Surveys

January 25, 2019

Before we enter any people group, we first conduct different surveys. We thus first visit specific people groups who often invite us to come and live amongst them, to help us evaluate what the need is and to present to them the purpose of what we are wanting to come and do. Last year I […]

“Hausboi”

January 21, 2019

The “hausboi” is a Pidgen term, for a men’s house. In Mengen they call it “Giunga.” In our Mengen culture, this is a house only for men. Young boys used to leave their homes and move into the men’s house when they are between 10 – 13 years old and then they get introduces to […]

Halfway Home

January 15, 2019

It is now 6 months since we arrived here in South Africa. And even though we long for our home back in Papua New Guinea, we can thankfully summarize by saying, “The Laureti’s are doing very well”. Those first few weeks here felt like a whirlwind… landing in JHB, some medical appointments, seeing friends and […]

Brus’ story

January 3, 2019

Many moons ago, a nervous me, landed in our bush village between the Mengen valleys and mountains. It was only for a short visit, to meet our future co-workers and meet the Mengen friends amongst whom we would live for the next roughly 20 years of our lives. During this time I met Brus and […]

How to support Madeleen

December 19, 2018

Hi Friends Marie and I have been sharing this morning about our joys and tribulations as missionaries in Papua New Guinea, and it was interesting to note, that our joys are actually our tribulations when handled correctly. One of these challenges for us was to have to raise a special needs child in our family. […]

it’s been a while

November 1, 2018

Hi there, remember me? I used to blog in this space. I used to write about our everyday happenings, new recipes I was loving, big things I was feeling. And then I stopped. I found that I couldn’t really tell you everything I was feeling, or everything that was going on — I could never […]

Diamonds In The Rough

August 29, 2018

An important principle in disciple making is to find the hungry hearts and feed them (2 Timothy 2:2.) This was Paul’s admonition to the hungry hearted Timothy (Acts 16:1, 2) as he handed the ministry baton to his spiritual son. The context for this treasure hunt, though, is a larger group of witnesses. Paul ministered […]

Rude Cultural Signal OR Is”Christ Is More Important”?

August 18, 2018

Recently in a team meeting, I was reminded that rude gestures are NOT the same in different cultures.

Excited and Proud

August 8, 2018

I don’t know better words to use right now. Today, August 8th Jason & Tami Hughes, Drew & Leasa Decuir and Nicole Cogan are on a separate planes, all heading to the country of Papua New Guinea (PNG). Why are we excited? Why are we proud? These guys are all from the missionary training class […]

Chaotic Peace

July 22, 2018

Chaos. Peace. How can both of these things exist simultaneously in my life? However, my life in these last few days before I depart for Papua New Guinea has a high degree of both. Chaos because my room in my parents’ house has clusters of leftover knick-knacks, miscellaneous articles of clothing, books, and papers through which to sort. […]