Vintage Church, Paris France

I've had the opportunity to spend some time with one of our more recently planted NewThing churches: Vintage Church in Paris, France.  Bill and Rachel Carroll, who were on staff at COMMUNITY for about 12 years, moved from Chicago to plant this new church plant to reach those far from God. 

Paris is a very difficult city to plant a new church.  Not because of the food, wine or scenery...but because of the disdain or even disgust towards anything that resembles organized religion.  In fact, about 1-2% of Paris is categorized as churched.  This hasn't stopped God using Bill and Rachel to reach the Parisian community though. 

Today we celebrated Thanksgiving with Vintage Church, with almost 70 people coming in and enjoying a American tradition of food, fun and football.  The best part was hearing the French language being spoken all around us as we enjoyed the American tradition together.  Not only that, as a community, they cooked 3 very large turkeys, to make sure there was plenty handout to the homeless community around Paris (they also distributed blankets).

I am very proud of their leadership and grateful for us here at NewThing to play a small part in their growing church.  Way to go Vintage Church!