An AIXplanation of pronunciation. Or, The life of a church planter is hard, we have to make ourselves laugh somehow.

Before I moved here, I would get a lot of confused looks and questions when trying to explain to non-French people where in France I would be living. "Aix? What's that? Is that a word? Oh, it's a city? How do you pronounce that? Ox? Aches? Ikes?"

No, it's Aix. Like X. Like X marks the spot of where Kerri will be living in France.

To clear up any confusion on the pronunciation of my beloved city, let me share with you an email exchange between several of our team members regarding the planning of our Easter service:

Apryl,
For Easter, if Katrina and Megan play violin and Kerri plays flute...we’ll have our own orchAIXtra!!! It will be a great AIXperiment, and I’m AIXtremely AIXcited! Hopefully no one will take AIXception!
(AIXcuse my AIXtraneous email :))
Dom

Ah, Dom, that was AIXcruciating!
Apryl

Dom, I would have AIXpected this from Apryl, but not from you!
Kerri

Please stop using such AIXplicit language!
Megan

Thankful for the roof over my head. Or, A post to assure you that I'm alive and well and not homeless.

A blog update is long overdue, seeing as I feel like I’ve been in France for ages and so much has already happened! I was waiting to get the internet working at my apartment before I updated my blog (more on my current living situation to follow), but seeing as I was told that en principe the internet would be up and running by next Wednesday, I figured I should go ahead and update now.

The expression en principe is so perfectly French. You’ll have the internet en principe by Wednesday means that it should be working by Wednesday, but don’t be at all surprised if it takes a month and a half. En principe the meeting starts at noon actually means that the meeting is just as likely to start at 1:30. If you’re apartment hunting and are told that en principe you’ll be approved to rent an apartment, well, you very well could be couch surfing for a few more months. Just last week we had a discussion at Aix Forum (a weekly dinner/discussion group that ICCP hosts as an outreach to university students) about how language is shaped by culture, and I think the phrase en principe is a perfect illustration of life in France. (The same goes for the word normalement).

I couldn’t be happier to be back in Aix en Provence, and it’s been quite easy to settle in and readjust to life here. So easy, in fact, that it almost feels as if I never left! I was blessed to stay for a with my wonderful friends Andi (who was my roommate last time I lived in Aix) and Andrea (a dear friend from Westmont). As fun as that was, I’m happy to now be temporarily renting a room from the Pettyjohn’s, a young couple who has been on the ICCP team for about 6 months. It’s great to have my own space and be able to spread out a little bit, and I love getting to know Pat and Lindsey as teammates and friends. They have been wonderfully hospitable and so helpful as I've been settling in. Lindsey even made an Ikea run with me so that I could get a bed. We discovered on this trip that Ikea bedframes don't fit in the church van. But we also discovered that we're capable and independent and don't need men to tie bedframes to the van roof. I’ll stay chez Pettyjohn until Andrea, Hilary (another Westmont friend) and I find an apartment for the three of us. We’ll be like Westmont Alumni: the Southern France chapter.

Lots more to share, but this will have to do for now. Coming soon: posts (including pictures, hopefully) about our awesome youth group and the fun things we get to do with them like Chicken Bowling and iPod Idol, Melanie’s baptism and getting a glimpse into the awesome ways God is working in Aix, a few triumphant French moments, and lots more cool stuff that God is teaching me.

My jubilant homecoming! Or, How to write a blog while extremely jet-lagged.

I'm in France! I arrived at the Marseille airport on Wednesday evening to loud cheers and waving signs from my entire team. I think all the onlookers in the airport were trying to figure out which celebrity had just arrived. They had planned an entire evening for me, which began with an apero at the Jones' beautiful new house, then an amazing dinner at Pasta Cosy, and finished with a digestif at the Pettyjohn's. It was such a fun night. The team welcomed me back into their family, and I feel so blessed to be a part of this wonderful community again.

