Ashburn Church holds French-Speaking Service
Word of Life International in Ashburn – holds French-Speaking Service
Church holds Service in French on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Sunday every Month at 2 PM
Word of Life (WOL) International Church in Ashburn held its first service on Father’s Day, June 17th 2001 with Senior Pastor Jeff Jacob. 8 years later Word of Life is a growing church with a congregation comprising many nations of the world. The WOL dream is becoming a reality and God is fulfilling His promises. WOL exists to bring LIFE, LOVE and LIBERTY to the people of Loudoun County and Northern Virginia.
WOL will bring LIFE, LOVE and LIBERTY by reaching up - through worship and prayer, reaching in - through fellowship and discipleship and reaching out - through evangelism and ministry.
Biblical Authority – The Bible is God’s inspired and infallible word. God speaks to us through His word and we recognize it as the final authority for our lives. God’s truths are timeless but must be communicated in a relevant way. II Tim. 3:16-17, Rom. 12:2, Heb. 4:12-13.
WOL commenced with its first service in French on June 8th, 2008. Pastor Serge Sefekme had previously established a French home bible study once a week in June of 2007. About 12 French-speaking people from various West African religious backgrounds attended the bible study. According to Pastor Serge, the 12 kept coming each week and the Lord gradually opened their eyes to Christ. Pastor Serge stated, “We kept studying and praying, and eventually baptized all the members in Christ. Their faith became very real to them and the group became united and continued to grow to about 20 people. By the grace of God, I prayed and asked the Lord if he wanted me to start a French language ministry. I shared the vision with Senior Pastor Jeff Jacob and he agreed to give the service an opportunity and a blessing to start.”
Pastor Jacob explained to me that he was aware French-speaking people were coming to Christ through Pastor Serge’s home bible study group. Jacob said, “We had many people coming on Sunday morning who loved the service but really could only understand a small part of what I was saying. We baptized probably 15 French-speaking people in that one year. We felt they needed to be able to worship in a way that was comfortable and comprehensible for them so one year ago we launched WOL French under the direction of Pastor Serge Sefekme.” Currently the French service is attended by around 35-50 West Africans on Sunday afternoons and they are a thriving congregation. Jacob said, “It has been incredible to watch God work by releasing the congregation to reach out to their community for Christ.” Jacob said Pastor Serge has been pasturing with WOL for several years.
Pastor Jacob and Members of the WOL Congregation in Ashburn - photo WOL
Pastor Serge told me that during the service the congregation functions as a French community. He said that Northern Virginia is fast becoming a multicultural population where the Gospel could be presented in different languages each Sunday. The French-speaking WOL congregation meets three Sunday’s a month with the first Sunday of the month joining together with the English service. The English service is held at 10:30 AM with an average of 150 Europeans, Africans, Australians and Americans in attendance.
The French service is held from 2 PM until 4 PM and the group continues to pray for more growth. Members come from Ashburn, Leesburg, Herndon, Chantilly and as far away as Maryland. The intent is to reach as many French-speaking people as possible and provide them the opportunity to know Jesus Christ. It is Pastor Serge’s passion to make Christ known to all those people in the community who seek Him out.
Pastor Serge also holds a “prayer warrior” meeting ministry that takes place every morning from 5 AM until approximately 6:45 AM by phone. Before the work day starts people can connect via phone and pray together. The prayer morning is the prayer and intercession line and open to different people from all walks of life with the goal of reaching the callers to come to Christ. The morning conference call builds and transforms people’s lives in prayer. The vision of this prayer line is to establish an army of God or prayer warriors with the objective to have people intercede for individual souls, marriages, church, pastors and nations. In the beginning Pastor Serge had callers with different religious backgrounds connect and gradually come to Christ. He presented them the Word of Life through Christ and the will of God by living Holy lives. “You also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” [1 Peter 2:5]. The prayer warrior meetings are connected each morning by a free conference line at 5 AM until 7 AM with the number of people participating ranging from 30 to 50.
Pastor Jeff Jacob can be reached via email at pastor@wol-ag.org. Pastor Serge Sefekme can be reached at ssefekme@att.net.
Word of Life International Church is located at 21641 Beaumeade Circle in Ashburn, and the web site is http://www.wol-ag.org/.
God bless all.