been boiled so I had to flake the skin off with my fingers (Krista I will never complain about peeling potatoes again). A couple of the other guys used the time to teach Clement and Caleb the American game of Pickle…For those of you who don’t know what Pickle is you can try looking it up on Wikipedia, may also be called run-down…think Sandlot and Benny “The Jet” Santiago.  After a delicious lunch that consisted of fresh mozzarella cheese on tomatoes, garlic potatoes, baguettes and cold cut sandwiches we started to get ready for the soccer field.

We had told Billel and Areski that we would be down at the fields around 2:30 pm. Both of them were there at 2:30 (which is a rarity for them to be on time in North African culture) and may have been there before 2:30.  Unfortunately when we arrived they were the only two that really wanted to have a game with us.  So we hung around and played another game on our own, World Cup (similar to half-court basketball with teams). After about 20-30 minutes a group of guys decided that they were ready to play against us so we started playing with them.  They were probably the best “team” that we played all week.  That coupled with the fact that we gave them Brock made it the first game that we actually were playing harder than normal.  They ended up whooping us.  As that game continued some of the other guys that we had been playing with during the week started to show up. They started to integrate themselves into the game, however they brought the game to a screeching halt because they are such individual players.  There were a number of times that players from the original game (not our group) threatened to walk off the field because the guys they were playing with were not passing. In the end we called that game after about 20 minutes, all in all we probably played for around 2.5 hours.

That evening we were scheduled to visit Pastor P’s house for dinner so we were unable to stay with Billel and Ariske.  Before we left we got their contact information and also took a photo

Our Group with Billel and Areski

with them. Our hope is that we can hang out with them a bit on Sunday and at least offer to pray with them.  When we left for Pastor P’s house we went by three different methods.  Brock, Dan and Hun got a ride with Carey and Pastor P straight to his house.  Rich, Ryan and myself took the metro to the end of France with Geoffrey and Caleb.  When we got to the end of the metro station Pastor P met us and offered to drive a few of us to his house which according to Geoffrey was only about 5-10 minutes away.  Since there were only 4 seats Rich, Ryan and Caleb went with Pastor P in his car while Geoffrey and I walked.  I’m not sure if the French 5-10 minutes is different than the U.S. 5-10 minutes but I can assure you that it was more than a 5-10 minute walk.  The one positive of the experience is that I can say I walked from France to Belgium!

When we arrived at the house we were served an excellent meal.  The meal consisted of pork with an apple, onion and other delicious ingredients sauce, potatoes, salad, corn salad and some various Belgian beers. In Belgium the legal drinking age is 16, so Carey was actually more knowledgeable than us on the subject matter because it is more a part of their culture. At the meal were two of Carey’s friends Laurita and Florine who are both the same year as Carey at school.  We were also joined by Elsie and Molly who are Carey’s younger sisters, Pastor P and his wife, Pastor A, and Mark who is the overseer of the church here in Roubaix.  It was a wonderful group and much to my delight we were able to play a card game called “Jungle Speed”.  It was actually not a bad game, I just wasn’t very good at it/didn’t really understand the rules.  Fortunately Elsie was telling me what to do the whole time. After dinner Pastor A and Mark drove us back to our apartment and we headed off to bed around 12:30 am.

Today was a day where we didn’t do a ton but I think that God was pleased with what happened today. We started off just as we had the days before.  The boys Kenan, Caleb and Clement (these are just local boys from the church) joined us around 9:30 am.  Hun had wanted to stop down at the fast food restaurant with Wi-Fi so Kenan took him down, however much to Hun’s and all our surprise he wanted to take him on his scooter. To say that Kenan is a little wild would be putting it mildly, we have nicknamed him “Train Wreck” because he is always causing havoc. So Hun was fortunate enough to get a ride with Kenan.

Hun with Kenan (Train wreck) on his scooter

The two of them caught up to us as we were walking to the church, stopped and talked to us and then Kenan proceeded to pull out in front of an oncoming ambulance and speed down the road, train wreck.

