Easter 2009

This Easter we celebrated with a house full of friends. We are taking care of the 16 year old daughter of some friends for a little while longer so she was with us. We had 2 other families over for an Easter ham lunch.

Easter found us all in a state of emotional heaviness. Not only has a lot been happening to people here where we live, and to us, but to friends and family back in our home country as well. We've received emails and phone calls detailing some of the sadness that you all are experiencing. Not the least of which was the news that my uncle had passed away this week. I had spent a lot of time with him as a young man and the news was very saddening.

It weighs heavy on our hearts, and we found ourselves sitting in church on Easter Sunday not really celebrating the resurrection, but more mired in the sadness that felt like the enemy all around us was winning.

We had spent the weekend shedding tears over so many things, it felt like we simply could not handle one more thing. And then another sadness hit, and another. We had to go to God in prayer and simply ask for some sort of emotional relief of this burden.

So there I was sitting in Church and the sermon was on how the resurrection applies to us today. If you've been raised in the church, then like me you could probably recite an Easter sermon or two.

BUT up on the screen flashed some Scripture, which wasn't even referred to or read aloud. I read them, and God did a good thing. He encouraged my heart, and I could feel the burden lifting.

After church I was cornered by our director and asked to be the Director of Security pointman for one month. Before those Scriptures hit me, I couldn't have done it. That particular job means you have to see the ugly underbelly of living here. All the sad stories and such that happen around the country flood your desk. But I feel that although I do need to protect myself emotionally so that the enemy can't get a foothold... that this job IF I HAVE TO DO IT... is something I can do. (we'll find out in a few days if I will be doing this job... as a side job to my networking work).

You can pray about that. Am I ready to be responsible for the security of everyone living here? I do not feel I am, but I have been asked by a man in authority and have told him I would but I did not think it wise at this time for me.

Here are the verses, and what they told me, I needed to hear:
-they told me our work here is not in vain
-that God will energize us and support us
-I love the imagery in these verses... a crown of beauty instead of ashes.. I felt like I was emotionally heaping ashes on my head in mourning...

Isaiah 61

1 The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me,
       because the LORD has anointed me
       to preach good news to the poor.
       He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
       to proclaim freedom for the captives
       and release from darkness for the prisoners, [a]

 2 to proclaim the year of the LORD's favor
       and the day of vengeance of our God,
       to comfort all who mourn,

 3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
       to bestow on them a crown of beauty
       instead of ashes,
       the oil of gladness
       instead of mourning,
       and a garment of praise
       instead of a spirit of despair.
       They will be called oaks of righteousness,
       a planting of the LORD
       for the display of his splendor.

And this one too:

1 Corinthians 15:58 (New International Version)

 58Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.

Christ is risen.

Another Dedication

It is a time to celebrate:
Kendal's back is feeling much better.
Conference is over.
AND...

Some of our friends wrote:

"After 17 years of work, prayer, laughter, pain, blessing and heartache; after seemingly endless checking, revisions,
re-checking, talking, talking and more talking, the Iyo New Testament is finally a reality. This is a sample copy sent to us
by the printer as they prepare to bind and ship 1000 copies to Papua New Guinea."


THIS is one of the great fruits of our labor.

Conference

What is Conference?
It is held once every 2 years and it lasts 2 weeks. It is a business meeting for our branch to get together and talk about strategy and vote on leaders. Imagine a 2 week long church meeting.

What is my job at conference?"
I'm responsible for the computing and technical side. So when folks are trying to get online, get email, get something on their laptop working they say "look for that big tall guy over there, go ask him."

You can find me running from table to table working out issues for folks as they try to do their jobs of recording information, getting online, projection, etc.

What is Kendal doing?
With all these adults in 1 place, the kids have to be looked over. So a team came in to do vbs and she is coordinating that, which means she runs around for part of the conference and makes sure things get done.

So mostly, the two of us run around and make ourselves available to others.

You never knew our jobs had so much in common did you?

A Word about Finances

Today a representative from our organization's USA branch said a few words in news about the economy situation in the U.S. Here is my paraphrase:

-now people will have to get used to living with less predictability in the economy for several years.

-on the whole as an organization giving to individual missionaries in down 5%, in past economic declines, giving hasn't been affected.

-an economist quoted believes that our organization will weather the storm when others might not because of our commitment to spreading the Gospel across the world

-as giving drops, it will flatten out... it will not likely increase for a long time (even though cost of living does)... we will need to adjust.


