Chad Wells Family Blog

We, as a family, spent the morning putting together the booklets for the Character Class.  Today is the first class of the 4th term.  I’m giving you a brief overview of this term’s material so you can see what types of things we are covering.

1. Your two greatest abilities (availability and dependability)
2. Humility (Romans 12:3)
3. The power of choice (Joshua 24:15 – Choose you this day whom ye will serve)
a. You make right or wrong choices, but you cannot decide the outcome
b. Good choices are paid for in advance
c. Bad choices are paid for after they are experienced
4. Habits (Romans 12:21)
a. Identify evil as evil (Romans 7:13)
b. Do not compare yourself to others who have bad habits (II Cor. 10:12)
c. Find a proper replacement for your bad habit (Ps. 37:27)
d. Do not concentrate on the evil that you want to overcome, but the good replacement (Phil. 4:8)
e. Make no provision for the flesh (Romans 13:14)
5. When your STRENGTH becomes your WEAKNESS
a. Abraham – faith
b. Moses – meekness
c. David – purity
d. Solomon – wisdom
e. Elijah – courage
f. Peter – boldness
g. Your strength becomes your weakness when you take it for granted
h. Your strength becomes your weakness when you neglect it

This evening Pastor Sam went to do the Bible Study in Maiya by himself.  He was hoping to get some one-on-one time with some of the people who raised their hands for need of salvation last week.  Without the “white man” there, attendance would probably be down, which would give him that opportunity.   He was able to speak with them a little bit, and a few are still requesting prayer because they see their need of salvation.  They just aren’t quite ready to make the decision yet.

Kirsten did the RI class for the grade school.  She did the first of a series on David.  She thinks she did “o.k.” teaching in Pidgin.  She’s anxious for a time, though, when the words flow naturally from her mouth and she doesn’t have to concentrate quite so fully on the language.  Then she feels she’ll be able to do a better job on the story itself.  Maybe it will be coming soon.  The other day she accidentally said a Pigin word while having an English conversation.  It took her a second to think of the English word.

Today was a very busy day!  We had services this morning, and then walked down to the creek to have a baptism.  There were 8 people baptized.  I really tried to keep my hands out of the water, but it just became impossible to do so.  Afterwards, we walked back to the village and I took a shower and Kirsten put more medicine and bandages on.  While taking off the wet ones, however, a small frog jumped out!  One of the men told Kirsten that they used to believe that if a frog jumped into your hand or pocket or the like then that meant you were going to have a little girl!

Kirsten taught the ladies in a Sunday School class this morning.  She was a little nervous since she’s still unsure about so many words when she’s speaking Pigin.  However, I asked a few ladies this afternoon and they said that they understood most of what Kirsten said.  They said there were only a couple of times where they weren’t quite sure what she meant.  They thought she did just fine!
We all then went back to the church and had communion.  Afterwards, we went to Pastor George’s house and had a mumu.  Pastor George invited us into his home to eat with him.  It was very good.  We had mutton ribs, kau kau, bananas, taro, and greens.

As a “thank you” for preaching this meeting, the church gave me a Cockatoo.  I’ve always wanted a Cockatoo, even before we went to New Guinea the first time, but was never able to get one.  The men remembered this and gave me my desire!  It is missing it’s tail feathers (thanks to an unfortunate incident involving a stick and kau kau Friday) but is about 6 months old and very nice!  It can say “hello cocky” and it can laugh.  We have named it Dr. Jones.

After the mumu was finished we went back to the house to get our things and headed back to Takenda, where the truck was parked.  We had an uneventful drive back to Pangia.

We didn’t have morning services today because most people go to the Saturday market to socialize and to buy and sell their vegetables (they all walk to the Apenda, about an hour and 20 minutes walk).

I tried to rest a lot today.  The pain in my hands is less when I keep my hands above my heart, so I work to make sure they are above my heart as much as possible!  Kirsten has been putting on the medicine and replacing the bandages regularly.  So far, we see no sign of any infection.  Thankfully, too, most of the blisters are still intact.  We are trying to keep them that way!

