Hi friends, would you eat a caterpillar? We went into the bush the 17th of May as you know and returned on the 20th. It was another great opportunity to build relationships as we had a team of believers from the church in the village help us with leveling ground and digging post holes etc. We had a plan in our mind for what we wanted to get done as we had a deadline of the plane coming back on Thursday morning! We didn’t get our full plan completed, but God is greater than our plans. Greater than the building plan was learning more about the culture of our Mengen friends and how to work with them as a church planting team. That’s why God has us building a house and that was a great reminder – the pictures tell the story 🙂
Our day started with:
Loading the aeroplane – you may see the familiar face of Steven Thompson who came out to help us set the posts; Steven is from NewtownardsBaptist and is serving here full time in support ministry. Steven’s wife Michelle stayed at home withthe three boys. Also withme was Roger Deeds a new missionary to the field who is busy with learning the national language – He has a wife – Lana and two kids.
Loading the plane.
To start with we had to level the ground before putting in posts.
We had a lot of rain the first day which slowed down leveling and digging the post holes.
Posts going in.
Roger held the posts until they dried – dedication!
Work stopped to eat some caterpillars – no really!
However after all of that we did get the posts finished.
The finished project! All posts in for our 24ft x 24ft one level house.
We are delighted as you can imagine to have all of our posts in the ground. This sets us up to get the outer shell and roof of the building completed when we next go in on the 20th of June. When we go in on the 20thas a family to build we will take a larger team of the support missionaries to help. If we can get the house built with walls and a roof within a week we will then move in permanently and work on the house ourselves from there. Thanks to all of you who have prayed and given to the building project. Please pray the Lord continues to provide so we can get moved in all the way without any debt. A big prayer request would be for relationships – PNG culture is very different from our own so pray we will be sensitive as we build and can be a real testimony to the church and community in the village.
The Lord is working amongst the Mengen people through all of you who pray and give – God will reward you!
Pray for us – with much love and prayers,
Simon, Annika, Nya and Noah