When we got to church we had a quick cup of coffee and then proceeded to a house of two church members. The house was approximately 30 minutes away outside of Roubaix.  Michel (husband) and Annie (wife) were the owners of the home we visited.  They just moved from the south of France (near Marseille) and have begun going to church in Roubaix.  Their house was extremely nice and they had asked if we could help them move some furniture and help them unpack a bit.  In typical SixTen fashion we were able to knock out all that Annie had wanted us to move and more in just under an hour.  Michel and Annie then treated us to lunch.  The food was a dish that is from Madagascar.  The two of them have lived all over the world and have acquired quite a wide variety of recipes.  We had a great time getting to know them and will be continuing ot lift them in prayer as we return to the U.S.

After we finished at their house we drove past an old “castle”

The "Old Castle"

it was actually a place where knights could relax when going out or coming in from the field.  We got a short tour of the castle and then headed back to Roubaix.  As soon as we got back into the church we started to change and get ready to play soccer. We got up to the field and saw many of the same guys we had been playing with over the last couple of days as well as some other new faces.  Geoffrey translated for us and we got a game set-up.

The game went well (for us) and we offered to change up teams a number of times but the guys on the other team seemed somewhat stubborn.  The final score of the game ended up being 11-1. Geoffrey told us that some of the guys on the team were not to happy and that today might not be a good day to invite them back for coffee.  However, we felt pretty confident that God was prompting us to invite two guys back in particular.  Unfortunately these two guys had left early and were nowhere to be found.  It was disheartening for us so we started to pray and started to head home.  Wouldn’t you know that as we were leaving the two guys we had wanted to invite back to the church were walking out of the park as we were walking out as well.

We had some small talk with them with Geoffrey and Carey translating and then invited them back to the church. The two boys said that they would like to come back and joined us on our walk back to the church. The two boys that joined us were Billel (bee-lel) and Areski (uh-re-ski).  They walked with us back to the church and when they arrived they had no reservations about even entering the church.  Short aside: Normally Muslims would have a difficult time and would not even enter a Christian church let alone be seen near one.  Also, when they eat a meal that is made of meat it would need to be “halal”.  Halal means that the meat would need to be slaughtered in a specific way in order for a Muslim to eat.  This would include things like the animal facing Mecca as it is killed, having it’s throat slit and then allowing all of the blood to drain out.  There are other steps, but these are the most important. Billel and Areski both hung out with us and the other youth in the church for a while before we were served dinner.  Both of them asked if the meat was halal and Francois explained that they were in a Christian church and that they should not expect to eat meat that was halal. Both of them decided to eat the meal anyways.  After dinner they hung out with us for the next couple of hours. When it was time to leave they did not give the typical response of “we will see you tomorrow, it is Allah’s will” and instead said “we will see you tomorrow”.  This was such an answer to prayer and we are excited to see them tomorrow (Friday).

One other exciting thing happened while we were at the church, Fred who is from Seattle, Washington joined us.  He is a friend of Pastor A’s and visits frequently to Roubaix and this year has an opportunity to enter Algeria on a special visa.  This is a huge deal and if we could all be praying for Fred as he goes into Algeria to meet with individuals.

Please continue to pray for divine appointments, God’s favor to rest on us as we talk with these individuals, Geoffrey and other youth of the church as they will be the ones who will continue the relationships with these boys, the two boys and that they would see a difference in us and be interested in why.  The boys commented that they had a wonderful time and really enjoyed being around us and the other youth. We are prayerful that we will continue to make inroads.

SixTen,

Please be in prayer for us as we continue to develop relationships and pray with those we come into contact.  Also, pray for our bodies as playing this much soccer is hard on our bodies. Thank you for your prayers so far, we can feel them and see them being answered everyday.

This morning was a bit of a later start. It was nice to get a bit more sleep.  We did this because of the longer day the night before we didn’t wake up until around 8:30 am.  We got up and had a very light breakfast (some baguettes and cereal).  Around 9:00 Geoffrey, Kenan, Caleb and Clement showed up and had some cereal with us.  They walked with us from the apartment to the church (10:00 am) where we met Pastor P, Carey and Francois.  We spent some time in Acts Chapter 4 and discussed Acts 4:31 specifically, “And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.” We prayed that we would have boldness in sharing Christ with the people of Roubaix. Finally we prayed as a group and finished up around 11:30 am.

We spent the next bit of time hanging out with the kids as Francois prepared a light lunch before we headed to one of the church member’s house for a prayer session and another light meal. The light lunch consisted of a “French-dipped” sandwich (filled with some type of meat, onions and au jus).  After lunch had been served Francois served us crème brulee. This was absolutely fabulous.  Francois and his cooking have blessed us beyond all understanding.  It has been such a blessing to have such good food throughout the week. We stayed at the church for a bit longer today (until about 3:00 pm) and then left for Jean-Marie’s (member of the church) house where we were going to pray and have a light dinner.

