Yep, I can’t believe I just said that packing is a privilege. Sure, if you ask Ellen, she’d say that she loves to pack and always gets right to work at it. In fact, if you know her well, you’ve probably teased her about it by now. But for me, packing isn’t really something that I look forward to. It’s not that I detest it, but given the choice I wouldn’t pack if I didn’t have to. So, what makes it a privilege? Even though it can be fun to play real life Tetris…trying to fit things as compactly as possible into a particular space, that’s really not the privilege. The privilege that our family has in packing is that we do it because Christ has made the way clear for us to bring the Gospel to those who have never heard in Papua New Guinea. What makes it a privilege? Christ is the one who has chosen us, the Church, to be the ones to share His love, mercy and grace with those who don’t know Him. He alone is worthy of our praise and He desires all men to praise Him! It can be easy for me to think at times that what we’re doing is a sacrifice. I mean aren’t we giving up life as we know it? Family, friends, church, work…we’re leaving those things that once, in one sense, defined our time here on earth. But really those things don’t at all define who we are. As a believer, who I am is not defined by me and my surroundings, but it is defined by Christ and my relationship with Him. He is the one who assigns my value and gives me my purpose for this life. The privilege that our family has (and that all of us as believers have) is in being part of what He is doing in the world today. God doesn’t lead us all to be His witnesses in another country, but He does call us all to be His witnesses. Isn’t that a great privilege… that God would use us as believers to declare His glory to the nations? My prayer is that our family will keep that in focus as we move on to Papua New Guinea and that you who are serving Christ here in North America will keep that in focus as well.
What are we up to? The boys have finished their soccer season and we were involved with our first missions conference. We had a great weekend at WAYUMI…a missions exposure retreat in PA with a big group of friends and family. We just got back from a great visit with our friends in Canada for the last time before we cross the Pacific Ocean! We will be busy packing, homeschooling and spending time with family and friends over the next two months. We have received word that our entry permits have been approved in PNG! We should be buying our plane tickets within the next week or two! We don’t know exactly what date we’ll be moving, but expect it to be sometime around January 20th.
How To Reach Us In Papua New Guinea?
e-mail:paul_swenson@ntm.org
ellen_swenson@ntm.org
samswenson24@gmail.com
Facebook: PaulandEllen Swenson (follow us… for our day to day adventure updates)
Phone: 802-673-7007
Address for letters and packages:
IMPORTANT! If you want to send us mail or a care package... PLEASE GO HERE for instructions!
Come along with us to bring the gospel where it has never been. Be part of our prayer and/or financial support teams! We are coming closer to our goal of 100% support (currently at 89%) and we now have over 250 prayer partners! If you have been praying about joining us, please talk to us soon. If not, would YOU pray about helping complete our support team? E-mail us at paul_swenson@ntm.org, call us at 802-624-3368 or go here for more info.
Prayer and Praises:
- Praise for the great weekend we had with friends and family at WAYUMI! Many were challenged with the world’s need for the Good News! Pray for more workers!!!
- Praise that our entry permits for PNG were approved! Pray that our passports “return home” soon through the mail so we can order our plane tickets.
- Pray that our support team would be completed soon as well as the Noyes family’s team. We’re so thankful for how God has been providing for us!
- Pray that God will continue to prepare our hearts for the move in January.
See our kids’ page here… it includes a new video