God Is at Work in the French-Speaking World

Dannah Gresh: Have you ever been so emotionally low that you feel like you can’t even function? Jeannette Kossmann remembers a time when she felt that way.

Jeannette Kossmann: At this low point, I had a hard time thinking, making decisions, getting things done. I didn’t understand how I should be dealing with this, so I pushed myself. Because it was so hard to make decisions, the smallest problem became huge, and I panicked because I didn’t know how to deal with it!

Dannah: We’re about to discover what helped lead Jeannette out of this emotional low point, here on the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth for Friday, December 13, 2024. I’m Dannah Gresh.

You could call today’s episode “cosmopolitan,” meaning our three guests have lived in places all around the world!

Jeannette: My name is Jeannette Kossmann. I am from Berlin originally, and now I live in Switzerland with my family. 

Dannah: And our next guest . . .

Janet Niblack: Janet Niblack . . .

Dannah: Janet, not to be confused with Jeannette. 

Janet: I’m J-a-n-e-t, and I’m from San Jose, California.

Dannah: And finally . . .

Rachel Denis: I’m Rachel, and I am from France and Switzerland; these are my two citizenships, but I live in California. 

Dannah: Okay, we’ve got California, Switzerland, Germany . . . but these women have a couple things in common. God has used Revive Our Hearts to get them into the Word, and they all have a passion for sharing this message in a language dear to their hearts!

Rachel: We need to have this in French!

Jeannette: We really desperately need this in French!

Dannah: Jeannette is so surprised God could use her to share the Bible with other women. About seven years ago she was in a very low point emotionally.

Jeannette: My husband had been through a burnout, and I had carried him through his. At this low point, I had a hard time thinking, making decisions, getting things done. I didn’t understand how I should be dealing with this, so I pushed myself: “You need to do the laundry. You need to get the house clean. You need to cook,” because I have a husband and two daughters.

I wanted to be useful and to do my part. At one point, just walking two minutes was too much. And because it was so hard to make decisions, the smallest problem became huge, and I panicked because I didn’t know how to deal with it!

Dannah: From her home in Switzerland, Jeannette heard an interview that another ministry conducted with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth.

Jeannette: I was so intrigued by what she said and how she said it. I started looking for her, and I found different Nancys: Nancy Leigh DeMoss, Nancy DeMoss, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth. I thought, Is this the same woman? Who is this Nancy!? On YouTube I found the video you Nancy had about her wedding. 

Dannah: In that video Jeannette heard how Nancy Leigh DeMoss married Robert Wolgemuth and became Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth.

Robert Wolgemuth: On Saturday morning, May 2, I knelt in front of her—she was sitting on her couch. I had written out the story of the ring, and so I read it to her. And that two-page letter finished with: “So I would like to know, will you marry me?”

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: And I knew that I knew. I said, “Yes, I will!” And then, for the first time, said those words that he’d been waiting to hear and I’d been waiting to say, “I love you with all my heart!” 

Dannah: The video is called Unexpected Grace: Nancy and Robert’s Story. If you haven’t watched it, I recommend it! You’ll find a link in today’s transcript at ReviveOurHearts.com.

Pastor: Robert, will you have Nancy to be your wife, to live together in the covenant of marriage? Will you love her, hold and comfort her, honor and keep her in sickness and in health, and forsaking all others be faithful to her as long as you both shall live? If so, say, “I will.”

Robert: I will! 

Pastor: Nancy, will you have Robert to be your husband, to live together in the covenant of marriage? Will you love him, hold him, and comfort him, honor and keep him in sickness and in health, and forsaking all others be faithful to him, as long as you both shall live? If so, say, “I will.”

Nancy: I will!

Jeannette: I was moved to tears! I just wanted to know more about her, and I found Revive Our Hearts and the podcasts . . . and I just couldn’t stop listening to them! It was a time when I was in a very, very low point, and she talked about real life—suffering and hard times.

Nancy (from a podcast): I think one of the most common things I sense among women today is that their soul is cast down, their spirit is heavy! They’re bowed down; they’re weighed down. Here’s a man who’s discouraged, he’s depressed. Some of you know exactly what that’s like.

You relate when the psalmist says in verse 3, “My tears have been my food day and night.” “I just can’t stop crying!”

Jeannette: It felt like she was taking me by the hand, bringing me to the source of Living Water . . . again and again and again. I didn’t have the strength to do it on my own.

