La Rentrée, Surgery, and a Video for YOU!

Dear Friends and Family,

You are often in our thoughts and prayers and we hope you are well and experiencing the peace of God that passes understanding, even in these uncertain times. God has given us some incredible moments of joy in these past couple of months and at the same time we are feeling the fatigue of slogging through an ever changing “normal”.

La Rentrée - Back to School and Life as “normal”

All four of our resilient children are back at our local school and doing amazingly well. There have been a lot of things we didn’t expect serving as missionaries in France, but we still feel our central call is to be family on mission. Over the summer we were meeting for Picnic Church at Bethanie, but as the weather has changed, we recently re-started small church gatherings in our home with other families and friends. Last Sunday Eli read our Psalm for the day in French with an absolutely spot on accent. Silas has recently become a bit of an evangelist - asking his badminton coach whether he has decided to become a Christian yet each week.

Bless Family Camping Week

Just before school started, we helped to lead a camping week for the Bless Network. As part of this week we had the joy of seeing four young adults profess their faith and be baptized. This was a special moment for Joanna and I as we’ve been privileged to watch two of these young adults start following Jesus since we arrived in Normandie. It was inspiring to see these young people, at the edge of their professional lives and facing a world filled with more uncertainty than any of us anticipated, putting their trust in Jesus and declaring that faith publicly.

Prayer Points

• Joanna dislocated her shoulder a few weeks ago. Many of you know that this isn’t the first time this has happened and each time has been progressively worse. She is scheduled for shoulder surgery on the 13th of October. Please pray for healing and for smooth recovery following surgery. Please pray for our family as Joanna pretty much keeps us together, and this task will be made more challenging with only one arm for a while.

• Please pray for several neighbors with whom we are growing in relationship. It is a trying time for many of our friends here and we are praying this is a moment when many would turn and find true peace and freedom in Jesus. One neighbor is very sick and they don’t know what is wrong with her. Please pray for an opening to speak about the hope of Jesus and for healing.

• Please pray for the refugees in Caen with whom we work. Many of them have recently been evicted from a squat where they were living and are sleeping on the streets. It is already getting cold here and this isn’t a good situation for them. There is a small group who have begun meeting for French and English language study with Tom at our church building in Caen. This has been an amazing way to grow in relationship and express the love of Christ.

• Finally, several of you have asked about how our financial support is going at this time. Thank you for praying with us about this. We have seen a dip in our monthly support due to people having lost income in the US. So far, that deficit has been covered by one-time gifts. Please pray with us that God would continue to provide for our financial needs here.

Video Update

We recently put together an update video for our sending church, the Gate Community Church. We wanted to share this with you too! Please note, we have been on zoom a lot during the past 6 months… ;)

A short video filling you in on what God has been doing in our family and in our ministry over the past year or so. Thank you for watching!

Thank you so much for your care for us, for praying with us and being part of all that God is working here in France. May you know the blessing of seeing His kingdom come and His will be done in your life.

Love,

The Appels

Way Maker...

…Miracle Worker, Promise Keeper, Light in the darkness, that is who You are…

Dear Friends and Family,

It still seems that we are living in the midst of very uncertain times. The world we are living in seems to be shifting daily. Perhaps this is revealing the truth of our lives that nothing is certain but the goodness of our God and our futures are secured when we put our trust in Him. We are praying for His peace and security to be with each of you and your families.

Reflecting on these past months of rather restricted living from which we are emerging here in France, it is clear to us that God has worked this situation for good for our family. For many of our friends and family it has been difficult, both in terms of health, change in job situations, and dealing with stress related to government restrictions and social distancing measures. Please know our prayers for you and please do reach out if we can be praying together about something specific. Click here to email us directly.

Even when I don’t see it, You’re working, even when I don’t feel it, you’re working, You never stop, you never stop working…

God Working in France

In our ministry here, this has been a fruitful season. France put in place pretty firm restrictions on meetings and leaving the house in early March. From that first week we started gathering online as church via Zoom. All three of the Bless churches that we work with in France gathered together for weekly bilingual services and a midweek prayer and bible study. We were joined by others in our network from several neighboring countries and we were also amazed that we had first time visitors connecting with our meetings. We met online twice a week for 10 weeks straight and have continued meeting every other week as restrictions have eased. God was working in many ways in these virtual gatherings. We saw new leaders step up and teach. Our times of reading the Bible together, prayer and celebrating communion were incredibly rich. One of our friends and a mentor in the Bless community said on Easter Sunday that she felt the Lord had treasure for our community to find specifically in this season and we truly experienced this as we gathered.

Emerging from restrictions, we have been able to gather twice now at Bethanie for what we are calling “Picnic Church”. This enables us to keep good distancing practices but also to sing our worship together and enjoy fellowship. SOS Chai (the Bless ministry with refugees) was able to continue in a limited way during the confinement due to the leadership of one young man, who was a refugee and is now a leader on the SOS Chai team. He lives near where many of the refugees have their squats and was able to identify needs and buy essentials for those who were in crisis. SOS has re-launched this past week, and it is exciting that we are beginning to have small groups of refugees coming to our church building in Caen for language classes and other training.

Jesus Calms the Storm

God Working in us

During this time, we have been growing in knowledge of our identities individually and as a family. It seems that God has used this time to mold our family and take us a few steps closer to his specific callings on our lives.

Tom: Leadership

For the past few months, Tom has stepped in to lead the Bless church and also helped to lead other elements of the Bless Network through the Covid crisis as our friends Gerard and Chrissie Kelly, who direct the Bless network, were in the UK with Gerard recovering from a major health issue. Thank you for praying with us for them, we are happy to report that they are back in France now and Gerard is doing much better.

