Embrase Nos Coeurs 2007

This past Friday and Sunday I spent at the Embrase Nos Coeurs conference in Montreuil, France. I appreciated the change in location, as it was a lot easier to get to this conference than the previous ones in La Plaine St. Denis north of Paris.

My official role was photographer. I loved getting to wander around the conference and take photos of events and especially people. A friend named Jean-Claude described me as a "capturer of images." After having been photographer plus a number of other roles at conferences and events, it was nice to just be able to focus on photography.

While I've been to a number of other ENC conferences, this was my favorite of all of them. A number of factors helped make this my favorite one. Firstly, it was easy to get to. From my place, it is just 2 bus stops, then 2 subway stops to the conference site. On Friday, I even went home for lunch and supper, yet still was able to photograph the morning, afternoon, and evening events. Today we took the car and went as a family, which is my 2nd reason. It was fun getting to talk with many people from our church and other places whom we don't regularly get to see. We even saw Marie-Cecile, the midwife who delivered our son 5+ years ago. The 3rd reason was that it felt like I knew a lot of people at the event. It was like a Homecoming.

A 4th reason was that, I felt that I participated in the conference, as well as photographing it. In previous conferences, I've felt detached from the conference, even in the midst of photographing it. I went forward for prayer on Friday and had some carpet time. Hank, a colleague in France whom I've known since 1989, gave me an encouraging word about being a precious pearl this morning. I think that my more intentionally particularly participating in the conference helped improve my photos, as I could identify more with what the other participants are seeing and especially feeling.

The 5th reason is because of the messages given by Chuck Pierce. I had heard of him, but this was the first time to see and hear him in peson. He had some encouraging words about what God will do in the France during the next 3 years. I purchased the 3 DVDs of his talks and have already watched them already. However, I need to keep watching them this week and reflect upon them.

A 6th reason is because of a generous woman from our church. Today Elizabeth gave our kids a kitchenette set and a car seat, as well as bracelets. Our kids have been wanting a kitchenette, as it's the most popular toy in our son's classroom.