Several of you have asked how the economic decline in the U.S. is affecting us, well there is the paraphrase.

Personally we are still able to make ends meet, we have had to get creative at cutting costs and such, but it only accents how thankful we are for all of you that support us knowing that you each have your own economic pressures.

We want you to know how much we value you, and look forward to photos of you to put on our prayer board so we can uphold you in prayer.

We also want to remind you that you are not supporting a lifestyle, but a goal. A mission. It is our mission to serve God's glory with our skills and those skills are going towards getting the Word of God into the hands of people who could never read it before meeting us. Spreading the Gospel.

Thank you all so very much!

Weekend Madness

Let's see, this weekend was a lot of fun, activity, punctuated with moments of rest.
Kendal and I flopped down on Friday after having gotten our conference duties finished. She is in charge of the children's ministry for conference... overseeing a team who came from the U.S. to minister.

Saturday I performed in a concert we have every 2 years.. playing banjo.
Sunday I performed as Goliath in a skit in front of the whole church, because the original Goliath was unable to at the last minute.

Monday we had a nice spiritual retreat, a true day of resting in God, meditating on the Word and praying and listening.

Our teenager moved out for a while but she'll be back. She has been a true delight having in the house as she is so helpful. Teenagers get a bad wrap (-;

Pics for Fun

One of the many beautiful moths we see in this country. Also we see some nice butterflies.


A fun prop for a Bible Dedication ceremony... I don't know who made it, but it makes the truck and the people seem small. Well shoot, I make the people seem small (-;



A little boy dressed in warrior ceremonial garb, dancing during a cultural festival in Goroka




For the next 2 weeks we will be hosting a 15 year old girl, the daughter of some of our friends who needs a place to stay for 11 days. During this time we will also be attending and facilitating a 2 week long business conference.

Kendal will be handling/coordinating the day care and Vacation Bible School with a team from the states. I will be doing the technical side (with others). Networking/wireless/projection/file sharing/messaging/email etc.

It's been a very busy couple of weeks preparing, so I thought I might post a few fun pics, being that I might not be posting much for 2 weeks (or I might, you never know).

You're good

well we still need the prayer
but after putting the last blog post up, I felt a definite lifting of my mood!
But that's not the cool part.

Do not doubt that God answers prayer, because... check this out:

Today about an hour minutes after I posted for prayer on the blog (enough time for some folks to read it on facebook and pray)...

I got an email that said "Chad why is this email bouncing, please fix."
and the email sent to me was titled "Spiritual Warfare" and it had several verses in there and so while I was troubleshooting this email issue, I also went through the verses and was greatly encouraged and helped.

Quick Prayer Request

Please be praying from today through April 12th (Easter) for our family and our center.

Quite a few things have been happening:
-another bridge is falling apart
-Kendal got a cold and it disabled her voice (she's getting better)
-I got a real bad case of being glum.
-We haven't seen any real sunshine for a few months.
-Everything is going wrong today at work, problems and pressures.
-Friends are getting dramatic calls from home.
-We'll be having a 15 year old move in with us for a few weeks as she has no place to stay.


The other day I was sitting there thinking "wow, a lot of stuff is going on, bad stuff."

Neighboring clans are fighting amongst themselves out in the villages right now.

And it started to really get me down..... I mean that "I can't explain why I feel so down." type of down...

And it dawns on me... WOW THIS could be a spiritual attack. Since I had that revelation, there has been some light.

PLEASE pray against the enemy. I don't know if God is going to move greatly during our conference (starts this week, ends April 12).

It is a 2 week church meeting of sorts, and both Kendal and I are deeply involved in it's success.

The last 2 weeks have been tough. We've had everything around us start to suddenly have an increase in "drama". Some friends hurried back to the states this week because of family issues.

Fighting broke out around us (not with us but around us)...
all kinds of things... add them all up and it spells

Spiritual Warfare.

I know this term is scary to many, it was to me... but it is a daily thing here.
Even something as simple as exhaustion can be an attack.

So if you have a few minutes, pray that God would cause the enemy to flee from us, from our family, from our center, and that God would work greatly here these next 3 weeks.

Thank you.

You know, how life has it's regular times, and then it's sudden new dramatic times? Then it has its "when it rains it pours" times? This is a "raining and pouring" time in almost every sense of the word. Every single thing around us right now has drama... a term I used for.. increased problems and stress.

We could use your prayer.

Fahr Mun

That's mah name.

