SOVEREIGN GRACE BAPTIST MISSION
International – Papua New Guinea / Malawi Africa
P.O. Box 60150 Ndirande Bt. 6 Blantyre Malawi /
P.O. Box 233 – Mt Hagen (WHP) Papua New Guinea
Tanggi Mission Station – North Koroba, Hela Province, PNG
Missionary / Evangelist: Peter A. Halliman
Email: panagioite04@gmail.com / Website: sgbm-malawi-africa.com
Date: 15 June 2020
Dear Pastor, Church, Supporters;
Mission Report continued from Part Five (5)… Part Six (6)
24 April 2020 — Day Five (Friday)
Luke 15:8–9 — Either what woman having ten pieces of silver, if she lose one piece, doth not light a candle, and sweep the house, and seek diligently till she find it? And when she hath found it, she calleth her friends and her neighbours together, saying, Rejoice with me; for I have found the piece which I had lost.
The morning came early enough. With a full day ahead, I was busy preparing — morning coffee, early morning meetings with men, preachers, etc. The programme was set in order. A nearby river that flowed from off the mountains provided not only safe, clean drinking water, but also water to be fetched for bathing. Even though I take a bucket bath I still like my water semi-hot.
The sounding of the trumpet was sounded and soon people were coming in from different directions and had assembled under a large tarp that had been carried by four men through the jungles from a nearby mining site — two days’ hike.
Time was 09:00 hrs. I brought the Conference to a start, prayer was made, and the singing began. If you could ask the valley which lay between the three mountains, and ask the river, what they heard that morning, you would get a reply — a group of near one hundred and fifty people lifted up their voices and sang “How Great Thou Art.”
Tears filled my eyes as I mused over what I was experiencing. In the middle of these jungles of Papua New Guinea, in the Hela Province, somewhere in the South Pacific — a lost and forgotten people, a land, a small group unknown by the rest of the busy world, singing and lifting up their voices unashamed — the valley resonated with their voices. INDEED HOW GREAT GOD IS! What a Saviour we have.
The song service continued, but I cannot tell you what other songs they sang that morning as I was musing over the hymn “How Great Thou Art” and gazing out to the distant mountains in front of me as I sat on a bush-made bench. A mountain river creviced between these giant mountains, the bush and people undisturbed by outside influence — I wondered how long, how many years, how many generations had passed this way before, and the Gospel had not reached here until now. GOD ordains the place, people, time, messenger, and message.
The Bible Conference started off with a message on “GOD called a man, his name was John.” It went from there: several messages were preached bearing out Baptist History, the Church that Jesus built, John’s Baptism, Salvation by Grace, and so on. The day was far spent, and with no lunch break, we resigned the preaching mid-afternoon to give the people opportunity to prepare and cook the food for the day.
Being a new area and new group of people, this was the first kind of preaching they had heard. The men requested an opportunity to sit and discuss biblical questions they had regarding the messages they had heard that day.
The afternoon meal was prepared as usual. There are no catering services, no restaurants, no take-away, no call-in service, no stove-top ovens or gas stoves, no refrigerators. This is not the place for lazy people, and if you don’t know how to survive in this country and climate, the ending of the story will be far different from what you are reading.
Firewood has to be split up and prepared, the fires lit, the earthen oven prepared, and food buried in it covered with fern and banana leaves. Whilst the food was cooking, I spent time with a group of fifteen men, and one by one their questions were asked.
One in particular that was of interest to me was: “What took you so long to get here?” Coming from a people where time seems to stand still, I was humoured by the idea. I simply gave my answer: “God is never early, nor late, but right on time!”
I believe the men would have stayed all evening talking and asking questions, but the day had been full, I was tired, and nightfall was upon us. Our meal was ready and soon I had finished my meal and bathed for the evening.
That night, as I retired to my sleeping quarters, I could hear in the distant valley two different houses — one the men’s house, secondly, the women’s house — and there was singing. It was as though I had been summoned to a theatre and someone had purposed and planned the two groups to sing in tandem. The men’s house was singing “What a Friend We Have in Jesus” and the women’s house could be heard singing “In the Sweet By and By.”
Soon sleep overtook me, and I woke whilst still dark. Coffee was prepared on the fires and soon the surrounding houses could be heard with voices and talking.
Life here is still that of interaction, talking, discussing, storytelling. There are no artificial instruments of entertainment where people are amused here. It is just pure, simple life — as probably many of the older folks reading this will remember in their day.
I managed to get a couple hours of study before preparations for the day were underway. I try to follow a timetable — even though here it doesn’t mean much. Everything takes time and work in this life, and without proper organisation and discipline it is not long until everything is amiss.
Starting of a New Day — 25 April 2020 (Saturday) — Day Six
Folks were assembled and the Bible Conference was again underway. I try to meet with the pastors prior to the people congregating in order to have a time of prayer. I appoint certain men to pray, included but kept to a small number — as most of the men here, when asked to pray, one would think they are trying to catch up on their prayer life! However, being the people whom they are, with the culture, the interactions, discussions, etc., there isn’t a time that they don’t pray lengthy prayers, so we just get on with it.
To be continued…
In His Name,
Missionary Peter Halliman