A Brilliant Weekend in Normandy

It was early on the 5th June that Tim and I boarded the Brittany Ferry Normandy for the seven hour trip across to Cann, and our checking out of Juno beach for a Miracle Street Prayer Walk of the Normandy Landing Beaches and the Juno Beach Celebration. As happens every year there are D Day celebrations on the Beaches and so getting the site on Juo Beach was a questionable thing due to an official event taking place at the time we wanted to be there. But we still went ahead and planned the day using the site we wanted and checked it out accordingly. After doing some shopping for the usual wine, cheese and other continental specials, we depart to our hosts for the rest of the evening and overnight and so relax for the rest of the evening. After a very enjoyable meal and a game of garden football, also finding out that I am so unfit I'm getting out of breath very quickly we settle down for the night, having to be up early to meet the rest of the Miracle Street party.

At 0600hrs on Sunday morning Tim and I depart to meet the rest of the party off the night boat at the port and are soon setting out the Miracle Street Banner over the seats in the ticket hall and settle down to await their arrival. Soon they all arrive and are quickly boarding the coach ready for the drive to Utah Beach. Once on the road Tim and I head off in advance to prepare breakfast for their arrival. When they arrive the tables are all set up and I'm boiling kettles for hot drinks from the generator in the car. With a continental breakfast inside each one it's then off onto the beach to pray and intercede for a French Revival. With the signs of war found down on the beach, barbed wire on a stake, concrete of the sea defences all broken by ordinance of some description, it seems an opportunity to get the feel of what it was like for the squaddies to fight their way over the sand dunes into France under fire from in front of them, a very hard time. After clearing up the breakfast tables we go off for a walk on the beach and contemplate on how God would break into France in the same way as those squaddies did on D-Day all those years ago. After a short time we were on our way to Omaha beach and the American Cemetery. Once again we were ahead of the coach and were soon on our way through the cemetery and down onto the beach, which seemed quite a long way from the base of the hill. As you went down the hill, you could quite easily have mistaken being in the countryside not on the coast as you went down the hillside, into some woodland and then into the sand dunes before getting onto the beach. Even the sounds were of birds,and insects that you'd find in woodland and not of the sea and associated sounds. Once onto the beach you looked back and the distance and the terrain the squaddies had to move through to get up the hill and clear of the beach, allowing the dunes and the woodland housed the enemy hiding out ready to shoot them. So as we think about taking France for Jesus we realise we have to go through the Christian eqivelant of getting over the dunes of life through the harder areas that the devil sets up for us and then get past his minions who want to throw things at us to stop us spreading the word of Jesus love and goodness to others. On getting back up the hill it's enter the cemetary again and see the crosses that represent all those American Soldiers who had died trying to get into France through the dunes, the woodland and up the hill, many who didnt make it off the beach.... You make the analergy of how the evil one wants to kill us Christians off so France will not get to be a Christian country, and then we think that if we're in his will, dressed in his armour with the weapons he supplies, then we'll get through those enemy lines and up into France reguardless. After a while in amongst the sea of white crosses, we have to return to the coach and car and head off to Gold Beach to have lunch and a time of prayer in amongst the memories of the Canadian slain. This was an uneventful drive and it was not long until we arrived, again ahead of the coach and were soon getting set up for the hot drinks to go with the lunch. So while we were sitting waiting for the coach we looked at the sea wall that was slowly decomposing and was causing the road to be shut off. When the coach arrives its settle down on the sea wall and enjoy the packed lunchs provided by the French church. Lunch went down well and after that we went on to Juno beach, having spent time before lunch praying on a different part of the beach... Once lunch was cleared up Tim and I departed and eventually got ahead of the coach, and arrived at Juno beach, and sorted out where we were going to have our open air celebration. Since we only had a small and simple PA system we did not take long to set it up as we decided to use the site under the memorial to the Free French in the middle of the beach where there was to have been a formal event that didnt seem to be taking place, so this was where God wanted us to be. Slowly our party assembled in the amphitheatre and we were soon into a time of praise and worship, part in English and part in French. Due to the breeze blowing along the beach, the sound carried and soon we had an unexpected audience and so on a prompt from me the leaders give a short gospel message with an acceptance call to which six people responded, a great way for the day to progress. After a message from a number of different nationalities and words of prophecy we move on to the final beach and the final chapter of the Miracle Street Prayerwalk Normandy. Due to the time packing up the refreshments and the PA kit Tim and I missed the final session, but soon met up with them on the way off the beach and returning to the coach and subsequently the ferry for our return to the UK. On the whole God really used the time in France and it was great to hear from him over that time