Nancy (from a podcast): You know, it’s actually a mercy of God—perhaps a severe mercy—that He does allow us to move into times where we are removed from visible means of support for our faith. Because, once again, that may be the time and the place when we discover the nearness and the presence and the reality of our heavenly Father in a way we did not realize when we had so many other props and crutches and helps around us.

Jeannette: I just went back, and I listened to them, I don’t know, three, four hours in a row. I was so desperate and so thirsty! I think, looking back, I bathed in the truth. She helped the truth wash me! 

Nancy (from a podcast): God gives songs in the night. Sight says, “Yes it’s dark outside, yes my enemies are all around me, yes it seems that God has forsaken me.” That’s what sight tells me. But faith says, “Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him. All He has given me is sufficient, and His supply is sufficient for all my need!” 

Dannah: Slowly, the Lord led Jeannette out of that dark season.

Jeannette: Slowly, but surely. You know, I would have loved for Him to flip a switch, but usually He doesn’t do that. It’s been seven years, and I feel like I’m out of it now, this year. I can say it’s behind me. I’m still growing out of it, but it’s the first time I can say, “It’s over!”

Dannah: Jeannette was listening to Nancy’s teaching in English, and Jeannette wanted other women to hear this message, even ones who couldn’t listen in English. That idea came to her as she first started to listen.

Jeannette: Oh, right away I thought, This is so good! My friends need to hear it! The French-speaking women around me need to hear it!I never thought I could be part of that, but I thought, We need this in French! We really desperately need this in French!

Dannah: Jeannette didn’t think she was up for the job of helping translate Revive Our Hearts, but the Lord had actually uniquely prepared her for this type of role.

Jeannette: In Berlin I went to a French school from kindergarten up to high school—baccalauréat, an exam for high school. I grew up with three languages because my father spoke French with us, and we went to an American church, and I grew up in a German city, in Berlin. That is the wonderful “baggage” my parents gave me! 

Dannah: Jeannette didn’t know it, but she was an answer to prayer! Mary Anne Piaget had a burden to translate Revive Our Hearts into French many years ago. This is Hannah Kurtz, Manager of International Advancement for Revive Our Hearts.

Hannah Kurtz: So the vision for Revive Our Hearts French began with a woman named Mary Anne Piaget who was in French-speaking Switzerland. A friend of hers introduced her to Revive Our Hearts, and she started listening to the program in English. Her heart deeply resonated with the message, and she began to dream about having this message in French.

Before Mary Anne was ever introduced to Revive Our Hearts, God had put a burden on her heart to see solid biblical resources made available for French speakers, specifically for women. When she came to the True Woman ’12 conference, she knew that Revive Our Hearts was the answer to her prayer!

She heard about what God was doing through Revive Our Hearts Spanish, and over time she started sharing her vision and dream with other people, and a group of them began to pray and ask for the Lord to bring Revive Our Hearts content into the French-speaking world. And still, to this day, there’s a group of women who pray once a week for Revive Our Hearts French!

Jeannette Kossmann was a part of that group that began to pray for Revive Our Hearts French. And then in 2020, when we launched the Revive Our Hearts podcast in French, Jeannette became the cohost voice.

Jeannette: So, that I am part of it, that just completely blows my mind! I never would have imagined that there was anything that I could contribute, let alone be part of it, and be here one day in Michigan and meet the staff! I’m just overwhelmed! I’m so thankful, so, so thankful!

Dannah: Jeannette is referring to an event that happened in the summer of 2024. Revive Our Hearts was able to bring staff from around the world together. I was able to attend that staff summit, and it was so refreshing in reviving my desire to pray and be in God’s Word!

Now, I’m often up front at a Revive Our Hearts or True Girl event, but at the staff summit, I was able to just sit in the audience and let God minister to me. It was amazing to watch how the international guests took the lead in sharing Scripture, praying, and telling stories about how God is at work.

I think the international staff invested in the United States-based staff more than the other way around! Along with Jeannette, the Lord prepared other women to help translate Revive Our Hearts into French, as well . . . like Janet Niblack.

Janet: I was influenced by Bible teaching about biblical womanhood fifty years ago, before Revive Our Hearts started. That’s always been my passion. So I looked for resources, and I found Revive Our Hearts when it was created.

I love the website. I’ve shared so many resources. I’m always searching for something. I’ve used them in my church. So, I’m really grateful for all that they’ve provided.

Dannah: Janet not only loved the message of Revive Our Hearts, she loved French-speaking people, starting with her husband.

