February happenings

 

Hey there friends,

First - just a minute for us to say HOW thankful we are for each one of you who are praying for us and for the Pal church.  Our work here in Papua New Guinea wouldn't be possible without your support as you pray for us and help provide for our needs!  We are so grateful.

Many of your wrote and shared that you appreciated having day-by-day prayer requests for the month of January.   Above are a few pictures from the trip that Chris, Nate & Sandra made into Kovol territory.  They loved getting to spend time with the missionary family on the ground and helped to assess and give direction for culture & language learning. 

The week before last, I made four extra meals for families traveling, families dealing with fever and sickness, and families coming out of their jungle locations.  At the end of the week, I marveled that even with hours of extra cooking I didn't feel overwhelmed!  It may seem like a small thing, but we have no 'fast food' here in PNG and yes, people need to eat multiple times a day.  You guys prayed for us to have strength through the intense month - your prayers for us are bearing fruit as we look to serve Him here.

February:  Our Pal literacy program opened a new location in a distant village!  Some of you might remember that before the outreach to N village happened, Pal believers taught a full literacy class so that readers could discover the Scripture for themselves.  The same process got started in what we'll call 'Fire' village this week!  It takes 3 hours of grueling hiking to get to Fire village, and it is a dark place.  Lots of violence over the years.  Pray for the teaching teams of 3-4 Pal men who are hiking and spending a week at a time in Fire village, they will be the forerunners for the Gospel.  Pray that they make His name GREAT as they stay in the village.

Feb. 10:  We will host an afternoon for new missionaries to the field here at our small mission center.  They'll hear a bit about our area of Papua New Guinea and meet some of our team here.  All 9 of these families/singles are heading into tribal church planting and are asking the Lord what doors are open to them.  Please pray for His leading and direction for each new family!  Fresh out of quarantine, these families are starting their orientation to the field.

Feb. 11/12:  Nate will teach two classes to new support ministry families.  I'll take a turn with childcare on the 12th.  Pray that we can practically show love for these new families!

Feb. 17-19th:  Our Pal team men (Nate, Axel & Chris) will fly into Pal with a small team of church development consultants.  They'll spend time carefully talking with the Mesi believers to get a sense of where the church is strong and where it is weak.  Our men will also spend some time encouraging the Mesi Bible teachers to go against the cultural norm and stand up publicly against lies being taught by non-believers that are sucking in weaker believers.  Pray that Mesi Bible teachers will stand firm for truth against the cultural standard of avoiding conflict.

Feb. 19-22: Nate may be traveling into an existing work for the weekend with our friend Bill to check in on the young believers living there.  The missionaries who had been serving in that area are a bit older and have been very limited by Covid in their home country.  Please pray for wisdom for Nate and Bill as they spend time with believers who are hungry for more teaching.

Feb. 21st: Our co-workers Axel & Chris will be speaking to the entire Mesi church to invest some additional authority in dealing with false teachers.  Please pray for wise and careful words, and for the response of believers.

Feb. 22-25   Nate may be traveling down to Madang to spend some days with members of our Pal medical team, walking with them through the process of purchasing medications from pharmacies in the area.   Pray for great connections with believers from another location, and pray for courage as they consider doing a long hike with cash through dangerous areas in order to purchase life-saving antibiotics for their community.

(Whew...I feel tired just writing about that week of Feb. 19-25!  This kind of tight travel would require lots of support through our aviation department, NTMA.  Please pray with us for the faithful men and women serving in aviation!  In a country with very poor to non-existent roads, it's incredible to even think about being able to pull off travel to remote areas like this.)

A few more pictures and life-happenings from the month:

While our January retreat with the senior class was local, we were so grateful that the time went smoothly and was full of laughter, conversation, great food and Biblical encouragement.  Thank you for praying for that time.

My Pal coworkers & dear friends Sandra and Maggie surprised me with a birthday tea party!  Scones and homemade jams and all!  We drank tea and shared stories and laughed.  What a gift!