All Scripture is Inspired by God…

 

Home Again!

Thank you for praying us back to PNG! Tomorrow, we will finally see our Madang “home” and do a few days of supply buying before taking the trek back into the little village we call “home.”

We just finished two weeks of meetings in Southeast Asia and our hearts were so encouraged by the preaching, the global vision that was casted, and by the friendships with others who are doing hard things for the gospel and the task of discipleship all over this globe.  Thankful for an opportunity to catch up with some old friendships from one of our sending churches and mutually encourage one another while we were there.  And, thankful for new friendships with both national and ex-pat missionaries from Africa, Mexico, India, South America, Europe, Asia and Pakistan.  SO humbled to be on the same team with all these men and women of whom the world is not worthy.  And yet, they wander like sojourners and work – looking for a city with eternal foundations whose designer and builder is God.  This Thanksgiving, we are thankful for global workers who are still busy about the Great Commission!  And, thankful for YOU who are part of that global team and keep us serving here through your love, prayers, and support.

THANK YOU!

The next upcoming task for us and our HUGE NEED FOR PRAYER is our visit to Itutang and the Bible Teachers Conference.  There will be 8 Inapang churches and 1 Tangguat church represented.  Guys, we need your prayer.  We are just not enough to know how to even prepare for the needs that are surely there.  We will be spending a lot of time  listening and hearing what the Lord has done in the last few months since we saw them last.  We need God’s wisdom as we love on these guys, encourage them and exhort them to keep letting God transform their lives through His Word and to evaluate every aspect of their life through His lens. So thankful for all of you who support us – you have contributed to this printing of the checked NT translation portions and we can’t WAIT to get it into their hands!

SATAN is at work as well.  Not long after we set the month for the Bible Conference, we heard that the Cargo Cult movement in our area is building a meeting house in the next village to do a conference of their own.  Coincidence?  I don’t think so.  The news of this has been spread all the way up to the other end of the Ramu Valley and is concerning to our church leaders.  BUT, we all know that this is also part of the winnowing process that we have all been praying for.  So, we rejoice for some conflict that will help us and our Inapang brothers and sisters learn to trust in the Lord in deeper ways. The leadership is welcoming a little conflict and one of our elders told us (tongue and cheek) during our last visit that when the church gets old and begins to fall down, that they wouldn’t rebuild it.  He said that they were just going to meet house to house so the ones who were sitting in the back just being “socially comfortable” would stop coming and fooling themselves into thinking that they have a relationship that they clearly don’t have.  Hmmm….not exactly a strategy that is often heard stateside.  Again, we are thankful for men who are concerned about the purity of the church.  Please pray for the Inapang Bible teachers.

The Conference will be in December and in all of this we need wisdom to help and encourage and point to Christ with every word and every action.  Pray for the teachers as they review the gospel, their roles as leaders, fathers, and husbands.  Pray for boldness and a spirit of prayer and unity.  Pray that we will let the WORD transform us for we know that God desires for our beliefs to be turned into behavior as we grow in holiness. (2Tim 3:16-17)

WE.NEED.YOUR.PRAYERS. Please, in this advent season, remember us, your brothers and sisters and the 9 churches who will be meeting together.  Pray that CHRIST WILL BE GLORIFIED for HE IS WORTHY!

By God’s Grace and For His Glory~

The Housleys