Témoignage AN

I have always loved travelling, for as long as I can remember. As a child, whilst the other children wanted to be policemen or firemen, I longed to be a sailor on cargo boats! Then, for several years, I traveled alone, hitch-hiking, or travelling by plane or sailing ship. And it was in New Zealand, in 1984, that I found the Lord. After getting married in 1986, Cathy and I set off for the Carribean in a sailing ship that we had bought. I was very much a seafarer! My father coming from Palma of Majorca, and my mother from Malta, they grew up on the coast of North Africa, and I was brought up on the French Riviera! But, when I understood and accepted that God wanted me to entrust Him with my destiny, I obeyed Him, and spent some time in the region of Savoie. This was a real test for me; of everything in my past life, this passion for the ocean and for sailing was the most difficult to leave behind! So, I was surprised when God called me to a mission in 1990. At first I didn't really believe it, and it was only in 1995, in the setting of the ministry in which I had been serving for three years, that I left, along with my wife and three children, for the Indian Ocean, for the Island of...

MADAGASCAR.

On our arrival, after numerous problems with visas etc, we tried to put back together the pieces of a church that had exploded. We were half a dozen of us, meeting in my garage. The Lord gave me, at this moment, a strategy to develop this church, which had brought forth, and is still bringing forth, lots of fruit. This strategy relied on the fact that the phase of the first spreading of the gospel has changed today, although the country had not become better as a result. We were far from the Acts 17 : 6 declaration: " These people, who have turned the world upside down, have come here ! " The gospel hadn't yet turned MADAGASCAR upside down ! God asked me to set up a framework which would in its turn help to form other frames, settings, in order to spread the gospel. The idea was to put into practice the verse from Matthew 28 : 19 " Go forth and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. " Often, we had " gone forth ", we had often " baptised ", but we had rarely remembered to make these people and nations into disciples. This means that our preaching of the gospel is ineffective in transforming our society. So, in our first year, we opened a training centre for " elders " which welcomed different people from churches in TAMATAVE (on the coast of Madagascar). We gave courses from Lumière(s) des Nations, (Light for the Nations) adapted to a Madagascar context.

Of the 74 people enrolled at the start, 52 went on to finish their training and are today active members of their assemblies, or even recognised ministries in MADAGASCAR. The idea, after having held several evangelism meetings, something fairly easy in MADAGASCAR, was to start to form one or two couples who would be able to develop and continue the work that had been started. Rapidly, from solidly planted bases, these couples started to organise new evangelism meetings. As soon as these started producing fruit, we immediately began a new training course for disciples and elders. Today, several churches are up and running in MADAGASCAR, and give these courses. Other churches in the country use these courses aswell, to form their leaders. Another aspect of our work in MADAGASCAR was on the social side. In 6 years, in the Indian Ocean we have mananged to transport several hundreds of kilos of medicines, clothing, school material, toys, etc. Most of the time, these gifts arrived in little packages of 2 or 3 kilos, prepared by charity workers in the Fédération Evangélique Souffle Nouveau, (Evangelical federation New Breath) but sent by our friends in various assemblies, who took parcels home to post, at their own cost. This work with an ant-like organisation, permitted the development of mobile dispensaries, campain of pest-control, the creation of an orphanage and a christian school. After three years, God asked us to go to the REUNION island, where we continued our ministry, whilst continuing to visit the churches in MADAGASCAR. This is where we created in 1998 "SOUFFLE NOUVEAU OCEAN INDIEN". Today there are 3 churches at the Reunion Island, 7 at Madagascar, an orphanage and christian school

We are today based in France and we are serving God anew, on one hand with the GUEBWILLER the Collège Daniel where Cathy teaches, in the maternelle (infant) class. As for me, I have an itinerant ministry both in France and abroad .