Through Every Season
Part 1: From Paris to Ecuador
By Françoise Dossmann
Edited by Shari Martin
INTRODUCTION
In the previous EdenRidge impact story, God’s Perfect Timing, you read about the installation of the EdenRidge sundial and how it reminds us of Ecclesiastes 3:11, which says, "He has made everything beautiful in His time."
Long before EdenRidge existed, God was already writing a story that would begin in a small apartment in Paris. It led Françoise Dossmann and her family from Paris around the world to eventually build a retreat center for missionaries called EdenRidge.
Françoise witnessed God at work during many seasons and decades of her life.
Looking back, she can see His perfect timing in her life long before she knew where the journey would lead.
This is her story.
A Small Apartment in Paris
I grew up in a very small apartment on the seventh floor of a building in downtown Paris with no elevator. My father was a Hungarian non-practicing Jew, and my mother was a French non-practicing Catholic. We did not have much, but we were never cold or hungry.
My first conviction that God existed came to me when I was twelve years old. While in the Alps and seeing the beauty around me, I became convinced that someone had made the world and that there was a Creator.
Searching for Answers
I met Daniel, my future husband, in a classical guitar class when I was sixteen years old. He was one of the teachers.
Our Wedding Day
April 6, 1968
Together, we felt a need to search for God. We explored Eastern religions and even traveled to India in 1972 when our son Oliver was two years old. We did not find the answers we were looking for.
Daniel wanted to read all the religious books he could find and eventually came upon the Bible. At the end of 1973, he became convinced that Jesus was the answer after reading the story of the Wise Men in Matthew 2.
At the same time, I was struggling with loneliness because I did not have any friends. So, I cried out to God the Creator and asked Him to help me. In that instant, I had a revelation in my heart that Jesus was alive, that He was God, and that the Bible was the truth.
Daniel and I said to each other, "We have found the answer, and the answer is Jesus. But where are the others who also believe in Him?" We had no clue where to look for those people, and we had never even heard the word evangelical.
Since we had a personal encounter with Jesus, our lives have never been the same. We truly passed from darkness into light. Daniel became a real husband and a real father.
A New Direction
A couple of months later, we found some Christians through a small Christian bookstore in Paris and attended their church as well as one south of Paris. I started to have friends. Daniel started writing Christian songs for us to sing together, with him playing guitar and me playing the recorder… and he never stopped writing music.
Daniel and I playing and singing at a church in France
Thinking about those days, I can see now how God was preparing us for a future we couldn’t even imagine. He gave us a love for nature, a desire to travel, and a longing to meet Christians from other parts of the world.
Called to Go
After attending Bible school in Geneva, Switzerland, Daniel and I moved to Amboise, France, about three hours south of Paris where his mom and stepdad lived. We attended the only evangelical church in town.
After a few years there, the Lord impressed two verses on our hearts:
“Enlarge the place of your tent, stretch your tent curtains wide, do not hold back; lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes. For you will spread out to the right and to the left; your descendants will dispossess nations and settle in their desolate cities” (Isaiah 54:2-3).
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).
Our first thought was to go back to India and meet Christians there. But we did not have personal contacts there. At the same time, the Lord also gave me a conviction that I needed to become more fluent in English. I did not understand why for several years.
I started to read Christian books in English. I listened to recordings of American teaching messages and music sent to me by a friend in Switzerland.
An Unexpected Invitation
The pastor of our church was married to an American missionary named Virginia Kremer, who had served in France for many years. She was originally from Bisbee, Arizona, and had a childhood friend named Tom Fulghum.
Tom and his wife Lois were missionaries in Ecuador with HCJB, a Christian radio broadcasting ministry. Over the years, Tom wrote to Virginia several times explaining that the radio station needed French-speaking Christians to produce radio programs. Virginia always said that there were so few Christians in France and their church was so small that it seemed impossible to send anyone that far away.
Then one day she saw Daniel standing in front of a microphone while we were recording some songs in French. Immediately she thought, "Why not them?" Not long afterward, Virginia shared with us the need in Ecuador. What made the timing so important was that Daniel and I had already begun sensing that God was calling us to go somewhere, and we had been thinking about India.
As we prayed, we became convinced that Ecuador was where the Lord was leading us. Suddenly things began to make sense, including my strong desire to learn English. We would be serving with an American mission, and although Daniel spoke very little English, God had already been preparing us for what was ahead.
Our family in Amboise, France, 1982
From that point on, doors opened one after another. In 1983, we went to language school in Texas to learn Spanish, and Oliver began learning English in preparation for attending the Alliance Academy in Quito, Ecuador.
To be continued...
Was your stay meaningful? We'd love to hear how God used your time at EdenRidge.
Email us at rest@edenridge.org and we'll schedule a short conversation with you.