For Tom, being thrust into a much bigger leadership role helped to remind him of God’s call in his life to lead. As we move into life together after COVID as church in France, Tom has been asked to continue in a leadership role with Bless alongside Gerard and Chrissie. We were surprised and honored when the church gave us a gift of a lemon tree and thanked us for our leadership through the crisis at our first in person gathering on Pentecost Sunday.

Joanna: Painting

Joanna has been spending more time painting to try to improve her skills and find her style. She has painted a few pieces for members of the church as gifts. She also took a course online that taught her how to paint colorful portraits. We are finding that her paintings are having an impact on people and feel that this is an important part of Joanna’s calling here in France.

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Family: Sabbath

In this season of being home with the kids all the time and working from home as well, we have found it easy to let our work time bleed into every day of the week and most hours of the day. We recently read a book called “the Ruthless Elimination of Hurry” by John Mark Comer and it has really impacted our lives and the way we desire to walk with Jesus in our family. We are starting to keep a pretty guarded sabbath day on wednesdays each week, where we stop. We celebrate who God is, who we are in our family, and we rest together. We turn our phones off, we take naps, and we worship together. It has been sweet and it is molding us as people who work out of rest. Praise Jesus!

God Making a Way-Opportunities

Music

Tom and Joanna are playing a show with Nashville twinning committee July 3rd as part of an independence day celebration. Our friends Doug and Emilee Irwin are coming out to join us for this show which is going to be such fun. We love the opportunities we have here in Caen to be a blessing to the city and to sing songs of freedom in the city. This concert venue is particularly meaningful as it is taking place at the cafe inside the old city walls which William the Conqueror built about 1000 years ago. We often pray on these walls that overlook the city and it is a privilege to get to sing and play there.

Camping

One of our opportunities to camp will be for the Bless Family Camping Week at the end of August which Tom has been working hard to organize. This will be the big gathering for everyone connected with the Bless Network and it is hosted at a campsite run by our friends Tim and Jane Rocke, who lead a Bless church on site. It should be a great time to refresh and be equipped, and to celebrate all the God is working in this part of the world. We are going to be baptizing some of those who became Christians this past year!

Specific Prayer:

Praise for Lauren

Lauren, our nanny, is returning to the USA this week after being with us for a wonderful and strange 5 months! We are so grateful for all she has done to serve us and become a part of our family. Please pray for smooth travel and re-entry into the US, and blessings abundant!

Prayer for Healing for C

C is a member of our church who became a Christian two years ago. She has really come alive since walking with Jesus and is such a beautiful soul. She recently had a stroke and has been in a medically induced coma for a few weeks and is in an intensive care unit. As a church, we are praying for a miracle. Please join us in praying for her total and complete healing, that would impact her family and neighbors.

As always, thank you for your prayers and support. We would not be able to be here without you.

Love, The Appels

La Bénédiction de Confinement

Dear Friends and Family,

We hope you are well in mind, body and spirit. We are praying for you and continually grateful for you in our lives! We believe in the power of speaking a blessing over an individual, a neighborhood, a city or a country, and singing a blessing can be just as powerful, if not more so. A song called “The Blessing” was released just about the same time that Covid-19 was starting to take hold in the west. It is a powerful declaration of God’s favor and peace straight from scripture. Tom and I led this song bilingually in our church service a few weeks ago and we would love to play it over you! We have made a little video with the words so you can sing with us (in english and in french ;) We hope that you feel our hearts as we worship and declare his goodness over your lives.

A bilingual cover of The Blessing by Kari Jobe, Cody Carnes, Stephen Furtick, Chris Brown Version bilingue français et anglais Bilingual version in French an...

Family Update

Here’s what’s new with us: We are on day 39 of our strict quarantine in France. We have only left the house to go to the grocery store, boulangerie, or do our allotted one-hour of exercise within one kilometer of our front door, all the while carrying our time-stamped papers to avoid a hefty fine. We are all well and feel tremendously fortunate to be in our home with a beautiful yard in early spring. We will be here like this until May 11th, and then the world will slowly start to open up again, but not as it was before. We are taking it one day at a time.

Though we are home ALL THE TIME, the days are very full of activity. We have been working through the assignments sent daily by the kids’ teachers, watching music classes online (thank you Mark Woodward), doing crafts, playing a lot and cooking a lot. We have a daily assembly where Tom teaches the kids about important qualities like strength, respect, grace etc. We had a fancy “High Tea” where we dressed up and had scones and cucumber sandwiches and we celebrated Carnival with face paint and costumes, and parading around the yard in the traditional French style. We also have begun a vegetable garden in two raised beds, but we had more seeds and more time, so we decided to dig up a few more plots of earth to plant more vegetables. We celebrated Easter and Tom’s birthday with as much tradition as we could with frosted cakes and dyed easter eggs.

And of course, we are doing chores, cleaning, learning to do laundry without a washing machine and then rejoicing in its miraculous healing! The kids seem to be doing remarkable well, the adults have our wobbly moments but we are finding grace in the midst of it. We are very grateful to have Lauren, our nanny, with us, though the circumstances have not been what was expected. She has been very helpful and more and more a member of the family. We expect that she will be able to return home in June as planned. God is very good and His timing is perfect.

Ministry Update:

You may remember that back in February our friend Gerard who runs the Bless network with his wife Chrissie had a health emergency. Gerard is on the mend and he and Chrissie are in the UK recuperating. Thank you for continuing to pray with us for them. While they rest and recover, Tom has taken on a much bigger role in covering leadership for the Bless Network. Thankfully, Bless is an amazing team of people and while leading a missional network through a crisis was not part of the plan for 2020, we are seeing blessing in it.