I did teach a lesson for “Soldia Bilong Kraist” today.  That’s their version of Master Club or Awana.  Cash, who was a student in this group years ago, took over the youth Sunday School class for mom in 2006.  Cash, working with Pastor George and Pierce, the song leader, have recently started up Soldia Bilong Kraist again, and are doing a fantastic job!  I loved seeing the kids saying their verses that they’ve worked so hard to memorize.  They played games for awhile too.  Amber, Trevor, Derrick and Connor enjoyed being a part of this group today.

Kirsten helped a few people again in the house sick, today.  Scotty’s boil is improving already.  One big help, we think, was getting the plastic bag that he used as a bandage off of it and having him wash it.  The smell wasn’t very nice and he said he hadn’t washed it in a week!  It’s on the side of his knee, so walking is very painful.

Services tonight went well.  People seem to be responding to what’s being preached and several people have already made things right with those whom they had been “backbiting”.

No sign of infection this morning, so Kirsten put more medicine on and we re-bandaged my burns and we headed off for morning service, which started at 7:00am.  Morning services have to start early, because the women need time to make it to their gardens afterwards for the days’ food.  The second service started at 8:00am.  I struggled a bit through both of those services and Kirsten said that I paused and just stared and blinked a few times.  This afternoon I slept for most of the time.

After the first service Kirsten and Jim (a friend from way back) went to the house sick to work at getting it open properly so she could get more bandages for my hands and see what else was available.  They finally got it open (by taking a block of wood off of the door) and Kirsten started going through the medicines.  When services finished she ended up staying and working with some people.   She helped with, among some more minor things, a boil, 2 ear infections (a 2 year old boy who has been having pus come out of his ear for 6 months, and a man who has had pus and blood coming out for 6 years!), another sore (possible boil), and pain medication for a woman whose husband had beat her and possibly had a fractured arm.  She said she knew mom would have been much faster than she had been because she had to look up everything in the book “Where There Is No Doctor”.  She doesn’t know the proper dosages for medicines.  One time showed “mg” but she needed it in “ml” (because it was liquid medicine for a child), so she had to figure it all out to get the conversion right.

I preached again tonight. We praise God because a lady got saved after the service.  The meeting is going well.

I ended up counseling 6 different people, individually, before we could leave for Palipini today.  We finally got out of the house and parked the truck in Takenda.  From there we walked to Unguliapu and then on to Palipini.  It only took about 1 hour to walk.

The meeting started tonight, so I preached at 7:00pm. We got back to the house around 9:30pm and were very ready for sleep!  The kids brushed their teeth, took their candle upstairs, and started getting ready for bed (they are sleeping in Wes’ old room).

Kirsten and I had just sat down to enjoy a little sugar cane that someone had brought us when we heard Amber calling out to us.  We paused to hear what she wanted and then we heard her call again, but she sounded more frantic.  We started for the stairs and then heard the word “FIRE!”  We ran up as quickly as we could.

Today we did some fixing and maintenance.  I fixed the chainsaw and the Coleman lantern.  I also took Derrick and Connor with me and trekked to the sawmill site to do a little bit of repairs.

We are leaving tomorrow to go to Palipini for a meeting.  Kirsten spent the day preparing food for us to take.  There’s no power and no generator in Palipini so food can’t be refrigerated.  We also won’t have an oven or stove, since we’ve already brought it back to Pangia.

We have yet another addition to our creature habitat.  We now have another spider, but this one is even bigger than the others.  Each leg is about 4 inches long.  Kirsten likes looking at it, through the wire mesh, but has warned the kids that they had better not leave the top of the habitat open “or else!”

Since Pastor Sam’s in the jungle with the sawmill I preached tonight.  It was a good service and we had a good time of prayer afterwards.  We all rejoiced about the man who got saved last night.  However, we had some sad news, too.  Peter (the high school boy who cut his foot in Hagen) had to go to Port Moresby because his dad died.  Peter has only been saved for about a month and had not had an opportunity to share the gospel with his dad yet.  So, we are sure this will be very difficult for him!  Please pray for him!