Because of the number of people we had going over to Jean-Marie’s house we needed to take two cars.  All together we took the six of us and five of the youth from the church. When we arrived at Jean-Marie’s house we had been told that it was in a very bad section of Roubaix.  Jean-Marie’s house was very nice and you can just tell he loves Jesus because what He has done in his life. Jean-Marie offered us some small appetizers (peanuts, pistachios, potato chips, Coca-Cola, Fanta) and we sat around as a group and talked for a bit.

Our Group at Jean-Marie's

Around this time some of Jean-Marie’s family started showing up.  Short aside: All together he has six children from two different marriages.  In short he fell away from following Jesus and has had two failed marriages. Also his children also did had not talked to him for 20+ years.  It has only been in the last two years since he has rededicated his life to Christ that his children have now started to talk with him (they are not Christians and there was a time where Francois shared his testimony and we prayed with one of his daughters). His family members said they would like to play a game with us.  At this point I was thinking we would play rummy or some cheesy board game.  Instead they started setting up boundaries and had Pastor A explain the rules to us.  After listening to the rules for all of about a minute we figured out what the game really was, yes folks that’s right, it was French Dodgeball.  While I expected to play soccer on another continent I definitely did not figure on playing Dodgeball (I am sure that Kim will be happy to hear this).   The children and the other French pastors wanted to play a game of French vs. Americans. The rules were slightly different but we (our SixTen team) made the decision that we would not throw hard until they threw hard.  Needless to say that lasted all of about 5 seconds.  To say we dominated the Frenchies is an understatement.  They actually asked if we were tired after we decimated them the second game.  The “playing area” was actually 12 yards by 10 yards and was littered with glass, screws, a large tree in the middle of the field, clothesline including pole and large divots in the ground.  The center dividing line was three large boxes across the middle of the “playing area”.

The "Playing Area"

After the second game they (the French team) thought that it was wise to mix up the teams. These games were at least a bit more even as the Americans got split up.  Yes, those of you that are keeping track of our Americans vs. French record, we are still undefeated (5-0, 3 soccer games and 2 dodgeball games).

After WWIII (France vs. America) we had drinks to cool off and then had an opportunity to walk and pray throughout the housing complex that we were in.  When we were walking and praying we were able to use conversational prayer.  Conversational prayer is where you simply talk normally as if you were in a conversation and pray.  In our case we were walking so that it looked like we were just “foreigners” who were having a conversation around this complex. When we had walked around the entire complex and prayed we returned back to Jean-Marie’s house and had a feast that he and his daughters had prepared.  The food was delicious but the fellowship

Group after dinner at Jean-Marie's

Jean-Marie with our group

was even better. Jean-Marie opened his house to us and seemed to spare no expense in providing for us.  It was a good reminder of how we should love our brother’s and sister’s in Christ. We finished the night as stated above hearing Francois’ testimony, we also got to hear Jean-Marie’s testimony.  It was so great to meet somebody who is so passionate about Jesus and to be able to fellowship with them even though we don’t speak the same language.  He asked all about Harrisburg/Mechanicsburg and even invited us back for his wedding in September.  He said in closing that he no longer does things in his own strength, but that it is all done in the strength of God.  So this marriage and his life from here on out will all be for the glory of God. We got back home at approximately 11:00 pm, got showered and ready for bed, of course Kenan, Caleb and Clement all wanted to spend some time with us as we got ready for bed so they hung out with us as well before we headed off to bed.

SixTen,

Our apologies for not getting these up sooner, but we have been extremely busy.  We will post two updates today.  The second one should post a bit later today, sometime around 5:00 pm.  We hope that you are blessed by these and enjoy our pictures.