Tom is leading online gatherings using Zoom twice a week for the three churches in our network here in France. As we are hearing from friends in other parts of the world - God is on the move during this time of limitation. It feels like our church community is going deeper with the Lord. Our times of prayer and reading the Bible together are so powerful and we are noticing a marked increase in the way we, as a body, care for and reach out to each other. We’ve also seen growth in numbers in this time. We’ve had rather large Sunday gatherings in part because friends of the church from the UK or other places in Europe are “visiting”, but we’ve also seen neighbors and friends coming for the first time to our church. There is something kind of wonderful about having first time visitors at a virtual service.

Many of you have asked about what is happening with SOS Chai and the refugee community we are connected with here in Caen. Thank you for continuing to pray for these young men, who are among the most vulnerable in our area. While we have had to stop our bi-weekly dinner and hang out with the lads, we are able to continue in relationship with several of them through messaging and phone calls. Thankfully, one of the lads who has been granted asylum and has been helping us as a leader at SOS for about a year lives very near one of the squats where many of the boys live and is able to communicate about need. We have worked out a way to send him funds and he is able to take other boys shopping for essentials.

The summer is a busy season for Bless, especially with groups coming and going. Tom has been busy with leadership teams working to make decisions, adjustments and communicate well about the changes that we’ve needed to make. Like almost every organization, there are financial impacts for Bless from this pandemic, so there has been some stewarding work to do as well.

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In all the ways God has made for us to join in what He is working, we are so thankful to feel well supported by you, our friends and family. Several of you have reached out to check in on us and see how we are doing. Thank you. We also love to hear how things are going with you. We so appreciate the way we feel deeply connected and on mission with you.

We also have the joy of working in wonderful teams here in France. Bless network has been family to us and it is inspiring to work alongside the amazing people we’ve met here. Our mission agency, GEM, has also been very supportive in this time. We have a weekly connect with our GEM France team and there are daily opportunities to pray with other GEM missionaries around the world. Here’s a video from GEM president Jon Burns, which he asked us to share with you. We so appreciate his heart for all of us, missionaries and those who send/support us, to be cared for well in this time.

As a global Church, we are all going through a challenging time - GEM is here to help and wants you to know what measures we are doing to keep our people safe and live out one of our core values of Stewardship.

We would love to meet and pray with you, talk to you “face-to-face”, as we all are learning to do more these days. We are very grateful for the opportunity to do so at this time. We hope to see each of you soon and we pray this blessing once again over each of you:

May the Lord bless you and keep you, make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you, may the Lord look upon you with favor and give peace. Amen.
Love,

The Appels

Hello from Quarantine!

Dear Friends and Family,

Well this has been unexpected. About a week ago, Joanna was traveling home (to France) following a visit with her parents and her sisters. At that time, we had some sense that there were a few areas in France where there were small clusters of this virus, usually 8 or 9 cases. In the week that has followed our day to day life has changed significantly. Thankfully, Joanna did make it home! On Thursday evening, March 12th, the president of France announced the closing of schools across the country.

Over the following weekend, we heard about restaurants, bars and all “non-essential” places of business needing to close. Finally on Monday evening, we watched President Macron address the nation with the boys and heard him say over and over “Nous sommes en guerre.” - we are at war. He then laid out the plan for the next 15 days (from March 17th) which is essentially a nationwide policy of staying at home except to go and buy food necessities, or receive medical care. We have a form that we must fill in and sign to leave the house for food shopping, etc, and the civil service and army are assisting the police in checking people’s papers and issuing fines. Although no one knows the timetable for all this, it seems likely that this 15 day period of restrictions will be extended. The healthcare system in France is stretched thin and these drastic measures are intended to give the best chance to ensure that care is available for all who need it.

Watching President Macron Address the country

Joanna with Her Parents

How are we doing?

Good question. On a health level we are doing ok. We’ve had a cold and both Joanna and I experienced some symptoms that are associated with the COVID-19 virus including some breathing difficulty, but we are feeling better at the moment. We’ve had friends here who have had to seek medical care or are feeling unwell and this is scary. Emotionally we are feeling a little shaky, but we are resting in the knowledge that God is on his throne and as it says in a song we’ve been singing lately “the waves and wind still know his name”. Joanna is working on a painting called “Dancing in the Storm” which is a reflection of what we are leaning into in this uncertain time, trusting in Jesus and worshipping him!

We had the blessing of some sunshine this week, which is a rare treat in Normandie. As a family we are finding our way into new rhythms. We have a morning devotional time followed by French school, some tactile activities or outside play, lunch, English school, and lots of play. Joanna is keeping us organized, fed and sane. We are grateful that Lauren, our nanny, is with us during this intense time of home living. She has been really helpful and a great addition to our family. There are wonderful moments as a family but it is also exhausting and feels confining to not be able to go for a walk together or for an outing. For Tom, this week has been full of decisions and pastoring as the church here adjusts to our physical isolation. We’ve begun to gather together online using Zoom and this has been a great encouragement. We are also trying to work out how best to serve our refugee friends when we cannot gather or work as a team in our normal fashion.

How are you doing?

There is so much unknown right now, and, from over here, it looks like the difficulties are growing quickly in the US and UK as well. We would love to pray for you and with you in this time, so please do reach out. We are isolated but not alone.

Changing Plans

One aspect of this worldwide phenomenon is the severe disruption of plans and the challenge of working out how, when and whether to reschedule. For us, we are canceling a number of things including our trip to the UK in April and Tom’s trip back to the US with the Nashville Caen twinning delegation in May. For many, the disruption is far more severe and the unknown much, much more daunting.

Trust

Yet, in all of this, we are feeling so thankful for the peace that passes understanding which we have in Christ Jesus. We mourn with those who mourn the loss of loved ones. We pray for those who are wrestling with fear in these uncertain times. We trust in Jesus, the Author and Perfecter, the Beginning and the End, the One who will complete the good work He has begun in each of us.