Janet: At the beginning of our marriage, we lived in France for five years, so I learned French. Now we’re back in California, but because of that, I have three kids that live in French-speaking Europe. I have bunches of grandchildren that live in French-speaking Europe, so I have a heart for France.

When I heard there was going to be a French Revive Our Hearts, I contacted the lady in Switzerland, Mary Anne Piaget, and just got excited about what she was praying for and envisioning.

We have a son that lives in Geneva, Switzerland, so when we went to visit him, we drove up to Mary Anne’s house. We met her, had lunch with her, started talking to her. We connected over the years. 

Then we went to a conference led by another lady on our team and her husband in Paris. Mary Anne came, and we had a little meeting—there were five or six of us. We said, “Let’s do it! Let’s start something!” That was 2019.

Dannah: Then the Lord led another team member to Janet.

Janet: So, Rachel moved to San Jose.

Dannah: Rachel Denis was a friend of Jeannette, and she moved around the corner from Janet’s daughter.

Rachel: God made a “divine appointment,” and I met Jeannette through that.

Janet: I just feel like God brought her right when we were starting Revive Our Hearts. 

Rachel: Janet talked to me about all the resources and everything. I was always very thirsty to find ways to go deeper in the Word, and learn, and grow. So this is how I got connected to Revive Our Hearts.

Dannah: Rachel started listening to Revive Our Hearts in English. One of the first series she listened to was called “Getting into the Word and Getting God’s Word into You.” 

Nancy (from that podcast): So as you read the Word of God, pause to meditate on the meaning of what you’re reading. Stop to think about what it’s saying. Absorb the Word of God into your system by dwelling on it, pondering it, going over it again and again in your mind, considering it as you would a love letter, from every possible angle, until that Word becomes part of you!

Rachel: That really changed me. It gave me tools so I could go deeper into the Bible, and that was great!

Dannah: Rachel sees so much potential for sharing these tools around the world!

Rachel: So the French-speaking world is really wide; I think we counted, twenty-nine countries.

Janet: The French world is very secular, so it’s just hard. My grandkids don’t know anyone at their school that’s a Christian.

Rachel: But there’s part of Africa, and all these countries, where it’s very different. I think people are really thirsty there.

Janet: We have a team member from Africa, and she says that they’re very hungry for the Word, and they listen to everything. But it’s a lot of “prosperity gospel” not a lot about suffering. She says Revive Our Hearts will address hard things, and how they can actually be good for us.

Hannah: Since 2020, when they started releasing the Revive Our Hearts podcast in French, they’ve been producing maybe one podcast a week, or a few a month. They looked across our library of content to select what would be good for their French-speaking audience.

Now they have over 150 episodes available in French, and we’re also getting opportunities to take the French podcast on radio stations throughout West Africa.

Rachel: Oh, I really hope that with Reveille Nos Coeurs we can help women ground themselves in God’s Word. In this time of information, where you don’t know what’s true, you don't know what news you can trust, you don’t know what information you can trust . . . but God’s Word is true!

Churches—I think worldwide—they’re struggling to stay anchored in truth. That’s my big prayer, that women anchor themselves in God’s Word and that Réveille Nos Cœurs (Revive Our Hearts) can be a part of that.

Dannah: Do you remember what Jeannette said earlier? She was in a very dark place in life, struggling to even function. If you’ve prayed for Revive Our Hearts over the years, and if you’ve given to help make Revive Our Hearts possible, you played a role in giving hope to Jeannette! You made it possible for her to find podcast episodes and solid teaching.

Jeannette: I just went back and I listened to them, I don’t know, three, four hours . . .

Dannah: Your prayers and support are also making current ministry in French possible.

Janet: I’m really thankful to Revive Our Hearts in the U.S.A. Everyone here has been so helpful, providing the website, helping us with anything we need. We’re just really, really thankful!

Jeannette: I am thankful beyond words for Revive Our Hearts, for this love that you can feel on every podcast. I’m thankful it is always the truth and not being afraid to speak about hard things, not afraid to speak about suffering. But it’s always packaged in love, and this is accompanied by such humility. That’s the message we need, and it’s the message that really helped me get out of the burnout. I’m immensely thankful!

Dannah: Okay, so let’s review what we just heard: the mission to the French-speaking world is huge! The need is great! The team is small but very dedicated, and we have a big God who can do anything! He may want to use you to be part of this mission!