Our center has a volunteer fire squad, and a Japanese fire truck with customizations and conversions done by our auto-staff here.

Each month we take turns taking the truck out, fire it up, drive it, test the hoses, etc. This month was my turn and I brought my son with me. We stopped to take a few photos after running all the water.

If ever we fight a fire, I'll let you know.
If a weekend warrior is a reservist, what is a "I drive the truck once every 5 months and never fight a fire" person called? .... Safe.

I really liked these two.

Rain Dance

It has been raining a LOT lately, usually when it rains we have a slow trickle into our water tank. My wife took a photo of the down pouring into our water tank during a heavier time of rain this week. Our yard is swampy.

On Friday Sydney, had performed in a musical in which she had a solo. She surprised us when she told us she tried out for it. And she did a GREAT job of it. It was nice to see her enjoy it.

They did like 4 performances.

Anyway enjoy the pictures.

Book Parade

The school doesn't celebrate halloween (which I'm glad about), but they do celebrate book week. For a week (or 2) they have the kids compete in reading. Classes compete against other classes for reading hours, individuals for book cover art, and they dress up on the last day and march in parade dressed as one of their favorite book characters.

Calvin chose Prince Caspian, Sydney "Fern" from 'Charlotte's Web'

These are their photos.

Sydney got first place for art in her class and Calvin got second place for art.
(art=book cover)

Kendal made the costume for Calvin. The question was "how to find a chain mail vest".. well, KEndal headed into town, found this silvery dress, and altered it. Then a friend found the belt in town.. Calvin felt like the star with this costume.. and we were very glad the whole getup cost around a dollar.

It is simply amazing what you can find in thrift stores. There are few "new" clothing stores in this country, you can buy some new clothing, but the thrift stores are packed every day. Most of the folks in this country are wearing clothes passed down from other countries and very rarely understand the logo they are wearing.

I saw a guy with a "raiders" t-shirt on and instinctively began to mock him jokingly, when I realized, he has no idea who the raiders are.

Mape

No this isn't a Vietnam prison camp photo.
It also isn't a movie set.

This last week the Mape language group had a Bible Dedication. This is where it was held.

Today I was able to view photos of this dedication, of which we all have played a part, but was unable to go.

What I was able to do, was to explain to a national who was trying to tell his family how to plant coffee, the very simple procedure of compressing images in a Word document so that his 16mb files could become more like 1/2 mb files.

I don't know in the long scheme of things how helping a man compress images helps, but I know that the teaching experience, helped build our relationship more.

Another Answered Prayer

A big challenge we've had recently is getting our kids' passports renewed.

Our kids passports expire in July of this year, and to renew them in country you need to have an official of the U.S. Consolate site the kids. This would be an expense of around $500.00 or more for us to travel to the Consolate by plane.

Well the good news WAS that a representative was going to travel to us to do the sighting, but then at the last minute they canceled. Which means we were faced with taking time off work, getting the papers, the money, oh the money!!! To renew alone costs about $100 per child, not to mention the hotel stay, and the air fare, and taxi rides and all that in town.

So our approach was "I dunno how I'm gonna do this, so.. let's ask God for help." And then wait and hope for the best.

Today my wife found me in a meeting and said "we have a small window of opportunity, can you get the paperwork ready in 20 minutes?"

Well of course we could because we already had the new passport photos printed and the application 90% filled out, because we were expecting to have to do this.

Apparently the diplomat I mentioned having lunch with earlier, was able to site our kids (as well as about 20 other families) today during dinner time. I was joking earlier today with my wife about asking him, but someone else must have because they pulled it all together last minute.

So, a few hours later, a few points in risen blood pressure for many families here, one speaker phone call to the consolate to say our oaths, and voila...

So Praise God!! Our kids passport apps have been submitted now.

You never know

"Chad do you think you'd get bored being a missionary?"

I was asked that more than once before starting this.
I marvel at how "un-boring" life is at times.

Today I had lunch with a Diplomat.
He was the US Embassy Diplomat for Security Affairs or something like that.
We talked about the trends in this country, about Muslim influence, about all manner of things security based and I found him articulate and intelligent.

And as I was walking back to work I thought "wow, I had lunch with a Diplomat."

The other day I was playing banjo down by the river, giving our puppy a bath and I thought:
"How many people in the world can say they have played banjo, near a river, in a jungle inside the South Pacific?"

I really don't know how long this ride God has us on will last, but there are these moments that are so rare that you think "I am living a life more abundantly."