May this peace rule in your hearts and the word of Christ dwell in you richly,

The Appels

Keys, Crossing the Channel, and Church in Caen

Abbaye aux Dames in Caen

Dear Family and Friends,

It has been an eventful start to 2020 for us. We are especially thankful for your prayer support as Joanna dislocated her shoulder. She is recovering well and we have found a specialist here who is working with us on next steps. It does look like Jo will need surgery, but we are so thankful that this didn’t need to be emergency surgery! We are very thankful for Lauren, (our new nanny!) who was there to drive Joanna to the hospital (on her very first day in France!) and help Tom with the kids while Joanna recovered.

Gerard and Chrissie Kelly

Lauren - Our Nanny

Post Shoulder Dislocation at the Hospital

We also want to ask for your prayers for Gerard and Chrissie Kelly. On Saturday night, we were leading worship for a prayer weekend for the Bless Network at Bethanie, and during the prayer meeting Gerard had a seizure and hit his head. He was taken to hospital and is still undergoing tests to find out what exactly happened. We work very closely with Gerard and Chrissie, they are our family here in Caen. Please pray for a full recovery and peace and healing for them both.

Upcoming Trip to the UK!!!

We are excited to report that we will be making a trip to the UK this April over half term to connect with friends and churches.! We’ll be in the UK and moving around a bit April 11 - 25. If you live in the UK and would like to connect while we are on that side of the channel, let us know!

Also, in an effort to keep costs low for this trip we are staying with friends when we can. We are hoping to be based near the Chorleywood area from around April 15 – 22. If anyone has or knows of a spare room or two where we could stay, please do reach out. We will be at the services at Christ Church Chorleywood, Sunday April 19.

Keys!

Joanna has been praying for a while that we might find a way to pray in our nearest local Catholic church (which we can see from our kitchen window, pictured above). This church is only open for a Mass once every 5 weeks, as the Priest covers several different parishes. Around Epiphany, many churches in our area put up a creche (nativity scene) and open their doors for a couple of hours for people to come and visit. Joanna felt a strong burden to go and pray in the church building while it was open for this creche. When she arrived, she met the women who is in charge of cleaning up the church building after mass and who is the local key holder of the building. They struck up a conversation and Joanna shared with her about her desire to find a way to pray regularly in the building. She suggested that Joanna could come and pray every 5th Monday, while she is cleaning up the church building. Joanna was excited about this opportunity. They continued talking together and then something seemed to shift. While in the middle of speaking about something else, this woman broke her train of thought and said: “Listen, I trust you, here’s what I’m going to do. I will leave a copy of the church key at the boulangerie just across the street. Whenever you want to pray in the church, you can just come to the boulangerie and say a special password.” Joanna was cried tears of gratitude and has made a new friend! What an amazing answer to prayer!

Developing Leaders

Tom made a trip to Frankfurt in January to connect with other GEM missionaries who are receiving ten2 interns this coming summer. This is an exciting program that gives college age students a chance to experience missions work in Europe and helps us with extra hands during a busy season. In connecting with the mobilization team and other site leaders, Tom was reminded about how much he loves developing leaders. We are grateful for the opportunity to lead and invest in this team of 4 college students this summer.

Speaking of leadership development, we will be helping Gerard and Chrissie and others from the Bless Network to lead the Seven Stories School coming up in March. This seems to be especially helpful to leaders in transition from across Europe. If you would like to know more about the seven stories school, visit www.sevenstories.org.

Church in Caen

In Caen, we have begun to gather weekly as church for nights of worship and prayer, a meeting that is called ‘Presence’. We feel that God is on the move in the city and getting to pray together and share stories about how we are seeing God work in each other’s lives has been a powerful step for our growing community.

We are continuing to host a family church gathering at our house on the fourth sunday of each month. Last month, we prayed for one another and learned about being a part of the body of Christ. We are looking forward to our February gathering this coming sunday!

Tom has also been getting closer with several of the refugees who are regulars at SOS Chai on Sunday evenings. He’s started teaching English to a group of boys from Eritrea, Somalia, and Ethiopia who want to learn this language. It has been rewarding and four of these lads came to Presence on sunday evening! Please do pray with us that this connection will grow.

Prayer Requests:

Safe and Healthy Travels

We are going to take a few days away at the end of this week to celebrate our 15th wedding anniversary. Please pray for health and safety for us, our kids, and caretakers (Lauren and Gigi-Tom’s mom).

Joanna is going to the USA to visit family in Arkansas and Chicago from Feb 29-March 11.

Church in Caen

Pray for Gerard and Chrissie as they recover from saturday’s events.

Pray for the church to grow in Caen, for strength and wisdom for each member of the congregation. Pray that more of the refugee lads would come and have fellowship at Presence.

Pray for our family house church gathering this Sunday.

Thanks for all you love and support during these early weeks of 2020! We are so excited about what God is doing here in Caen and we know we could not be here without your prayers and support. We love you all and are grateful for each one of you!

May God Bless you abundantly,

Love the Appels

A Ministry Year in Review

A Ministry Year in Review

Appels to France 2019

Hello Friends and Family,

We are quickly approaching the end of a decade and looking towards a vision filled 2020! We hope you’ve all had a lovely Christmas. After a lot of activity for us from Thanksgiving through Advent and Christmas services, we are thankful for some quiet family time here in Normandy. 2019 has not been without its moments of challenge, yet, we are feeling more settled and fruitful here. In this newsletter, we want to share some ministry highlights from the past year, what we are looking forward to in the year to come, as well as some of our needs as a family on mission in France. It is an incredible privilege to be a part of this work together with you!

