We signed a lease for our apartment at the beginning of August-- we love our location, its proximity to everything and just the character of the old building. We've slowly but surely been able to make it our home. Our boxes arrived from the states, in tact and everything was just as we had packed it.
In mid-August we were able to participate in youth camp with several of the churches from the region. There were just under 100 students there, ranging in age from 13-18. We served as "Tâche-mats" for the week, helping to clean the camp and assist the kitchen crew in getting meals served and cleaned up. The week finished up with the topic of purity. It was interesting to see how shocked the teenagers were when the idea of making a commitment for purity was suggested. But, in the end several students did choose to commit to guard their purity until marriage.
As September began, thousands of students descended upon Namur to prepare for the start of the new school year. It truly is incredible how many people are here under the age of 25! With the start of the school year, also means the beginning of language school for us. We have been in class now for about 3 weeks, learning French for 3 1/2 hours a day. Since the class is for individuals who are not native French speakers, we have quite the diverse group. There are students from Kosovo, Rwanda, Ukraine, Russia, Venezuela, Romania, Afghanistan, Armenia, and Brazil.-- and we range in age from 19-62! It has been fun learning together and getting to know people as we find a common language in French.
We have also begun meeting with our team in Namur to make plans for the café, which we hope to open in the next year. In the meantime we are looking for ways to connect with people and to just become part of our community. One of these ways is by creating English conversation groups. These groups are for people with some spoken English, but who wish to improve. This allows us to meet local people without having to be fluent in French (yet!) and to see our ability to speak English as an asset.
The weekend of the 17th was 'Fête de Wallonie' which, this year, celebrated the 600th birthday of Namur. One of the highlights of the Fete are the Echausseurs, or stilt walkers. They march down the street to a fife and drum and then have "combat"; the last man standing wins'!We also celebrated Robyn's 30th birthday with a day trip to Mini-Europe, in Brussels.
- Please continue to pray for us as we take on the daily task of cultural adjustment and learning French.
- Lift up our team in Namur as we continue to follow through on God’s plans for the café, through which, we hope to reach those who may not find God otherwise.
We continue to thank God for your role in this ministry and pray that you are encouraged that God is moving in Belgium!
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