I reflexively praise God in those moments.

Book Week

At our kids school, they have several non-U.S. traditions. They don't celebrate halloween, or president's day because the kids that attend are from 17 different countries. But they have other special days, one of which is Book Week.

During Book Week the teachers emphasize reading through several fun events. The classes compete in different challenges, the biggest of which is to see which class can read the most pages in a week. Typically my kids say "whatever class has Jo in it will win" one kid is to books what piranha are to meat.

Most of the kids here read a lot because frankly there isn't too much else to do at home.

Yesterday kicked off Book Week with a bang. The principal paid for a helicopter from our Aviation department to come and land, dropping off "Sparky" the clown (one of our neighbors when dressed as Sparky, becomes an entirely different person and the kids love it.

Sparky talked about reading, the Bible, and getting "taken away" by books. In the end, the helicopter lifted off, and took away their principal and vice principle (and one very excited Finish onlooker who got a free ride).

At dinner it was all the kids could talk about... how exciting it all was, how funny the clown was, and the message stuck with them.

It's great when something unique like this happens, because it reminds you that for all that our kids will not experience that other U.S. kids will, they will experience as many things that the U.S. kids will not.

I enjoy taking time to appreciate these little blessings from God that I see as encouragements that our kids will turn out to be adults who follow God.

Training

We are a training facility. We have more Papua New Guineans working at the computer department than ex-pats. As such, the ex-pats usually have the training background and we try to share it. We are all united with the common goal of reaching people for Christ, and so for us to share training with co-workers is a natural thing as well as a way to help their futures here.

We have been conducting training recently, writing the curriculum and then training. Today we introduce a few people to tcp/ip. I'm interested in seeing how that goes.

My experience is that the nationals here are for the most part very bright, and once they hear something, they retain it very quickly. Especially anything relationship oriented. So if we can communicate networking in a "relationship" context I'm hopeful they will learn it quickly.

I'm still amazed at how many people know my name after only hearing it once many months ago.

Wokim Wok

Someone said this the other day, "wokim wok" in tok pisin it means "work the work".

This month is flying by, each day is a challenge trying to stay on top of things.
I'm managing a building overhaul (still, they decided to double the project). We have a server that habitually goes down and we've been troubleshooting it.

We are responsible for Conference, (a huge every other year, 2 week long meeting), and so there are a lot of technical considerations there (which I am also managing).

Excitement, after 4 years of using a 1200 lumens projector for our meeting house, we have purchased a very affordable 4000 lumen projector with LAN capabilities. (toshiba tw420).

I was in charge of finding and researching projectors for a replacement. Was given a budget and found a GREAT projector for under half the budget. Everyone was SOOO pleased that we weren't sure if it was too good to be true.

But the package came this week, we opened it, and WOW.
Not only can you project over the network, but you can actually see images and color backgrounds now in the meeting house!!!

People going to functions, (church, prayer meetings, tok pisin services etc) aren't going to know why but they will enjoy the projections much more now.

The lan sharing is ahead of competitors but still is very first generation and needs some tweaking (you can't halt someone from sharing over the lan once they begin, so they can monopolize the projector).

Anyway, it was a big "phew!" moment for me as it was the first time I've been in charge of ordering equipment here. I used to do it a lot in the U.S. but here you have the added obstacle of not being able to actually SEE the unit until it's been paid for and shipped. So if you make a mistake, it's up to 3 months to find out.

thanks to God for the guidance on that one!

Valentine's Day

Well I took photos and I was waiting until I got them off my camera to post, but things have been busy and I haven't prioritized it. So here is my non-image post.

My valentine for my wife was three fold:
-I found some tile in storage and mortar and grout, and tiled up a hole that has been bothering her for some time (total cost = $0.00)

-I had my daughter sneak off to market early on Friday to buy flowers (total cost = .33 cents)

-I took my wife "out" to eat at a fundraiser for the high school, we double dated with a couple who recently had a baby and it was their first night "away" from home. It was fun, (total cost = $12.00)

We got our puppy!
And even though I was voting for "blunderbuss" the name "budge" sort of stuck.

I'm pretty happy with this puppy. I've been doing serious research on dog training and choosing, and so far it's paying off.

In 3 days he knows his name, he's been crate trained (potty trained, doesn't whine at night, knows who his master is, etc), and he's GREAT with the kids.