Would you ask the Lord how He would have you give so Revive Our Hearts can keep serving the French team, and translate Bible teaching into many more languages? In a typical year, over 40 percent of the donations we need to keep this work going arrive in December. So, we’re praying God would provide in a big way here in December and keep nurturing these new teams serving around the world.

Some friends of the ministry share this vision, and they have offered to double every gift up to a matching challenge amount of $2 million. That’s between now and December 31. If the teaching on Revive Our Hearts has helped you grow or encouraged you, would you help pass the message on to others who need to hear it? 

Visit ReviveOurHearts.com to make your donation and to be part of the matching challenge, or call 1-800-569-5959. Would you pray this prayer with us from Habbakuk?

Nancy: “The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea!” (Hab. 2:14) 

Rachel: “Car la terre sera pleine de la connaissance de la gloire de l'Eternel, comme les eaux couvrent le fond de la mer.” (Habacuc 2:14) 

Dannah: One final thought, maybe you can relate to the way Jeannette felt seven years ago. You’re experiencing depression or burnout. Let’s listen as Nancy opens God’s Word and provides hope for anyone in that situation.

Nancy: The day is coming—I don’t know when, I don’t know how long it will be-—but I know that the time will come when God will deliver, when God will intervene in my situation. In the meantime, I will hope in God.

In the meantime, I will trust confidently. I will rest in assurance that God knows what He is doing! God determines the nature of the trial; He determines the extent of the trial; He determines the duration of the trial. God is Sovereign! 

 

So hope in God, because I know that in time God will intervene, in time God will deliver! I love that passage, Psalm 30, verse 5, that says, “Weeping may endure for a night . . .” Your night may not be just one eight-hour night. It may be an eight-month night or an eight-year night or years and years of darkness. . .

But the psalmist says, “Weeping may endure for a night but joy comes in the morning.” You say, “Oh, God, let it be morning!” That’s alright to say, but keep hoping in God until it is. Know that in God’s time and in God’s way, the morning will come, the joy will come!

And even in the night, knowing that joy is ahead, you can have joy now! God is my exceeding joy. It’s not the presence or absence of the storm that determines my joy level—it’s the presence of God! He is my exceeding joy, so I will be joyful in Him.

And so the psalmist says that chorus one more time, “Hope in God! For I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God” (Psalm 42:5 paraphrased). Ladies, that needs to be the chorus of our lives!

That word “hope” is translated from a Hebrew word that means, “to wait, to tarry, to hope, to expect, to be patient, to trust.” Hope in God. Wait. Cling to Him, be patient, trust in Him while you’re waiting. “Hope in God! For I shall yet praise Him.” You say, “In the midst of my storm?! In the midst of my depression? In the midst of my doubt? In the midst of my fears? In the midst of my trouble?”

“I’ll praise the Lord when I get out of it!” No. Praise the Lord while you’re still in it—knowing that you will praise Him in the long run, so praise Him now. The waves may be still beating on your boat, but you’ll be safe. Listen, the storm may kill you, but you’ll still be safe if you’re a child of God. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain! So hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him! 

And then let me just talk about one other word, “For I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God.” That word “help” is translated from the Hebrew word yeshua. Yeshua, does that name sound familiar? The word yeshua means “deliverance, salvation, victory.” God is the yeshua of my countenance; He is the deliverance of my face; He is my salvation! 

If you add one syllable to the word yeshua, you get the name for Joshua, which means not only salvation; it means Yahweh saves! Yahweh is my salvation!

And what is the Greek word in the New Testament for the name Joshua?Jesus—hope in God! For I shall yet praise Him—the yeshua, the salvation, the deliverance, the victory of my faith and my face and my God!

You know, ultimately, every struggle in life, every pressure, every problem, is intended to take us back to the Savior. So, say to your soul, “Why are you so cast down? Why are you disquieted?” Then your soul may say back to you, “Well, it’s this reason and this reason and this reason and this reason. I have a lot of reasons to be cast down, to be disquieted!”

And then speak back to your soul and say, “Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, the help—the yeshua—the Savior, the deliverer, the salvation of my countenance and my God!”

Dannah: On our next episode you’ll hear about the amazing power of encouragement. A young wife named Marie was challenged to encourage her husband every day.

Marie: That transformed my marriage! And I just really wanted it to be in German, because I know women that need exactly this, that are in the same position that I was in.

Dannah: Please be back for Revive Our Hearts. 

This program is a listener supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness and fruitfulness in Christ.

*Offers available only during the broadcast of the podcast season.