Bordeaux is grey, wet and miserable today
But there's lots going on. This morning I am going to do some planning (French faire le planning) for the English Class build up to Christmas. We'll take the opportunity to do some Christmas Carols that are linked to Bible passages, like "While shepherds watched" and "The race that long in darkness dwelt" and 'Good King Wenceslas"°. Then I need some language clarification stuff which the BBC website will give me - I was wondering about pronouns like I, me and myself. They'll like that because it is easier in English than in French, though we still get it wrong a lot! Dare I do some concordance de temps - putting things in the past and in the future and keeping the tenses working?
Numbers have been down over the past few weeks for the English Class. I would begin to wonder if it is my tongue twisters, except for the fact that this week almost everyone who turned up was for my class and hardly anyone for Fiona's. Perhaps it's a time of year thing.
This afternoon a man is coming to sweep the chimney and deliver our first load of logs. We'll start using the fireplace then, which will cheer us up no end. Then I am off to see our former landlords to pay them for the repairs on the boiler and to advise them that the new tenant should pay for the maintenance contract like what I did, but mainly to keep up the contact and assure them of our interest and concern. Their souls matter more than the money.
Tomorrow we have our prayer meeting at the student centre, and I am also meeting with the elders of the church to plan out an afternoon where people are to be encouraged to develop their service for the Saviour. I have responsability for dealing with "teaching", "Biblical knowledge", "evangelism", "liberality" and "hospitality". The two elders are each taking five sessions on other areas of church life.
The afternoon of workshops takes place next Saturday.
Then I am preaching on 17 December in the morning. It was due to be 24th, for the culte de Noël, but I asked to swap because 24th is Gwilym's birthday, and I think it is better for the pastor to preach at the culte de Noël, really.
29th December there is a big meeting for those who are waiting to become members. This involves us, though the date may have to be changed. We'll see.
° I was kidding about "Good King Wenceslas"
Numbers have been down over the past few weeks for the English Class. I would begin to wonder if it is my tongue twisters, except for the fact that this week almost everyone who turned up was for my class and hardly anyone for Fiona's. Perhaps it's a time of year thing.
This afternoon a man is coming to sweep the chimney and deliver our first load of logs. We'll start using the fireplace then, which will cheer us up no end. Then I am off to see our former landlords to pay them for the repairs on the boiler and to advise them that the new tenant should pay for the maintenance contract like what I did, but mainly to keep up the contact and assure them of our interest and concern. Their souls matter more than the money.
Tomorrow we have our prayer meeting at the student centre, and I am also meeting with the elders of the church to plan out an afternoon where people are to be encouraged to develop their service for the Saviour. I have responsability for dealing with "teaching", "Biblical knowledge", "evangelism", "liberality" and "hospitality". The two elders are each taking five sessions on other areas of church life.
The afternoon of workshops takes place next Saturday.
Then I am preaching on 17 December in the morning. It was due to be 24th, for the culte de Noël, but I asked to swap because 24th is Gwilym's birthday, and I think it is better for the pastor to preach at the culte de Noël, really.
29th December there is a big meeting for those who are waiting to become members. This involves us, though the date may have to be changed. We'll see.
° I was kidding about "Good King Wenceslas"
Comments
Anyway, when I sing that particular camel I always think of it as "See, while I am stuck here amidst the Winter's snow, born for us on earth below (and what the weather was like then I neither kno nor care)