Attacking the Garden

Pikinini bilong mi, hatwok.

 Our first week in PNG we set out to reign in our garden, so we can get some much needed food grown.  Our first attempt took 2 hours and we got a 1.5 metre square patch of garden dug up.  It was a massive job, our garden is big and we worked hard in the hot sun.

At the end of the day we decided to seek the help of a local lady to work with us to get the garden manageable and growing.  

Our boys like to call her a 'machine', she is amazing as cleaning up the garden.  She nailed the entire pineapple patch in a morning.  The next morning she worked she tackled the banana patch.  

The boys and I felt a little sheepish about our efforts, until we spoke with an ex-pat who said the local weed by scraping off the surface, rather than pulling weeds out by the roots.  This made us feel slightly better for our initial efforts.

Sena, gaden mari, bilong mi,
"Sena the Machine"

We are eating our first harvested banana's. In fact we had them hanging in our laundry to ripen in a large bag when they got ripe, very suddenly.  We had been checking them every few days, we left it 4 days and they went from green except one, to all bright yellow.  So it's banana muffins, banana bread, banana smoothies, dehydrated banana chips for the cereal and mashed banana on toast, and bananas as gifts. No doubt we shall be tired of bananas by the end of the week.

I planted some seedlings upon our arrival and some of them have come up and are growing nicely, nearly ready to transplant.  I am guessing some seeds may have been consumed by bugs in the ground before they had a chance to sprout.  So I shall plant some more today. I am looking forward to telegraph cucumbers and moneymaker tomatoes. I'm hopeful the courgettes will prosper, the humidity can rot the flowers before they are pollinated.

PNG Here We Come

It's happened, or happening.  A few weeks ago our visas finally came through!

In case you missed the story, here it it...

Some of you may be aware that we will shortly be moving to the Highlands region of Papua New Guinea in a voluntary position for the Christian Leaders’ Training College.  We hope to share a little more about this before we leave in early June.  In the meantime, below is some background.

The Weekend

Early in December 2012, we had a weekend of ‘ducks lining up’.  A “random” conversation with a previously unknown acquaintance led to a job description finding its way into our hands which led to a lot more conversations.  By the end of the weekend, we wondered if we were being called to a Bible college in Papua New Guinea, called the Christian Leaders’ Training College (CLTC).  

The Week in PNG

In January 2013 we visited PNG for just over a week.  It was a week of intensity and challenge. Marcus was asked to apply for the position of Chief Financial Officer, to work alongside the college’s leadership team and guide the college’s finance team.  We got home back to our boys, and wrestled intensely with whether we were willing to move them into the environment we had spent time in.  Ultimately we couldn’t see any room for manoeuvre.  God was clearly calling us to PNG regardless of the costs to our comfortable lives.

PNG is a place of contrasts.  It is beautiful yet the filthiest place we have ever visited. The people are friendly, yet in the Highlands (where CLTC is situated), they are reknown for being quick to erupt, displaying volatile and aggressive tendencies.  Natural resources, including oil, gas and gold deposits, are being mined, yet the poverty is everywhere.  In many ways the people are relatively untouched, yet they have been ravaged by what has been introduced since their discovery by the ‘developed’ world.

CLTC is something of an oasis in the middle of this storm and a light in the dark.  For nearly fifty years, it has been a place where people have come to be developed into the next generation of Christian leaders.  The college’s educational activities are 70% self-funded by various business activities which at various times have included poultry activities (laying hens, meat chickens and day old chickens), rice, cattle and a transport business.

The Wait

Having accepted the college’s offer in mid-February 2013, we began the epic wait for visas.  In February 2014, Marcus received his visa, then in April 2014, Ingrid, Sebastian and Solomon received their visas.  It doesn’t seem so bad writing that now, but it was a very difficult 14 months!

The Why?

Why do we want to up-sticks and move to a developing country to work for 2+ years for no wage?  Given the loud call we received, “why not?” is probably a more relevant question.  When God calls you, you go.

During our visit to PNG we were confronted with or advised of various situations of the kind we’re not usually exposed to in semi-rural New Zealand.  We really wrestled over whether we should take our children into such a volatile country but the Holy Spirit was undeniably speaking to us through Bible readings, sermons and songs. Ultimately, we realised that God is sovereign and we needed to trust the care of the boys to Him.  We can’t imagine what life would look like if we had said no to God, out of fear.

We are certainly excited about the opportunity to be part of this ministry though, which has such a powerful impact on PNG and the wider region of Melanesia (students come not only from PNG but the Solomon Islands and Vanuata too, also other parts of the Pacific including Tonga and Samoa).  We have always wondered if our occupations were transferable to the overseas mission field. This appointment proves that God can use anyone in any occupation, even an accountant.  

The How?

If you are interested in supporting us, we would love you to journey with us and the boys over the next couple of years.  We have never felt so reliant on God as during our visit to CLTC last year.  The environment there meant that we barely took a step without praying over the situation first and while that’s the way it should be, it was a great comfort to know that friends and family were praying for us too.  We would be really grateful to know that people were praying for us over these next two years also.  

Speaking of comfort...while we have faced many challenges over the past 17 months, one of the challenge that makes us both most uncomfortable is having to raise financial support.  No one likes talking money, even an accountant and his wife, especially when you are asking people for theirs!  While God has blessed us financially and we have endeavoured to be good stewards of the resources he has given us, we are nowhere near able to fund our living costs in PNG.  A wise sage told us that when people invest financially into a place and people, they actually join in the mission and they become part of the ministry...perhaps that makes the thought of supporting us financially more appealing...maybe not?!

