Dear Friends,

      Back to PNG…

It will be just under two years since we left PNG, and now we are planning to return to Mt Hagen in September! This time, as programme manager for MAF in PNG, leading the team of 30 expat missionary families and 120 national staff. We are looking forward to the challenge of the role and the privilege of serving the people of PNG. There are many different demands and pressures, and we ask you to pray that we are constantly mindful of our need for God’s strength and wisdom in all we do.

There are many preparations to make before we leave in two months time – packing up and renting the house, especially now we seem to have so much more stuff!

      Introducing Matthew…

I just got my birth certificate today, so I am officially here. I have been in Cairns for six weeks now, and everyone says I am growing well and look cute, but I am getting a little bored of the menu at this hotel – always the same milk! Mummy is a little exasperated because sometimes I am just not interested. I am looking forward to lots of new food and a new place to stay in PNG.

      Elizabeth writes…

I like Koala Kids club where I wear pink high heeled shoes. I go to daycare two days a week and play with my friends in the sandpit. This term I started going to gymnastics with Daddy. We do forward rolls, balance beams, somersaults and bouncing on the big trampoline! When Grandma came to visit, we went to the zoo – I chased a cheetah!

I like having Matthew and share my chair with him as we watch Playschool and Dora the Explorer together on Daddy’s computer. Last month I had my second birthday and I had a pink cake and my favourite present was a huge duplo train track.

Last week, Mummy and Matthew and I all got baptised together! Rev Trev baptised us at the Good Shepherd Church that we go to in Cairns, and Grandma read a special prayer to dedicate Matthew to God and for all of us to follow Jesus.

I was only five months old when I left PNG and I am a bit worried about missing all my friends here in Cairns, and all the fun things to do, so please pray I make lots of new friends in PNG.

      Prayer…

At a recent service at church, the Bishop was visiting and quoted this old prayer in his sermon, which we found very moving as we knew we were returning to PNG:

Christ, whose insistent call disturbs our settled lives, give us discernment to hear your word, grace to relinquish our tasks, and courage to follow empty handed wherever you may lead, so that the voice of your gospel may reach to the ends of the earth.