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Highlights

People Turning to Jesus

It has been such a joy to witness God’s transforming work in 5 people who decided to receive the gift of salvation in Jesus and have been growing in the knowledge of His love in our community.

Music Opens the Door

Tom has been invited to serve on the board of the Twinning/sister cities association in Caen with a particular view toward developing cultural exchange through music. This has offered the opportunity and platform to sing songs of freedom and worship songs in the heart of our city with the blessing of the local authorities - a very rare thing in France.

In addition to playing some shows with the Nashville/Caen Twinning, Joanna and Tom have been able to play some other shows locally. This has been a great chance to build relationships and a way to be a blessing in our community.

Thanksgiving

Last Thanksgiving, Joanna hosted an amazing meal for 35 people despite the fact that Eli had just entered the hospital 2 days before. This year, the tradition continued with about 50 people and 4 turkeys. It was an amazing time of fellowship in a group comprised of equal parts our church friends and our not yet believing neighbors. Eli wrote a Thanksgiving story that he shared and we had a lot of fun together.

Something about gathering to give thanks is remarkable profound here in France. We were so thankful for the conversations that happened about the tables. I was part of a conversation in which a new believer was sharing why the day was so meaningful to him with one of our agnostic neighbors. He said: “I look around and I feel the joy everywhere in this group. It’s God!” He went on to say, “He saved me!” and describe his recent experience of God’s love and some healing he had experienced in relationship.

People Coming to Help

We had much needed help from abroad in the early part of the year when Eli was still immobile. Tom’s parents, our friends from GEM France, the Irwins and Micah Heath, and friends from the UK Dave and Sally, amazing to have help arrive in our moment of need!

A team from our sending church in Nashville, the Gate Community Church, came to visit and they introduced our community to the Freedom Immersion Prayer model. Their prayer and care for us was personally revitalizing, but also had resounding impact in our community. Bless church plants in Livarot and Caen will be working through this material in more depth this year.

We hosted our first GEM Intern, Troy, this autumn. He was a huge blessing to us and did fantastic work. He lived with us most of the time and really became one of the family!

SOS Chai Refugee ministry

We’ve loved being part of the incredible ministry to refugees in our city lead by the Bless Network. Twice a week a team pulls up to the roughest neighborhood in our city in an old ambulance that has been retro-fitted as a food truck. We pull out Ikea garden tables and stools and set up a pop-up café for the refugees who live homeless in Caen. These refugees are young men aged 16-30 many of whom have traveled for years before arriving in northern France. They are served tea and coffee and a hot meal. We play soccer, Uno, and Jenga and offer a safe and welcoming space for them.

We have amazing teams of volunteers who help to make this happen. An unexpected byproduct of SOS Chai is that it has been our strongest instrument of church growth. A majority of people new to our church gatherings connected with us by first volunteering at SOS Chai.

Church Planting in Caen

This past year we were able to host house church gatherings, group bible studies, worship nights, BBQ’s, and visiting teams in our home, all as a way of bringing people into what God is doing here in Normandy and in growing Bless Church in Caen.

After lots of prayer, in october we were able to lease a building in Caen where we can gather as Bless Church. We love working with Gerard and Chrissie Kelly and the rest of the Bless team. It has been a joy this year to see new people coming and feeling a deep sense of belonging in our community.

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Looking Forward to 2020

• The continued open doors in Benouville and Caen for us to build relationship and minister through music and opening our home for gatherings. We have been asked to play at a ceremony for the mayor in January as well as the D-Day events in Benouville in 2020!

• Welcoming Lauren, (through missionnannys.org) who is coming specifically to help with our kids (what a blessing!). This will open up more opportunities for Tom and Joanna to minister together and travel individually for events and visits.

• Welcoming and leading a team of interns for the summer from GEM’s ten2 project. Four college age students will be based in Caen with us for 8 weeks! Find out more here.

• Tom has been selected to make an official visit to Nashville this May as part of a delegation from Caen with the twinning association.

• We will be visiting the UK in April to connect with our partners and Christ Church Chorleywood, our partner church.

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Needs in the New Year

We continue to need intercessory prayer.

We keenly feel the spiritual battle here in France and it makes a huge difference when we have consistent prayer cover. Thank you for praying with us! We invite you to continue to partner and stand with us in prayer and intercession to share the love of Jesus in France. We LOVE it when people get in touch with us, give us verses, words or pictures. It is so encouraging to hear from you and we want to pray for you too!

We need more team here with us.

While we have incredible French and international volunteers, another couple who are able to work full time with us, and fairly regular short term interns; yet, there are so many opportunities here and we simply do not have enough hands for the work! We are currently praying for a couple or family who could serve as missional hosts at the spiritual retreat centre, Bethanie. We are also praying for one or more, to come and help lead and grow our ministry with refugees. God is just beginning to open some doors for us to serve the trafficked women who work right next to where we park SOS Chai, and we would love to have team who could specifically work with and serve the girls.

We need increased financial partnership.

It is humbling and incredibly moving to watch the way God provides in His kingdom family. We are so thankful for the generosity of our sending church and for individuals who support us financially. Having been on the field for nearly three years we are seeing some short fall in our monthly support due to changing life circumstances with our supporters. We are praying that God would call some new people to ongoing financial partnership, and trusting that He will provide all that we need. If you are interested in joining our financial partnership team, please contact Tom! (tom.appel@gemission.org) or you can sign up directly here.

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Grateful Hearts

It is an incredible blessing being here on mission with you and we are constantly aware of the abundant blessing of our community across the globe. We want to report that Reuben’s surgery went really well and he is practically back to his normal self, no more infections in his throat (or enormous tonsils), praise Jesus! We have even managed to get away with a sickness free Christmas, which is pretty phenomenal!

We want to send each of you our very best wishes and we are praying for many blessing for you and yours in the year to come.