It is so great to be back in Aix en Provence! And it's great to jump right back into ministry at ICCP. We've started planning an adventure camp (through True Life Adventures) for jr. high and high school students to happen this summer. I also helped Andi put together a fundraising party on Friday night to raise money for an 8-person team that ICCP is sending to Uganda in a few months. Hilary and Dominic did some great live music, we raised some good money and had a great time!

I've only been back in Aix for a few days, and already I've been able to see how God has carved a niche for my ministry here. The best part about coming back has been renewing old connections with people I knew before. When I was an exchange student in Aix in 2003, I purchased my cell phone from a French girl a few years older than me. It was one of those pay-as-you-go plans, so I had to keep going back and buying more minutes, so I got to know this girl pretty well. I'd run into her around town, and she was my "cell phone girl." Well on Friday night at the party, a French girl came in. Darrin (my team leader and our pastor) told me she had helped a lot of our staff members get cell phones last fall, and some of them had developed friendships with her, so she had been hanging out at a lot of our community gatherings. She looked so familiar, and after a while I realized she was my "cell phone girl" from 2003! I got to talk with her for a while, and we made plans to go have coffee sometime soon. I'm excited about developing this friendship with someone I met so many years ago.

On Friday night I also bumped into a kid that was involved in the youth group when I led it 2 years ago. Back then he was a squirrely 15 year old French kid who seemed mostly uninterested in the youth group. 2 years later, he has grown up, learned English, and become very involved in the ICCP community. I'm so excited to see his involvement in our community and see how his faith has matured.

Coming down from the "I'm-back-in-Aix euphoria" means adjusting to my new life. That includes not-so-fun things like trying to find a place to live and filling out the mountain of paperwork to make sure I'm "legal." But right now, I'm still in the honeymoon phase.

Three cheers for the Family. Or, How to say goodbye without falling to pieces.

I’ve been at my parents’ house in Thousand Oaks for a few days, and I’ve spent pretty much all of that time sorting through boxes and boxes of all my worldly possessions. Normally I hate the sorting and organizing and packing of things like this, mostly because as soon as I open a box, I’m compelled to look at every single item within and relive the corresponding childhood memory. It’s quite a lengthy process. But this time it has been good, because as I’ve been sorting through boxes, I’ve had a lot of time to simultaneously sort through all my thoughts and emotions.

(A warning: this will probably get sappy and sentimental very quickly. I apologize.)

I’m trying to figure out the appropriate way to say goodbye to one’s life and to finish that life well without emotionally detaching or becoming excessively sentimental. How do you prepare for and look forward to the next chapter in the story while enjoying and appreciating the chapter that is coming to a close? (For all you international types- has anyone figured out how to do this yet? Or is it just supposed to be gut-wrenchingly hard to say goodbye every time you leave a place?)

I was incredibly blessed to experience true community in Santa Barbara for the past year. As I try my best to say farewell, all I can do is be thankful. I’m thankful for my friends who challenge me to grow in my faith, who push me to follow Christ even when the path is hard, who listen with love. I’m thankful for my homegroup who journey into the Word of God each week with me, who encourage me to reflect on the Scriptures in a fresh way, who share honestly, who faithfully pray for me. I’m thankful for the family that is Family Dinner, who have taught me how to break bread together and how to live as a family. I’m thankful for the roommates who have authentically lived their lives alongside mine and encouraged me in the quest for Truth. I’m thankful for the coworkers who have taught me so much about being a part of an amazing team. I’m thankful for the many laughs and all the joy that has been my life in Santa Barbara.

I will never ceased to be amazed by the way Christ uses His Family, that is His Church, to grow us and shape us. It is in part because of the encouragement and support of my family, friends, and church body in Santa Barbara that I have arrived at this place of returning to Europe, to bring the refreshing truth of Christ to a land that is dry and thirsty.

I realize these aren’t new or unique thoughts I’m having, but I think that, as Christ has chosen His Body the Church as the vehicle for the working of His grace in our world, I’d be remiss if I did not pause to give praise for the blessings of my community in Santa Barbara. Here’s to you, SB.