Bixby Bulletin-- Aug/Sept. 2009

August/September 2009

Dear Friends,

As I write this, we are in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, wishing we were about two weeks later to enjoy the even richer colors of autumn. The trees are changing and the leaves are falling, but not like it will be in a few short weeks. God’s creative ways are “infinitely interesting.” We are in our sending church in Stephenson, and will be leaving in a couple of hours for another supporting church way up on the banks of Lake Superior. Following that we will be heading for Minneapolis, then down to Charleston, IL. Then out to Arkansas and Mississippi, and finally back to Greenville for a week.

In just over six short weeks we have put over 9000 miles on our car. A good bit of that has been getting around to see our children scattered around the country. Tsiry, the teenage boy who came to the states with us, returned to France as planned after spending one month traveling with us. Little did I know that less than ten days after his return, I would be following him. Our dear Rene Rottier, age 86, went to be with the Lord. We were shocked to learn of his sudden death of a heart attack. Rene and Marcelle have been with us since day one of our Bordeaux ministry, and have faithfully stood by us and with us over these long years. I knew that my place was there beside his widow and son as we are the only “family” they have. We will miss him dearly. I was there eight days before returning to Boston where I had left Bonnie with Johanna and Brian during my absence. We returned the following day to Greenville and then headed out for meetings in the north mid-west.

One bonus from my quick trip to France was to spend some precious time with Tim and Ruth and bonding time with my two grandchildren. They are adapting so well in the ministry in France. We are so thrilled to have them on the field. Micaiah and Miriam started school last week. There was some apprehension on all of our parts as to how they would do going into a strange school where a foreign language they didn’t understand was spoken in a strange culture that they weren’t used to. Up to this time they’d only known home schooling. They are doing well – very well, in fact. They love it. Their teachers seem excited to have them. Ruth began the semester of French learning on Monday of this week. They are doing a wonderful job of “filling our shoes.”

Continue to pray for us as we travel. It has not been wearisome, although these aging joints need more stopping and stretching than before. That didn’t stop us from traveling non-stop 1010 miles last week (from Boston to Greenville) upon my return from the funeral in France. Who says we’re old?

We are looking forward to seeing many of you over the next 4 months before our return to France on February 2^nd. We long to be a source of blessing and encouragement to whomever we meet along the way. We have been refreshed and encouraged already by those of you whom we’ve seen up to now.

Once again, thank you for your faithful love, prayers and support.

In Christ,

Bob and Bonnie Bixby

Bixby Bulletin-- Spring 2009

Spring 2009

Dear Friends,

It was a beautiful day here today. Spring is in the air and the weather has warmed up noticeably. Our church family enjoyed being together. Most of our people were here before 10:30 this morning and quite a few didn’t leave until six this evening! Our Sundays are long but full of wonderful fellowship.

Next Sunday will be even fuller than normal. It is Easter and we are starting with breakfast together. Then we will have our regular service. Bob has been working hard with a choir and they will be singing “The Love of God” (in French, of course). Our regular meal will be replaced with a special one – by that I mean that the menu is planned and it is not a “potluck.” Following the meal we are going to have a special Easter service. The young people and children have been working hard on special music for this service.

That should tire us out, but we won’t be finished!! We need to leave immediately after the afternoon service and travel at least four or five hours on our way to Germany. Bob is bringing the messages for BMM’s German field conference. It begins the next evening. We are looking forward to getting to know better our fellow co-laborers north of the border. Please pray for Bob who will be bringing eight messages during the 4 days.

Since our French field conference is the following week in the eastern part of France, we will not come home in between. We plan to go to Switzerland to see some of our special kids – former students and younger brothers and sisters in Christ . You probably remember hearing about Nati who lived with us for almost a year, Gina who was saved here three years ago and Laetitia who is one of those extra special students who leaves a mark on everyone. We will go to church with her. At the present time, she is working at a Bible School in Geneva.

Please pray for our conference. Our field has suffered the loss of some godly missionaries to cancer in the last couple of years and we have others who are very ill. Pray that the time together will be encouraging for all.

Also continue to pray for our travels in the states. We have still many “holes” that need to be filled with meetings to report back to faithful supporters. If you would like us to visit your church during the months of August to December would you please contact us? Our email is still rbixbysr@aol.com .

We mentioned in our last letter a young lady who grew up in the church and then completely left and was living in the world. She has really changed since her salvation. What a joy! She is having regular Bible studies with Bob now and we hope to see her baptized before we leave in July. There are a couple of others that should be ready to take this step, too. Pray that we will be able to have a baptism service and for faithfulness in the lives of these young Christians.

Thank you so much for your prayer support and your financial support. We know that it is a difficult time for all. One final request—pray that Tim and Ruth will be granted their visas quickly so they can come in June as planned.