With Love,

The Appels
Tom, Joanna, Reuben, Eli, Silas, and Elodie

Prayer Requests for Health

Hi Everyone,

We mentioned in our last newsletter that we needed prayer for health and we are writing again for you to intercede on our behalf!

Reuben

In the last newsletter we mentioned that Reuben has been having problems with his throat. We have since seen the specialist twice and done a rigorous course of antibiotics. We now have Reuben scheduled for a tonsillectomy on Monday morning December 9th. He is pretty fragile at the moment because he isn’t breathing or sleeping well. It is difficult at this time of year with four kids in public school and the cold, wet weather to keep everyone from having runny noses and sore throats. Please pray that he can be healthy enough to go ahead with surgery and that the procedure goes smoothly. Pray for his heart as he goes through this process.

Joanna

The day after we sent out the newsletter, Joanna had a crazy pain attack, likened to passing a kidney stone. We called an ambulance and she spent the day in the ER. The clinic was not great and we did not figure out exactly what happened since the blood tests and CT scan came back normal. Joanna has an appointment with a Gastro doctor tomorrow to assess further the problem. She still has pain daily that comes and goes. To add injury to mystery injury, Joanna feel down a few stairs the other day. Please pray for healing for Joanna, wisdom for the doctors, and protection from any further accidents.

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We know kids get sick and, as we age (God help us), we can develop health problems, but things seem to be relentless at the moment. We know and believe and trust in God’s goodness and He continues to open doors for us and bless us in ministry (Thanksgiving and the concerts were GREAT btw and we will tell you more in our next newsletter…) but the enemy continues to attack our health. Thank you for standing with us in prayer and for your continued support of us being a family on mission in France.

With love,

The Appels

4 Turkeys and a Concert

Hello Friends and Family,

It is getting into a lovely wet, cold, wintery season here in Normandy, but we are building fires, baking, and trying to recover from the illnesses that have been with us for a couple months now (see prayer points…;)). We have so much to tell you about what has been happening and what is coming up for us this next season.

Praise and Thanks!

Tomorrow is the anniversary of the day Eli broke his leg. He still has a special gait, injures himself more easily (and uses his crutches as in the photo), and he gets tired walking long distances. But Eli is a champion and IS recovering well. He sees a physical therapist once a week still. We know that the healing process will take more time.

We have been feeling very aware of God’s goodness and how much he has brought Eli and our family through in this last year. We want to start off by saying how very grateful we are for your prayer and support. We know this for certain: without you, we would not be here. We would not be able to be a part of what God is doing here in France and that would be heartbreaking. We simply can’t express just how much it means to us when you pray for us, when you give your hard-earned money to support us, when you send an encouraging word or card. We know we team together with you and that you are a part of our great big family. We love you and thank you from the bottom of our hearts for being with us and we praise our amazing God for his sustaining love and peace and his power, protection and goodness, AMEN!

Thanksgiving

The turkeys are ordered, the invites are out - we are ready to have an amazing thanksgiving celebration with our church and our neighbors! We are expecting upwards of 50 people for thanksgiving this year and we are so excited to be opening our home for this special community event. Despite Eli breaking his leg just days before our celebration last year, the thanksgiving meal was one of my annual highlights because it was an amazing opportunity to invite not yet believers into the loving family of God in a tangible way, and to be able to openly thank Jesus for his goodness. It had a lasting impact on so many who came and especially on me!

Prayer Point:

We are having the meal this coming Sunday, November 24th. Please pray for God to be moving in our community and for us as we prepare to host!

Music in the City

A few weeks ago, we had the opportunity to headline a local concert series called “Les Racines et Les Vagues” (The Roots and the Waves), which highlights folk, country, and blues music. We played about ten songs, of which my favorites were Amazing Grace and Pieces ( a worship song based on 1 Corinthians 13). There was a crowd of about 50 local french people and we even had our picture in the paper! We were able to invite some of our new friends to the concert too. The vice mayor was there and he is interested in having us play at some special events in the village, especially for some D-Day Celebrations. Our friend, J, who heads the association, has started coming along to church! We are also going to be supporting J in upcoming concerts over the next few months. Such an open door!

This Friday we will be playing some “American music” for an event in our city called “American Croq” which is a sort of food festival. We have been asked to “animate” (a fun French verb) the day with a bit of music. This is an official government festival asking us to play American gospel music! This does not happen in France! We are very excited about this opportunity!

Prayer Point:

Please pray that hearts would be open and stirred by the music that we play and that we have more opportunities in the city to share the love of Jesus through music.

Bless Church IN CAEN!

After months of searching and waiting and praying, God has opened up an opportunity for Bless Church to have a place to meet for prayer and worship IN CAEN! We got the keys in early October and we have been working out what it looks like to actually have a place to gather. The space has already been so useful as we have had church gatherings, prayer nights, weekly cooking for the refugees and a fundraising event for SOS Chai. Praise Jesus for getting us a place IN THE CITY!

Additional Prayer Points:

Health

We have been battling with different illnesses for a couple months now. Elodie had a febrile seizure when she had a virus in September, and then hand, foot, and mouth disease a few weeks later. Tom and Eli have had bad throat infections (including a swollen gland the size of a golf ball!), and Reuben has had a throat infection so bad and so long we had to go see a specialist. We are hoping he does not need to have surgery, but we are still waiting for medicine to improve his breathing and take down the swelling! We will be seeing the specialist again today o see what the next steps are. SO, we need your prayers for health and healing for our little family.

Refugees in Caen

Please pray for the refugees facing a the long, cold nights this winter. Pray for the SOS Chai team to know the best ways to help and support these lads as they find new life in a foreign place.

