Crazy experience in Crossville, TN.
We had a God-moment in Crossville recently, while taking a weekend away at Fairfield Glade. See below for an account, as was documented by the couple we met...who sent us this in an email:
On Friday July 10th, around 4 PM, our daughter-in-law, Rachel, called us to see if she could come over to
spend a little time with us. Oliver was taking care of the 4 kids (age nearly 9 to 4). We said yes, of course.
It’s a 4 minutes drive.
We had some tea, we talked, and as it was getting closer to supper time, Rachel said, do you have plans
for supper? We said no, not especially. So she said: let’s go to the pizza place (a 3 minutes drive).
We went to a larger room we had never been into before. After we started eating, two young couples
came to the table next to us. Rachel noticed that one of the guys had an accent.
- Rachel
Where are you from?
- The guy
South Africa. where are you from?
- Rachel
Here
- Me
From France.
- The guy
From France? With the typical British way of saying it!
- Me
Where in South Africa?
- The guy
Cape Town. My wife is American.
- Me to the other couple
Where are you from
- The other guy
From Cincinnati, Ohio.
- Me
We have been many times to Akron, Ohio.
- The other guy
Why?
- Me
We are missionaries, we used to be supported by a large church in Akron and we have several good
friends there.
- The South African couple
We are missionaries too! I met my wife as she was doing mission work in Cape Town.
- Rachel, Daniel and I
Oh really!
So Rachel started to tell them about EdenRidge, the missionary retreat center that Oliver started and is
in charge of.
After their meal was served, I thought I needed to ask them if they, by any chance, had heard of Radio
Africa Network in Cape Town. John and Avril Thomas, who started the radio ministry, had come to
Ecuador in the nineties and John was our annual speaker. He had also been a ReachBeyond/HCJB Board
Member for several years. And we still have a relationship with Sandy Day, who works with Radio
African Network in Cape Town and who visited our team in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) in 2002.
And we knew that several people from ReachBeyond/HCJB had been to Cape Town.
So I stood up, went to their table and asked my “little question”.
The answer from that couple was:
We work with John Thomas, we are with the same mission:
http://www.livinghope.co.za/
How can you beat that!!!!!
We gave each couple a CD. They were in Fairfield Glade for the week-end in a time-share offered by a
church supporting them in Nashville (two hours away). Unfortunately, they didn’t have time to come to
EdenRidge. But they said they will definitely speak about it to their mission’s pastor who is always
looking for places where missionaries can go and have rest. We exchanged email addresses with the
couple from South Africa, Simon and Ashley, and already wrote to each other.
They are going back soon to Cape Town. They said they will greet John and Avril especially for us. John
and Avril might remember us from their time in Quito, as we also had them over for a meal.
I shared that story with a couple of friends and one of them called it a “Heavenly Conspiracy”!
Daniel & Françoise Dossmann
Reach Beyond (HCJB Global)
https://reachbeyond.org/
dfdossmann@missiontm.org
www.missiontm.org
On Friday July 10th, around 4 PM, our daughter-in-law, Rachel, called us to see if she could come over to
spend a little time with us. Oliver was taking care of the 4 kids (age nearly 9 to 4). We said yes, of course.
It’s a 4 minutes drive.
We had some tea, we talked, and as it was getting closer to supper time, Rachel said, do you have plans
for supper? We said no, not especially. So she said: let’s go to the pizza place (a 3 minutes drive).
We went to a larger room we had never been into before. After we started eating, two young couples
came to the table next to us. Rachel noticed that one of the guys had an accent.
- Rachel
Where are you from?
- The guy
South Africa. where are you from?
- Rachel
Here
- Me
From France.
- The guy
From France? With the typical British way of saying it!
- Me
Where in South Africa?
- The guy
Cape Town. My wife is American.
- Me to the other couple
Where are you from
- The other guy
From Cincinnati, Ohio.
- Me
We have been many times to Akron, Ohio.
- The other guy
Why?
- Me
We are missionaries, we used to be supported by a large church in Akron and we have several good
friends there.
- The South African couple
We are missionaries too! I met my wife as she was doing mission work in Cape Town.
- Rachel, Daniel and I
Oh really!
So Rachel started to tell them about EdenRidge, the missionary retreat center that Oliver started and is
in charge of.
After their meal was served, I thought I needed to ask them if they, by any chance, had heard of Radio
Africa Network in Cape Town. John and Avril Thomas, who started the radio ministry, had come to
Ecuador in the nineties and John was our annual speaker. He had also been a ReachBeyond/HCJB Board
Member for several years. And we still have a relationship with Sandy Day, who works with Radio
African Network in Cape Town and who visited our team in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) in 2002.
And we knew that several people from ReachBeyond/HCJB had been to Cape Town.
So I stood up, went to their table and asked my “little question”.
The answer from that couple was:
We work with John Thomas, we are with the same mission:
http://www.livinghope.co.za/
How can you beat that!!!!!
We gave each couple a CD. They were in Fairfield Glade for the week-end in a time-share offered by a
church supporting them in Nashville (two hours away). Unfortunately, they didn’t have time to come to
EdenRidge. But they said they will definitely speak about it to their mission’s pastor who is always
looking for places where missionaries can go and have rest. We exchanged email addresses with the
couple from South Africa, Simon and Ashley, and already wrote to each other.
They are going back soon to Cape Town. They said they will greet John and Avril especially for us. John
and Avril might remember us from their time in Quito, as we also had them over for a meal.
I shared that story with a couple of friends and one of them called it a “Heavenly Conspiracy”!
Daniel & Françoise Dossmann
Reach Beyond (HCJB Global)
https://reachbeyond.org/
dfdossmann@missiontm.org
www.missiontm.org
Such a small world!!!
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