Survey Time

The time is finally here!!!  Wow!  This is a day we have been waiting for and looking forward to for a long time.

Bart leaves on Tuesday for a 10 day survey into the tribe our team is targeting!

On Tuesday our NTM pilot will fly the guys to this airstrip in the tribe.  And then he’ll turn right around and leave again!  The tribal people don’t know that they are coming so the airplane landing on their airstrip will likely be a big event.

Bart, Benjamin and Dave will then spend the next 8 or 9 days hiking to different villages within this language group.  On the initial survey done here last year, the guys on the survey visited several villages in a certain direction.  Our guys will now go a different direction and try to visit all of the remaining villages.

They don’t really know how long they will have to hike each day or how steep and slippery the trails will be.  But they will probably be hiking through areas that look something like this.

They don’t know where they will sleep each night or what they might be offered to eat.  These photos from the previous survey give you an idea, though, of what it might be like.

There are several objectives that the men on our team hope to accomplish on this trip.  First of all, they want to confirm that the tribal people do indeed want a missionary team to come live with them.  Second, they need to scout out where would be the best place for our team to locate within the language group.  Third, they will be observing as much as they can about the conditions in the tribe – everything from what the weather is like and what foods grow there to what building materials are available.  Knowing these things will help us as we continue to make plans for building houses and moving into the tribe.  Finally, assuming that everything goes well, they will be setting up a time to return with several of our NTM leaders to make things official.

At the end of their 10 days of hiking and roughing it, they will be picked up again at the airstrip, this time by a pilot from another mission.  They will probably be tired and pretty smelly, but their wives and kids will be excited to see them again!

Please pray for Bart, Benjamin and Dave while they are in the tribe.  Please also pray for Emily, Missy and Robyn and all the kids as they hold down the fort at home.

Stay tuned for photos and updates about the survey.

Thanks for praying!!