From Left to Right: (Back Row) - Dan, Rich, Geoffrey, Sean, Kenan, Brock, Hun (Front Row) - Caleb, Clement, Ryan, Carey

Today was an awesome day. The day started off just as yesterday did with Rich getting up and making us eggs.  For breakfast Kenan, Caleb, and Clement all joined us for breakfast.  Around 9:30 we left for the day and went to the church.  When we arrived at the church we spent the first hour or so talking about the first chapter in Acts as a group.  Pastor P led us through the passage and asked us to share what our thoughts were on the passage.  After some good discussion and some prayer (all about what we were thankful for in relation to Roubaix) we spent the next hour or so hanging out with Caleb, Clement and Carey (Pastor P’s Daughter). The youth who attend the church are in need of prayer. Prayers for the youth should be specifically for the pressures that they face everyday from outside sources (i.e. Islam, Drugs, Violence, etc.).

From here we had Francois

Francois and Caleb

(an older gentleman who travels between France and Miami).  Francois is a passionate Christian who is originally from Algeria.  He is also our cook for the week and has been making some unbelievably good food.  I asked him today if he loved cooking, his response, “I do not love cooking, I enjoy it.  I love God.”  His passion and zeal can be seen as he moves around the kitchen singing and humming to himself. For lunch Francois made macaroni and cheese, however the cheese was actually Parmesan and he also put marinara on the macaroni. This macaroni and cheese was accompanied with a breaded fish and of course French baguettes (bread may be the national icon for France). When we finished lunch we cleaned the dishes and hung out for a little until we were ready to leave for the soccer fields.  Before we left for the fields Geoffrey

Geoffrey and Sean

met us at the church.  Geoffrey is our translator and also plays soccer with us when we are at the field.  He is a very solid Christian and even stopped playing club soccer because he had games on Sunday that interfered with church.

When we arrived at the field (approximately 2:30 pm) we were greeted by a few players, we had played with a number of these players the day before. These guys seem very interested in us and asked if they could play on our team today.  Unfortunately the numbers didn’t work out so they ended up being on the other team.  We played for approximately an hour and then took a break as more of the guys we had played with yesterday showed up.  We greeted these guys as well and offered to have them play in the game we had going on.  They agreed and we picked up playing again and played for another hour and ten minutes. The entire time we were high fiving the players, saying good job (in our broken French) and just trying to show the love of Jesus.  In both games the “good guys” won (except for Brock in the second game).  But better than that was that after the game we talked with a couple of the players and said that we would be back on Thursday (Wednesday we are going to a barbeque for a church member and praying through his house) and that we would like to go to a café (coffee) after we played.  The players seem very open to this and when we go for coffee we will invite them to the church to talk with them and just hang out.  This goes a long way in helping to develop a relationship.  We will not try to beat them over the head with Jesus, but instead we will simply show them that even the church is an ok place.  Hopefully this will provide Pastor A and P with an opportunity to reach out to them in the future.

When we had finished playing soccer we returned to the church for a prayer meeting with the rest of the church.  During the prayer meeting they asked to pray for us and laid hands on us.  It was a moving time and so awesome to hear the heartfelt prayers that were offered to God.  All of us were left in tears and even though we didn’t understand all of the prayers (as some were in French) we know that they were praying for us to reach out and touch the people we had come into contact with.  After the prayer meeting Francois heated up some of the leftover macaroni and cheese and also got us some cold cut meats/cheese with baguettes.  At this point it was approximately 8:30 pm and we started to clean up around the church.

The night was not over; in France the day hasn’t even started until approximately 11:00 am, which I guess, means that they can go late into the night.  We were invited over to Kenan, Caleb and Clement’s house for dessert. Caleb speaks English that is quite good and Geoffrey came along with us so we had at least two interpreters for when we visited.  We were served delicious crepes

Delicious Crepes

with chocolate and some type of pine nut/sunflower seed. The food was amazing, but the fellowship will be remembered for the rest of our lives.   Their mother was a kind and caring woman who has a deep relationship with Jesus.  Their father was asleep as he had to go to work the next day, but the boys entertained us and we heard stories of them when they were younger.  We had a fantastic time and some of us were even laughing so hard at some of the conversations that we started to cry.  It was a sweet time of fellowship and sharing

Group eating crepes

.  Around approximately 11:30 we called it a night and headed back to our apartment (only about 2-3 minute walk).  We said good night to all of the boys and headed off to get showered and go to bed.

SixTen,

It has been a packed couple of days since we last posted.  Please continue to pray for Roubaix, France, the church leaders here, our health/bodies and that we would continue to strengthen and develop relationships that have now started.  Please read below for a brief synopsis of what we have been doing over the past two days.  There are even pictures!!! Thank you for your prayers and we look forward to seeing all of you soon.

