A report from Sim Ashford, Create Team Leader from Yeovil Community Church (YCC)
We should’ve brought wine! That’s what I thought to myself as we entered the room on a bright Sunday afternoon. Greeting us, a small community in Fougères made up of four families gathering for their Sunday service. Everyone’s brought something to share. That is, everyone except us. As we stand by the table, it dawns on us that this is no ordinary church.
Back in March, myself and the Create Team (interns from YCC) visited two Perspectives churches. The purpose of our trip was to pray with and encourage the local communities alongside discerning the future for our connection with France. In our preparation, we were reminded of Peter’s words in Acts 3: “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you” (Acts 3.6). We felt that, practically, we had little to give (only one of us could speak French!) but that Jesus almost always works in our places of weakness and lack. So, we sat down mildly embarrassed but confident that Jesus would work through our quite literally empty hands.
After a loud and lively lunch, church-planter Élise Duchemann (an old friend) directed us to relocate to the living area. A time of worship in English followed before Amy (a member of our team who grew up in France) shared the gospel in French. Then, the room divided into French speakers and English speakers as we unpacked (and translated!) what we’d just heard. Greg & Nicole Saldi, an amazing American couple who lead the church alongside the Duchemanns, helped us to understand much of what was being said. However, whilst this discussion was engaging, it was the love and respect this community had for all involved in the conversation that impacted us most. We were being reminded what true community looks like.
The following day, we travelled to meet with Patrice Alcindor, leader of Nantes International Church. We prayed all over Nantes whilst hearing about the joys and pressures of leading a multicultural community in the heart of a thriving city. Over dinner, we shared what we’ve seen God doing in our different contexts and were so encouraged to hear stories of faith conversations in schools and not-yet Christians belting gospel music! Speaking of gospel choirs, we had the opportunity to practise with the Nantes group later that evening. We were struck by the beauty of so many different people singing songs of hope together. They were likely struck by the addition of some rather questionable altos…
After returning to Fougères for the night, we travelled with the Duchemanns to Annoville in Normandy. Once there, we ate with Jan & Malcolm Stevens – a power-couple who pioneered our connection with France up until last year. It was a reminder of the legacy of this connection and how much God has done through the Perspectives communities we’ve visited over the years: in Nantes, Fougères, Argenton-sur-Creuse, and Châteauroux.
However, through this lunch, a dinner at our AirBnB, and the last day we spent with Élise, we learned perhaps our most important lesson. We saw that, unlike any scheme, programme, or one-way missional operation, what has breathed life into the relationship between a random church in Somerset and multiple communities throughout France has been the genuine friendship between those involved.
And so, by the end of our time in Nantes and Fougères, we’d come to a beautiful realisation. This team had arrived looking to connect, encourage, and discern a strategy for the future of our relationship with these communities. However, no neat strategy could fully capture what we discovered: that the future is found in friendship.