Lauren H

Lauren, whom we connected with through Missionnannys.org, is planning on coming to help us in 2020 as our nanny from February to June! Please pray as she applies for a visa and prepares to join our family on mission in France.

Addresses Needed!

As we mentioned in our last letter, we are working on sending out a card, in the actual mail this year!! Please let us know your address if you are interested in receiving a card and you think we may not have your most up-to-date information. ;)

We love you!

Love, The Appels

Autumn Update from the Appels

Dear Friends and Family,

After a rather full summer, it is nice to begin to find an autumn rhythm here in Normandy. This is the start of our second school year in Caen and it feels really good to be in the same house for more than a year! (We have been rather mobile for a while now…!) In August, for the first time in his 6 year-old life, Silas celebrated his birthday in the same place as the year before! We are thankful for each part of the journey as we’ve sought to follow God’s call, to join in the work He is already doing here in France. There is much to celebrate, to report, and for your prayers, so... thanks for reading!

Church Planting in Caen

It has been one year since we started meeting in our home once a month for church in Caen. On Sunday, we met for the first time this school year and we celebrate that there were seven new people with us that we didn’t even know last year! Praise God that our house church continues to welcome new people! 

We’ve seen God at work in our gatherings and in relationships over the summer. One young french man who is not yet a Christian but has started coming regularly to our meetings has been searching for something real about God for some time. He has tried out a number of other religious paths and he took Tom aside at our gathering last week for a chat. He said, “You don’t know what it is you have here. This is something completely different than I’ve ever found. The way you love each other is not normal, it can only be God’s love because people aren’t able to care for each other this way on their own” (paraphrasing). We love that he has seen God’s love in our community.  

PRAYER: That our church would continue to reach out to our community and that more people would encounter the love of God in transformative ways!

SOS Chai

What exactly do we do with SOS CHAI? We come in our retro-fitted ambulance/food truck and set out some brightly colored tables and stools along with Uno and Jenga and a few soccer balls. We serve tea and coffee and wraps with rice and some kind of meat. We hand out lots of hard boiled eggs. It is usually joyful and boisterous, though it can be tense and sometimes the boys are quite downhearted. We are convinced that the way God is building His church in Caen begins with these beautiful people on the edge of society. Here is a short video about SOS Chai posted on Facebook by one of our interns: CLICK HERE

In addition, to our home group gatherings, our work with SOS Chai continues to be central to the church planting work. Working with refugees can be difficult at times, but it is consistently humbling and rewarding. Along with our regular community of refugees, we’ve started to have a group of homeless people coming to our twice a week cafés. We’ve been praying for the trafficked women who work as prostitutes in the area where SOS Chai operates. This past week we had some of these women come to receive some help for the first time.

Equipping through the Seven Stories School 

Another aspect of our work here is the training we help to lead with Gerard and Chrissie Kelly at Béthanie, the spiritual retreat center which is also the hub of the Bless Network. Later this week, we are helping to lead the Seven Stories School. This ten day course is full of teaching, worship, retreat, mission, and spending time in church and community all pointing each participant towards deeper knowledge of their God-given identity and place in His story. It has always been such a privilege to worship with these groups, and this will be our fourth school!

PRAYER: Pray for fruitful experiences for the participants and for us to manage home-life and worshipping with these groups at Bethanie.

La Musique 

God continues to open doors for us in the city, especially through music. Tom helped to welcome a  delegation from Nashville this past month and we’ve been invited to submit an application for a grant from the US regional consulate to lead some cultural exchanges through music in the city. We have been invited to play a couple shows in November. There is also a musical association near us that is starting to host some live music nights at the town hall. We are meeting with their leadership next week. We are excited about playing music, but more excited about the relationship that we have the chance to build and the connections we are able to make in the city.

More People!

We are excited that God is answering our prayers for more teammates! There is so much possibility here in Caen, so many doors seem to be opening, and the need for Jesus is huge. We are thankful to have Troy Gebert working with us through GEM, our missions agency. Troy is courageous and hard working and we are already seeing fruit come through his efforts in his first couple of months here.

In the January, we are looking forward to welcoming Lauren, who will be with us for five months working as our nanny! She is coming through an organisation that sends people to nanny for missionary families all over the world called Mission Nannys. Please pray for her visa application process to go smoothly!

There are also some families praying about coming to serve with us on a longer term basis. Please join us in praying with them for discernment and that God would bring the right team together for the work He has prepared for us.

La Rentrée (back to school)

All four of our children are attending our local school now and their first couple of weeks have gone very well. Elodie is nothing short of heroic, marching into a foreign language environment for the first time on her third birthday! The boys are adjusting well to being in the same school now and are glad to be able to play together during recess. We’ve also started some associations this year which are a good way to connect to the community and get to know our neighbors. Sy is playing tennis, Reuben is going to try badminton, Eli is continuing his good work at the physical therapist, and Elodie is starting “baby gym”. Joanna will be continuing with her painting association and Tom has started at a badminton club.

The Most Contemplative of Seasons…

It is a huge blessing to begin to feel settled. Beginning the year in the same school, seeing some familiar faces and friends, deepening relationships with neighbors, and growing opportunities in the city…!!!!

Even in the transition and relative chaos, it has been amazing to see God moving, drawing people to Himself; into freedom and deep love. Now we are sensing the opportunity for even more fruitfulness here in France.

Thank you for being here with us, for your ongoing love, prayer and support. We could not do this important work without you and we are so grateful!

Love,

The Appels
Tom, Joanna, Reuben, Eli, Silas, and Elodie

P.S. - We are going to be sending out a card this year (!) and we would love to have your most recent address. Please drop us a line if you would like to receive a card or have moved in the past few years! Thank you for reading to the end!