I'm very happy with the personality of this dog, and how quick he takes to the training. I have no experience training a dog, but all the reading I'm doing is paying off because he really is well behaved.

he is an outside dog and I will begin training him to be a guard dog in a few weeks, for now I'm going over the basics... who the master is, where he can relieve himself, not to bark at the wrong time, to bark at the right time, etc.

Google is man's best friend here, maybe I should have named him google. I went from knowing nothing to being able to crate train this dog in 3 days!!

I enjoy dogs, however I only enjoy well trained, well behaved dogs. Around here, a quick way to upset neighbors is to have an all day barker, a digger, or an escaper. So far, budge isn't any of those things.

Having a dog around brings a sense of security to the family, and really he has brought excitement to our household, and fun too.

Special Daddy Moment

You might file this one under "too much information."

2 years ago we experienced a 6.0 earthquake here which really frightened my daughter. She got under the table, and was crying. After that there were several "I can't sleep" nights where any floor movement woke her up.

So finally one night I said "I will be here to protect you."

Well, an earthquake hit around 3am one night soon after and I went from a dead sleep to running to her room when she woke up she saw me standing there. I was glad my brain was able to remember to go to her room like that, so I kept my promise.

Typically during a night quake (we have one or two a month, very small, almost unnoticeable except I'm good at noticing them), I wake up, and wait to see if my daughter did. My son and wife sleep through them typically.

Anyway, last night around 1:15am, a 5.5 came and I shook awake, and went from a dead sleep to a sprint in less than a second.

I got to my daughter's room moments after hearing her scream "DADDDDDDDYYYY!!!"

I hugged her and kissed her and told her it was alright, daddy was there.
she replied "yes, you came, but sometimes you don't come."
I said, "you're safe, go back to sleep."
and she went to sleep.

If I hadn't have been there she would have lost about an hour of sleep.

This may seem odd, but one thing I have learned more here than anywhere else, is that when I get an adrenaline dump like that it goes to my stomach and about 15 minutes after I calm down, my stomach really hurts for a bit.

Those who have been in a field may sympathize, there are times when you JOLT awake and react quickly. Mostly it's quakes here or an odd noise that jolts you awake.

So I lost around an hour of sleep last night thanks to the quake.... but it was worth it... I was there with my little girl able to make her feel safe.

Prais i Go Antap Tumas

"Price He goes On Top Too Much" - The price is too high.

We are getting a puppy soon as I've mentioned. He will grow into, among other things, a guard dog. So we need to have a fence installed. The most affordable way to install a fence is to use firewood logs, coat the bottom foot in used engine oil (to avoid rotting) and then put them in the ground and run wire between them. It isn't a picket fence, but it's also not entirely ugly.

If I were to do the work myself, the fence would not come out very good, and since labor is very inexpensive here, I looked up a man with a good reputation and hired him to do the work.

Hiring a Papua New Guinean is always a tricky ordeal because in their culture the boss man, has certain responsibilities. If his children get hurt during the course of the work, regardless of where they get hurt, or why, he will come to me for help. I am his caretaker, I look after him. This is true to a certain extent.

So employing is a responsibility, but then there is the "what price is fair?" and "am I getting suckered?" question that makes you wonder.

I explained the fence to him, bought all the materials and asked him to quote me a price. He quoted me a REALLY REALLY high price.

I was surprised, in my head I had a number I wasn't willing to go passed, and this price was double that.

Knowing that in this culture you do NOT haggle. They say a price, you can ask for a number two price, and that's it. AT least not over FOOD. You can slightly haggle over other things.

So I asked him to come down a bit, and he did no problem, still way more than I thought was fair.

I went to a trusted friend and asked "what is fair" and he gave me a price that was more what I was thinking. So today I had to speak with this man and offered him the lower price and he took it without grumbling or even frowning.

And it struck me as odd, that this man started at 800 Kina and wound up with 300kina and is perfectly happy.

So it was then that I learned a valuable cultural lesson.
Someone told me today.

"Papua New Guineans are not good at estimating work cost. You need to tell them what you will pay them and let them accept or refuse."

AHA!
So he wasn't trying to gauge me, everyone who recommended him said it didn't sound like him. He was simply not capable of doing the math in his head that would figure out what the labor cost him.

Also because of this inability to estimate well, it is often wise to draw up a contract because jobs can drag on and on and on if you are paying by the hour, not because they are trying to bilk you, like we might view it, but because in their culture, pace is slower, and there is no motivation to finish a job until there is another job lined up.

So I got a contract for 300kina.

And in the process I learned a lot and will be getting a fence.