Hun and Brock Pointing

Yesterday (July 3) we woke up around 8:00 Roubaix time.  The house where we are staying has a nice seating area and nice kitchen.  We ate a light breakfast and proceeded to sit in the family room (seating area).  We turned on a bit of worship music and simply read scripture that was striking to us as we listened to the music. It was a sweet time of worship together and was a great start to the day.  From there we left and went to church.  The church service was all in French, but the worship team was gracious enough to sing a few songs that we recognized (Open the Eyes of My Heart was one of the songs that we sang that is coming to my mind.)  We took communion as a team and Rich was able to share with the congregation (about 20 people) about what we are doing in Roubaix. After church we went down beneath the church and celebrated a birthday and ate cake (delicious cake) with the rest of the church.  We also had an opportunity to meet and talk with Louis (28 years old) who is French and is doing a pastoral internship in Paris, France.  Louis was a student at Hillsong Seminary in Australia before his time in Paris, but has lived in France his entire life. Louis has a heart for the lost of Paris and it was great to meet another young adult who has a heart for Jesus.  Around this time we left and went to the park where we would be ministering this week.  We spent some time as a group playing soccer and scoping out the park.  Finally, we came back to the church and had dinner. When we had returned back to the apartment we are staying in we spent some time sharing with one another what God has been doing in our lives.  Along with this we spent some time in prayer about what the future may hold for missions in Roubaix and/or North Africa for SixTen. It was a long day but a good day.

Today (July 4) we woke a bit earlier (7:30) and Rich cooked up some eggs.  For six guys this was a treat.  From here we went to the church (approximately 30 minute walk) and spent some time reading through Colossians specifically Colossians 1:9-14 and praying these verses over Roubaix. After we prayed these verses we finished the “pointing” that we had started which is filling in the gaps between bricks with cement to help hold the wall up.  We had started this on Saturday and wanted to finish this up today.  After a couple of hours we had lunch and then went back out to finish the pointing.

Rich the Pointing Expert

When we had finished the pointing we prepared to go out to the park where we would be playing soccer.  The park is approximately 15 minutes away when walking and because of the nature of the individuals at the park we would not be conducting a camp, but instead playing soccer with whomever was at the park. We were all a bit apprehensive at first when we stepped on the field.  The French players we were playing against looked very good.  However, after about 5 minutes it was 4-0 the good guys (us for those of you keeping score at home).

After our game...Final score 7-1 good guys.

Needless to say we had a great time and started to build some relationships that we are hoping we can nurture over the next couple of days. We are hoping that this first game was a stepping stone to being able to share and invite some of the guys back to the church that we played with. Finally we went back to the church, ate dinner and now Rich and I are sitting at the Quick (think McDonald’s) writing this.

Hey SixTen!

As I write, Sean and I are sitting inside a Quick Burger in the picture that you see posted. It’s pretty much like a McDonald’s which thrills me!

We’ve had a long three days to say the least. We left from the States on Thursday morning and arrived Friday morning, including a full day of meets and greets on Friday. But God is good. He’s brought us safely here and has us in good hands with the church here. We won’t use the pastors names for safety reasons, but for the sake of conversation, Pastor A and P have been very hospitable to us. It’s amazing to see the bond we all have in Christ and can fellowship with them halfway across the world.

We were each able to share our lives with them over bread and coffee, which is a definite staple here in France. Travel-wise, we’ve been able to walk most places, with the church not being a far distance from our apartment.

At the outset of our trip, we’re looking to just “take in” the city and learn about the deep Islamic heritage here. We’ve found that the pastors here walk the city and just pray over it. Parts of Roubaix tend to be very dark, with drugs and poverty being a large part of it. So we partook in some of those walks today, as we prayed that the light of Christ would breakthrough those strongholds. Although the enemy is at work, Jesus is greater.

Thank you for your faithful prayers as we continue on God’s mission here. Please continue to pray for the people here, as around 80% of the city is Muslim. Pray that God would transform the hearts of these people to see the glory of God in Christ. Please also pray for courage and the Holy Spirit’s perseverance in the leaders of the churches. They are working hard, but there is much to be done in their ministry. Pray also for the sports camp and the kids that come. They will undoubtedly be Muslim, and it would be great to share our lives and the gospel with them. As always, you can pray for boldness for our team.

Thank you again. We love you and hope to share again soon.