In Christ,

Bob and Bonnie Bixby

Bixby Bulletin-- Winter 2009

Dear Co-laborers,

Thank God for financial crises. They are so good for us. They help to show our true colors and values. As a small missionary church across the waters from you, our travels through Colossians during the last several months, have underscored the completeness of our lives, if they are found in the Lord Jesus Christ. With Christ we have absolutely everything we need; without Him we are totally destitute – we have nothing. The international economic crunch only makes that light shine all the more brighter. Those whose eyes are fixed on Him, with eternity’s values in view, do not lose their joy as they seek the ways and means to make up the material difference. God has never yet been baffled by finances, and He will be up to this one too.

Having said that, I must also add that up to this point we have not noticed a huge difference, although like everyone else we have tried to tighten our belts, and be extra prudent and discretionary in our handling of the financial support that you and others have entrusted us with. Once again we thank you for your faithfulness in these matters. Some of you probably have to sacrifice more than we in order to insure that our support continues, and we are deeply humbled and grateful. May we be worthy of every cent, and stretch every cent even farther than we have in gratitude to you and our Lord.

Last Saturday we had a very encouraging meeting with 12 selected faithful members of our Pessac Baptist Church. I say selected because we do not have an official member list yet, so I invited 12 mature adult faithful Christians to prayerfully seek together the Lord’s direction as to immediate and longer term direction for our assembly. The enthusiasm, humility, and Christian love expressed was so encouraging and stimulating, that even though we met for 2 ½ hours, all wanted to schedule another meeting very soon (within the month) to tie some of the loose ends together, and to get some things rolling – for instance, we may be a tiny church, still pastored by a missionary, but we need to support a missionary ourselves.

Our Annual Repas Agape went over very well. There were right at 40 university students present, at least half of whom were lost and unchurched. They heard an excellent message by fellow missionary Mark Nelsen. Mark pastors in La Rochelle about two hours north of us.

One of our young people who had gone far from the Lord and left the church years ago, was born again just before Christmas and is excited about being baptized soon. Hopefully sometime in the next two months we should have three people ready to follow the Lord in baptism.

And so the work goes on. We hear from students from time to time who have gone on in their studies elsewhere, or who are installed in their careers, and who are faithfully walking with the Lord and serving in local churches where they are, and that is always so encouraging.

We are still working on our itinerary for our time in the states. We look forward to seeing many of you soon.

Yours in His wonderful service,

Bob and Bonnie Bixby

Contact information:

Email: rbixbysr@aol.com

Blog : www. bixbys.blogspot.com

Bixby Bulletin--Fall 2008

Dear Friends,

We are coming to the end of a whirlwind fall. We turned on the heat this weekend so our cold weather is officially here.

The tract distribution in the university dorms has been strung out over several weeks this year. We had new tracts printed in Spain. Our friend Andy Bonikowsky was gracious to work with us at the last minute and reproduce an updated brochure. The students have folded the tracts and slid them under a couple thousand doors. At this point, there is only one village left to do. (You can see a picture of the students at www.bixbys.blogspot.com.) We have had several students come already from the distribution. In fact, in that picture there are at least four new students who helped last Friday night!

Our biggest effort this fall has been preparing for the Three Church Retreat. This year it was our turn to pull it off--that means you do everything! Our theme was "More than Conquerors." Our guest speaker, Jeff Abbett, did a great job and people were really blessed by his messages. There were 74 who attended, and we were grateful that the Lord answered so many prayers. Our major concern was that there would be a warm spirit and fellowship with everyone. God answered in such a marvellous way. In fact, our people feel that it was the best retreat ever. (For some pictures, look at the blog!)

After the retreat, we had the privilege of having the Andy Bonikowsky family here for a couple of days and tonight we are waiting for Roy and Lou Ann Keiser to arrive. Both of these families are dear friends and missionaries in Spain. Actually, Roy is coming to do some much needed work in my kitchen. I have one burner out of five that work and with all my company, that is sometimes tricky. We will post a picture when it is done!

Our big news is that we will be going to the States next summer for a 5-6 month furlough. Tim and his family are going to come out to replace us. They will take over the work here, plus squeeze in some French study. We have two major prayer requests for this:

1. That Tim and Ruth will be able to raise a significant amount of support before June. They would love to be at 100% so they can just stay on! We would love that, too.
2. Our traveling schedule. Please contact us right away if you have any special dates that you would like us to visit. This is the first time since 2000 that we will be in the States in the fall, and we are looking forward to it. We want to visit all of you, so we have to start scheduling now.

Thank you all for your love and support. Please don't forget to check out the blog for up to date news.

In Christ,

Bob and Bonnie Bixby