Part 2: Summertime Update (Blesstival, Visiting Teams, Music in the City)

Hi Folks,

Welcome to part two of our Appel summer update! In yesterday’s update, we largely focused on family and local updates, and prayer needs. If you missed it, and would like to read, click here. This update will bring you news of all the things God has been up to through our ministry life in and around Caen with the Bless Network. Thanks for reading!

Women’s Retreat Day

At the end of May, we had a women’s retreat day at Bethanie. It was a lovely time of worship, prayer and teaching. A young woman who has been coming along to serve at SOS Chai (Bless’ refugee ministry) since November, became a Christian during one of the prayer times! We are so excited that she is a part of our church in Caen! She is already bringing other people along to our gatherings! Amazing!

Blesstival

Down at L’Orangerie de Beauregard, the campsite near Tour that is a part of our greater Bless Network, we hosted a four day festival, lovingly called ‘Blesstival’. This is a gathering of everyone in our network across Europe for worship, teaching, and fellowship. Tom and I were responsible for leading the worship (Bi-lingually!) for the festival, we helped host a 24-hour prayer room on the site and facilitated many of the events. Our kids were very involved in the program as well by dancing, drumming, and doing the words on the computer. Joanna also was able to paint as part of one of the worship sessions, (painting in pictures above)! In all, it was a fruitful time where relationships were strengthened, people received prayer and healing, we were envisioned for the future, and celebrated what God is already doing through our community in Bless. Plus, the bonus of a pool. ;)

Nashville Team

It was a huge blessing to welcome a team from our home church in Nashville, The Gate Community Church. This team came and led what they call a Freedom Immersion day in which they taught and modeled ways of actively standing in prayer for the freedom we have in Christ. This teaching was well received among the group of French believers who came, many of whom are new in their journey of faith. The Nashville team also helped us with SOS Chai and supported Joanna and I in our work with the twinning association. Most of all, the team was a source of refreshment for us and our church.

Blankets for SOS Chai

While the team from Nashville was here, we had a quick visit from some other friends in the UK who are part of our UK church - Christ Church Chorleywood - and who help to lead an organization dedicated to helping refugees. A team of three stopped by for one of our community group BBQs and brought a huge van load of quality blankets for us to distribute to the refugees! We have given out almost all of them in the past weeks and the lads are very grateful!

Music in Caen

After praying for years that God would open up opportunities for us to share about His love through the arts and music, we had the chance to play two ‘soirées musicales’ (nights of live music) in Caen in the space of a week! This was through the relationship that has been growing with the Caen-Nashville twinning association. Our friends Ryan and Karen Hall were in town with the Nashville team and along with our friends and teammates Dan and Kate Soar, we played one open air show in front of Keys & Co. and then a show in a bar in the center of town a week later. It was an amazing privilege to sings songs about freedom and God’s love over our city. We had a lot of fun with this and it seems that it might be the beginning of something for us here in Caen.

Upcoming Visits and Trips

We have already had a few short term teams come through this summer from Canada, Nashville and the UK, but next week we welcome a large group (above 40!) of Californians to Bethanie for a week of worship, service and teaching, along with a BBQ at our house, which is becoming a bit of a tradition ;) The next week we travel as a family to GEM’s Annual Conference in Frankfurt, Germany. There we will celebrate 70 years of God at work through GEM in Europe and have a chance to worship and fellowship with other missionaries in our organization. When we return, we (Tom and Joanna) will be going on a week of retreat and the kids will be at our home in the care of some very great friends who are fellow GEM missionaries. This sums up our big events for the summer, but we are hoping to have a family “Stay-cation” and explore Normandy as a family in August before school begins again in September.

Prayer Points

Caen Nashville Twinning

The nights of music in June were a success and we would like to develop further the musical connections with Nashville and Caen through the relationships we have made. Please pray for continued favor and God-inspired strategy for this partnership.

House of Songs Rental Location

In our update in May, we talked about a rental location for a prayer room in Caen. We have submitted the application but the owner is on the fence about renting or selling and we have seen no movement on this for two months now. Please pray for breakthrough on this location or for another location to open up in Caen.

New Believers and New Connections

Praise Jesus we are seeing new believers join our community! We are also meeting more people interested in coming along to our house group and church meetings. Please pray for these relationships to flourish and strengthen in the coming months.

Recruitment

One thing that is a constant prayer of ours is for more workers for the harvest. We have so much opportunity to serve here but only a few of us able to take part. We are grateful and excited to be welcoming two new interns to work with us this fall, but Dan and Kate Soar, who have hosted at Bethanie the past year, are moving on and returning to the UK. Their departure in September leaves a massive hole on our team. Please pray for the right people to come and join our team in God’s timing and for patience and wisdom for us while we wait for them.

Travel Safety and Stamina

We are excited to have this full summer in our home for the first time, without a lot of travel, but we still have some! Please pray for safety, health and protection as we travel to Germany and as we are away from the kids for a week in August. PLUS rest for the whole family as we all recover from a difficult winter season.

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Sword Beach, Ouistreham France

You’ve made it to the end of this two part update. Something we reflected on in our time with our friends from Nashville is the difficulty of expressing difficulty in our update emails. What I mean is that while we feel so very well supported and able to be transparent with you, sometimes our hope or trust that God is winning the battles can make it seem like we are walking on sunshine, that everything is going amazingly well here. The reality is that there is rarely a week that goes by when we aren’t struggling. We are seeing God at work and we are so thankful to be joining in this work. But, we are also wounded. This is why Joanna and I are getting away next month - we need some time for God to work deeply in the places we are injured. We write this, not to be a downer at the end of our update, but because we’re understanding more deeply our need for life together with you. Thank you for praying with us and please do let us know how we can pray with you too.

Every Blessing,

Tom and Joanna, Reuben, Eli, Silas, and Elodie