Sunday, May 27, 2018

Today is church and rest day.    We split up into four groups for church.  The ones who went to the bush church last Sunday are staying on station and helping with pikinini (chidren’s church).  There are supposed to be about 100 kids there. It started at 8:30.  The rest of us (12) went to 3 different bush churches.  Two groups left at 9 a.m.  The third at 9:30.   Steph, Andy, Jerry, and Barbara went with Tim to a church where Steph was originally asked to be prepared to give her testimony.  When they arrived she found out she was not only to give her testimony but to preach.  Cheryl, Jeff, Brookelyn, and Byron went with missionaries Jordan and Rachel to a bush church where they had to sit on the floor.  Sam & I, along with Clarence & Wonda went with Dr. Sheryl to the Kudjip village church, a mile or so behind the station to the Kopsip church. Now we know why there is so much foot traffic on the road between the main road and the hospital.  Most of them are going on up to the village.  We could only drive about 5 mph or less because of the massive holes in the dirt road.  It was a very friendly church with lots of singing  and a good sermon preached by the NYI leader.  We had chairs!   They also apparently took the Thanksgiving offering in all the churches today.  This offering goes to the general Kudjip church to provide for its expenses and other things the district leadership needs to run to church.  When we left we were given lots of fruit.  When we returned to the Barnabas house we found that children’s church was over at 9:30.   As each of the bush church groups returned they were all loaded with fruit and vegetables.  We have lots of pineapples, sugar fruit, tangerines, papaya, bananas, cucumbers, carrots, and tomatoes.     Lunch today is chicken spaghetti which was prepped and prepared last night and this morning.  Cooking it didn’t take long because the oven stayed on as it is supposed to.   The afternoon formal activity is a station wide softball game.  Some went to the field to play, some stayed and napped and others just rested or took a walk around station.  A nice restful afternoon.   Tonight after supper Brookelyn led devotions and then a fire was started in the fire pit.  Some of the first year nursing students joined us as Hadyn and Sadie had gotten to know them at the hospital.  Tim said that as far as he knows this has never happened before.  The two girls had visited the students in their dorm this afternoon.  So we all gathered around the fire and introduced these PNG girls to marshmallows and roasting them.  Some of them had seen a marshmallow roast on a movie but didn’t know what they were.  Not all of them liked them but a few really did.  I think there were about 9 or 10 girls who joined us.   One of the questions asked was if we roasted marshmallows every night at home.   It’s now 10 p.m. and everybody but Sam & I are in bed  Early to bed……early to rise.  Good night!