Finally, another way you could support us is to visit us.  PNG is not so far away - a couple of 3+ hour flights from Auckland to Port Moresby via Brisbane, then a connecting flight to the Highlands.  We will be the only “expatriate” young family on campus so while there will be other young families and other expatriates, we will be relatively isolated compared to the abundance of friends and family we have at Hope.   We see a whole heap of ways that people at Hope can bless the business and educational activities at CLTC through short-term visits, although we’re aware that there are “dependency” issues if this is not carefully managed. We will have a better idea of how to avoid this after we’ve spent some time there.

The Unexpected

During our wait for visas, I think I have been really very patient. I don't want a medal, because I don't deserve it after last week. It was the first week where I have let my frustration at the visa delays become anger. A close friend told me "His timing is perfect", I said, "yeah, yeah.", I wasn't in the mood for the reality of truth. I was peeved and getting peeved-er.

After the reality of this past weekend I am so grateful we hadn't had our visas approved. I can't imagine how different it would have been having emergency appendicectomy in a developing country.

Now it's time for mending and a good dose of humble pie, as I squirm up to God and give back the driver seat to Him who actually does know what he's doing.

CLTC in PNG

Here is a link to a less than 5 minute clip about CLTC (Christian Leaders Training College) in PNG.
This beautiful place is were we hope to travel to soon to be apart of this vibrant community and country.

https://vimeo.com/89066172

Enjoy.

Life Sized ME

Another home school Mum, whom I highly respect, gave me the idea of this life sized ME activity. My boys loved it.

Here is what we did:  First the boys lay down on a huge bit of paper and we drew around them.  Then we dithered around for about a month, with these huge bits of paper in our desk, getting in the way, I wouldn't recommend that bit.  

I finally got myself organised to fit this activity into a home school day, and this is what we did.  In different parts of our bodies I asked then the boys answered the following prompts;

Head:

3 things I want to learn this year are...

Heart: 

I love ...

Tummy: 

My favourite foods are ...

Arms:

1. My favourite things to do are...

2. I feel nervous when ...

    I feel relaxed when ...

Hands:

1. My favourite  (for each finger/thumb) colour, movie, Bible character, lollie/sweets, song

2. People I like spending time with are (a dash leading into each finger)

Legs:

My top 5 dreams for 2014  (physical, spiritual etc)

I then suggested they lay down on top of their outlines (carefully) and think about all the things they had written under them.  I then asked them if there was anything else that was important about who they were, they should write it on their feet.

Later in the day after reading a portion from a book called Boundaries with Kids, I decided to add a responsibility element to these life sized Me's.

We stood looking at our outlines, which I had hung on the wall, up high so they looked bigger than life.  I spoke with them about how God had given them these bodies, like machines (it's a boys world in our house), they need a driver, someone in control.  I asked them who was in control of their machine?  We talked about who makes their machine lift things or move things? Who makes their machine move their arm?  I asked if I could make their arm move, and we concluded, no, unless I forced them, I could direct them to move their arm, but they would have to comply and do the moving.  

This lesson has been a spring board to talking about self-control.  Controlling our machines is self control..

We've dropped the ball

Chaos. Answering back, rolling eyes, aggressive play, words without love, stroppy attitude, selfish heart, blaming ... I could go on.

You know those times when you realise that all of a sudden the chaos that has ensured is actually a build up from the last weeks or months.

When we get busy, distracted, or disorientated from our parental mission things can go awry.  Normally we tend to wonder how it has happened, then we realise over time, our slight divergence, our centimetres off course becomes a metre, from where we can still see our intended track. After a short time that metre becomes 50 metres off the track we were on, then 100 metres and if we continue we will miss the mark we were aiming for, our destination will be vastly different, we may even find ourselves lost.

This very morning we realised we have missed the mark.  It had been brewing for the last 5 days, we can see that now, thanks to hindsight.  Out focus took a slight divergence, and we kept moving forward, off track.

It's hard to stay your course when life gets busy.  We know this all too well.  We've been blessed with family staying, and it has been great, they were not the divergence, we allowed others things to crowd in.  Now we are having to refocus.

At times like this, refocusing can feel very overwhelming.  Yet all it takes is a refocus, parents in control, not children out of control. The time is now for pulling back the freedoms our children have taken and we have inadvertently given.

May honour return to our home. Honour of God, each other, visitors, and ourselves.

2014 Mash-up

So this year, due to age differences, we cannot go with the Sonlight Curriculum, so we have opted for a bit of lots of things.  For non-home schoolers this next paragraph will be utterly dull.

Our base curriculum this year is Ambleside.  We are making the most of their Bible, history (with a tiny bit of Sonlight), literature, and readers, as well as all the other online resources we can glean. Maths, we have stuck with Horizons, this program worked so well last year. Geography, we have opted for Ann Voskamps Geography, The whole earth and the Holy Land.  So far, it's not the kind of geography we are use to, it seems more like science.  But this may change. Speaking of science, we have gone with Jenie Fulbrights Animals of  the 6th Day.  We started this last year, but decided a broader science through Sonlight may be better for the first year.  Language Arts, I am making up, using some NZ Curriculum books, Handwriting Without Tears and then my own exercise sheets.  Memory verse, we are following Ann Voskamps Jesus Project, learning 2-3 hand picked verses through each chapter of John. Art I decided to base loosely on Ambleside and some Art books we have at hand.

I love that Sonlight has given me the confidence to be able to pick and choose to form the mash-up curriculum we are doing this year. It has been so fun to be able to pull together so many flavours.  And this has given us the opportunity to add to our day if we so desire, or to focus on areas of interest.

We may be heading back to Sonlight next year, for the American History year, but we shall see how this year progresses first.