At 5 am on New Year’s Day we boarded our first flight back to PNG, leaving both boys behind this time. We arrived on Saturday afternoon, and within 24 hours I had developed a fever that would eventually get up to 104 and render me useless for the next week. I spent the first week of school on the couch instead of in the classroom, while Chris moved furniture and unpacked our storage stuff.
After that auspicious beginning, the rest of the term has gone well. The girls are thrilled to be back home and with their friends again. Chris is currently in our house in the tribe, meeting with believers to listen to their struggles and encourage their faith, and coming alongside the church leaders to help them deal with some issues that have been ongoing in the community.
The issues are these: Before we even moved into the Pal tribe, many people there believed that God’s gift to mankind was not the atonement for sin offered by his Son’s death, but earthly wealth and the supernatural power and rituals that would produce it. So when we came onto the scene with our commitment to tell them what God’s Word said, they assumed that we were going to share with them what they and their ancestors had failed to attain on their own–the secrets of how to plug into that supernatural power and create for themselves the kind of life that they wanted.
Obviously, we disappointed them. When confronted with the truth that God’s greatest gift is reconciliation with himself and not “the good life” on earth, they agreed with it at first and said and did all the things that they thought we wanted them to, but really in their hearts they rejected the gospel and continued to seek after the secret way to get money and possessions. And they continued to believe that we would eventually let them in on the secrets hidden in the Bible.
Fast forward to the time when we missionaries started moving out of the bush and into town. It started to hit people that maybe we weren’t going to tell them the secrets after all. So they doubled down on finding the source of power by themselves, and the thoughts and beliefs that were under the surface before began to be lived out openly. People invented and carried out weird rituals, and even believers were convinced by peer pressure to take part in pig sacrifices to atone for sin. And the disappointment turned to anger–anger that we missionaries were keeping things from them, or were telling the secrets to some but not to others.
But God is still working. There are some who refuse to be carried along by the lies and have clung to God’s truth. Also, the church that was planted in a neighboring village several years ago has not been influenced by this overt rejection of Jesus. In fact, they laughingly admitted that they had been through it already several times and were not going to be fooled by it this time. Also, another church plant has resulted in salvation for a small number of people who live near the clan that seems to be leading the opposition to the truth, and though they live right on the edge of a very deep darkness God is working in them to develop a hunger for Him and a desire to be strengthened in their faith. Please continue to pray for the Pal believers and especially for those who are leading the church. Prayer is our most powerful weapon in the fight against evil, so we ask you to use it to fight on behalf of your brothers and sisters in Papua New Guinea.