almost 3 weeks!

Some things I could not express yet in my last update are becoming more clear in my heart and mind. Some of those include: awareness of my great selfishness, need for grace to give grace to others, learning to really respect people I don’t necessarily agree with in every way, etc. God is teaching me a lot.

I wish I could just transcribe my conversation with Diane Reese from 2 days ago. God spoke straight to my spirit through her, to my struggles and worries and hopes. I asked her the same questions I asked Jeri, and she had very different answers because she’s very different and because she’s been here a lot longer. I’m beginning to see through things she said and through being here how true it is that this world is not our home, that our purpose here isn’t to be comfortable, how real God’s truth and strength and power must become in your life when you’re NOT comfortable. There’s struggle and pain and frustration and disillusionment. But transcending all that, there is the Lord in his glory and goodness, giving everything we need, giving joy and blessing and fullness of life in him. My heart is so full today!

So much has happened, I can’t recount it all to you, but I’ll try to give a few highlights. Things are certainly busier now. Saturdays are our “day of rest”. Today was very restful, but last Saturday we had a fun, tiring day snorkeling and hiking through the jungle. A PNG man from the village nearby led us up to some “skullcaves” which is just what it sounds like: caves with dozens of skulls of victims of cannibals. Our guide assured us though that they were not skulls of his people, but skulls of people his people had eaten. (Cannibalism is no longer in practice, so no worries).

Two big things this past week have been the female youth bible study on Monday. I’m not sure how well we’re communicating, but I think it went well. I know that at least one of the girls, Jacinta, is not a Christian. We invited the Sunday school class and their friends. About 12 came, which is more than expected. Rachel and I shared the teaching about equally, which went smoothly (praise God!). We drove some girls home and on the way one asked us “If you sin one day and God forgives you, and then you sin again the next day, will he forgive you again?” It just blew me away to be able to explain God’s grace and forgiveness, and the gospel basically, to someone who wasn’t familiar with the concept already!

The second major event of the week would be giving a presentation to the town high school on American culture and as much of our Christian viewpoint as we wanted. They don’t have the trouble with Church and State being mixed like the U.S. does. About 400 students were there, and 3 of us sat on stage and answered some prepared questions Marcus asked, and then students came up and asked questions. Afterwords they flocked around us for almost an hour asking more questions and getting our address to be “pen-friends”. Our main purpose for doing that was to invite them to the youth camp we’re doing later this summer, and also to make contacts and hopefully correct misconceptions about America. The people here generally have the attitude that white people are better, because we’re seen as richer and better educated. I don’t like it, and I try to take every opportunity to praise them and their culture and to ask questions and learn from them.

prayer requests: intern relationships (they're ok, but that they will be filled with grace and wisdom and stay healthy and have good communication), that when we go to the Trobriand Islands the elections will be done, the youth camp coming up, health of missionaries and interns (several people have been sick lately), our girls bibly study. Thank you so so much!