Preparation for our bush orientation is our focus this week. This is a big job, as we purchase food, toiletries, and suppies we’ll need to continue what we’ve been doing here in town… out in the bush.

Bush orientation is a pretty intense time of total immersion in language and culture. It is a kind of a dry run of the whole tribal church planting experience. The living conditions will closely mirror the conditions we will face when we move into our own tribe, and so it is a good time to get a really clear picture of what precisely this job demands of us out here in the Sepik Region of PNG.

On Friday, Jan20, we leave for a village called Sino. This village has a church established there in the tribal language, and it is this tribal church that will be evaluating whether or not we are prepared to “hack it” as missionaries in the bush. This is an awesome way for new believers out in the middle of the jungle, who are not in a position to financially support the work being done in their country, to support the expanding of the kingdom in another important way. We will be discipled by the believing men and women of the Sino church, and get some serious instruction on language, culture, and how to live in the jungle.

Sino is stationed right on the Sepik river, which is a highway of sorts here in PNG. Along the river, culture, ideas, cargo, money, and language move pretty freely, affecting villages perched along this meandering waterway in as many ways as there are villages. Below are some views of the Sepik river from the house we’ll be living in. There are perks to being a missionary out here in the middle of nowhere.

Here is an image of the house we’ll call home for the next two-ish months…

Living in a home like this, as rad as it may seem, takes anyone some adjustment. This is another huge reason for bush orientation. To keep from getting completely fried with shock at the contrast, bush orientation is the perfect blend of immersion and adjustment; a great environment to recalibrate expectations, and do some planning for the future when we’ll be building your own ministry center (office/clinic/home/teaching house) for life and work in our own tribe one day.

Sino has an airstrip, so we’ll fly right into the tribe, and unload all the stuff we’ll be bring straight into the house we’ll be living in. Being on the Sepik river, however, this airstrip is key to supplying other missionaries’ Bible Translation and Church Development efforts as cargo moved into the airstrip can easily be boated up river to neighboring villages.

There are two other tribal churches the airstrip in Sino services, Uriai and Siawi. While in Sino, it is our desire to visit the missionaries and the churches in these villages and learn all we can from their hard work. Huge resources to tap, and great people who have given their lives to seeing the Gospel taken to a tongue that has not yet had it.

Here is a video describing a bit of the work in Uriai (only a canoe ride away from Sino!)

Here is a video describing the work going on in neighboring Siawi (only a canoe ride + hike away from Sino!)

SUCH a privilege it is to be so close to such giants in our faith, such faithful servants. We have a lot to learn yet, and who better to learn from, right? We are encouraged by these awesome people, and pray we can encourage them as they finish the task of carrying the truth into these dark places.

So the team at Sino is now comprised of these two couples, none of which are American. The great commission is not only something for Americans, I am reminded! From left to right in the photo above, Sien (who calls Holland home) and her husband Kelly (a Canadian) are the people who built the house we’ll be living in. We have had the privilege of getting to know them well over the last four months here, as they serve in administration roles from the base here in Wewak as the translation work they are doing doesn’t require them to be on site in Sino all the time. As I write this, they are on a bush plane heading back here from a trip into Sino where they continue to disciple believers as well (they live in the apartment directly above us when they are here in Wewak). The Tertels are the other couple in Sino (both of them are German) and have been in Sino for the majority of our stay here in PNG, so we have not really had much time to get to know them. That is going to change here soon, as they will be the only other white and english-speaking folk anywhere near us! Please pray for our relationship with this couple, and for grace as these couples from different parts of the world, who’s native languages are completely different, are thrown together for two months. We are confident this is going to be a great time, but we can use all the prayer we can get!

So we’re a bit fried from packing and prep already, planning and not having “all the information” is trying, and we sometimes feel like we are only guessing at what we’ll need and what we have to bring. Constantly feeling behind and unprepared is jarring and discouraging… but we need to remind ourselves that there is nothing we can really do to prepare completely for this stuff. We are going to have these small regrets like “I wish I would have brought ___ ” or “Why did I bring this, I haven’t used it the whole time I’ve been here!” but this is all part of the training. Please pray for our morale during this time of moving AGAIN… When we come back, there will be even more people on base here for the Annual Sepik Conference, so all of our stuff needs to go into storage, and we will not be moving right back into the apartment we’re in right now… we’ll be sharing a house with our friends’ the Rees family temporarily. The excitement never ends here in the land of mystery.

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