Well, this past weekend our family made a trip interior to a small jungle village called Kiwi.
With Chris as our pilot, we left on Friday morning.
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| "We have a whole plane to ourselves!" (Makenna) |
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| Flying over Lake Sentani |
We landed in Kiwirok just about an hour later.
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| This is the place of calendar photos & missionary tales. |
The airplane was secured ...
And we began our 2 hour jungle hike to Kiwi.
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| We were not alone! Many followed, helped, and carried our belongings. |
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| Even Chris' remote glider was carried in a large noken. |
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| Do you see the trail? |
Here are some of the faces of those who travelled with us:
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| Tehya fell in love with this little sojourner. |
When we arrived in Kiwi, the abandoned missionary house had smoke coming from its chimney ...
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| What a welcome sight! |
The missionaries who had lived here, began their work in Kiwi around the time that Chris was born, and then lived here for almost 40 years! For about 20 years of this time, translation work was done, and in the year 2000, the New Testament was completed in the language of Kiwi.
This missionary family departed Kiwi in 2013, and other than one other visiting family, no other family has stayed here since.
It was as though we stepped into a storybook, a little piece of history, that had only been seen by God, a few visitors, and the walls.
Let me take you on a tour ...
For nearly 40 years this house was lived in by a devoted family
who gave to these people --
a people who used to walk in darkness, but are now living in the Light!
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| The people are gentle ... |
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| ... and generous! |
What a very special trip it was ... 3 nights of "Little House on the Prairie" living (no electricity, no phone, no fridge). We talked and played with the people, we sat by the old stove to keep warm, drank instant coffee, ate freshly-killed pig meat, boiled our drinking water ... Yes, the kids all got sick, and the floor around the toilet was rotting & threatening to topple the toilet ... but we survived!
And we came away richer ...
because someone answered "yes" to the call,
and came and lived in Kiwi,
to let the people know that Jesus loves them.
And because of His love in them,
we foreigners,
were richly welcomed and generously loved.