Happy Birthday to Brad today!

I met with the 2 council members again today for a few hours.  Kirsten made fried rice and quartered cucumbers for the men.  They really liked it.  Neither of them had ever had fried rice before.

The ants killed the big lizard that the boys had, so we had a little science lesson and dissected it.  The kids enjoyed seeing how the eggs were forming inside and what they looked like.  Kirsten’s always looking for an opportunity for a science lesson or experiment!  Her favorite expression seems to be “Well, let’s get out a book and look it up!”  Trevor made a barometer a few months back and has enjoyed watching how the weather affects the water level.

Kirsten finished the final touches for the character booklet this morning.  Then she made up the tests for the rest of the semester.  For the folder we’re making for dad we are putting in a teacher edition of each test plus a master copy, the teacher edition of the booklet and the student version master copy (the school will make the 500+ copies that we need each time).  Since we started late we only were able to do a few tests last term, so Kirsten also made up the rest of the tests that dad will need for next year.  I know dad really enjoys the teaching and not so much the computer work so I’m glad that Kirsten is more than happy to make sure this will all be ready for him.

I dropped off the booklet at the school to be printed.  They are back in session, but it takes a few days for things to get into full swing.  Only 3 teachers were there so far, so there are only a few classes a day until everyone shows up.  They didn’t have my class today, either, and I’m not sure if they’ll be ready for Religious Instruction class tomorrow.

I went tonight to the village of Maiya tonight to do a Bible study.  Jack and Margaret have been asking me to come for several months, but I just haven’t had the time because of sleeping at the sawmill.  However, because Pastor Sam is taking over a lot of the sawmill work I’m able to spend more time on the station (home).  Pastor Sam happened to be home this evening as well (he came back to get some diesel and he needed to ask about an adjustment he wasn’t sure about) so he came, too.  I also brought 5 of the high school boys from our Sunday School class.  They were excited for the opportunity to go and considered it a training lesson.
We all piled in to Jack and Margaret’s bush house, along with the majority of the men and women from the house line (about 30-40 people – the kids were all pushed out to make room for the adults).  In Sunday School we are teaching on soul-winning and outreach.  So, I used the salvation outline from our textbook to show the boys how it could be used.  Seven people stayed after the lesson to inquire further about salvation.  Only one man, Apuka, was actually ready to accept Christ as his Savior.  Apuka is the leader of the village and him getting saved will make it much easier for some of the others to follow.  Apuka can be seen in the Haus Krai Mumu video.  He’s the man speaking to the whole group of people towards the end (we mention, on screen, that he’s speaking about the man who had died, but you can’t actually hear what he is saying). Pastor Sam, the boys, and I had a great time singing songs and fellowshipping as we came back to the house.

The men came by to do the land survey today.  They have some really old equipment, so it took all day.  They still aren’t done, so they’ll be coming back another day.  Amber made up some freshly squeezed lemonade and gave a glass to Simon, the man in charge of the survey.  He was surprised at the taste but then downed it all in one breath!  I think he was hoping for more!  The people here don’t eat lemons.  They just let them rot on the tree because they are sour.  The only benefit they see for a lemon is to help when they have a runny nose.

Kirsten and I spent several hours finishing the 2nd part of the book for the Character Class for the high school.  This is the 2nd half of the first book.  Next year dad will teach this class and will repeat this class for the new 9th graders.  We still need to make the book for the 2nd half of the 9th grade year (we started halfway through the year this year, so we won’t be using it quite yet).  We also need to make the books for the 10th graders for next year.  Kirsten and I want to get all of the work done before we leave PNG so that dad won’t have to do any of the time consuming computer work.  He’ll have everything he needs all ready and can just study and teach.

School was supposed to start today, but nobody really showed up so Kirsten didn’t have the Grade School RI class today.

School doesn’t start until tomorrow, so most of the high school kids will be walking in from their villages this afternoon.  One of the young men who got saved a few weeks ago, Kaiape (he lives about an hours walk away in a village called Unguli), brought his best friend and his little brother.  He said that he had been witnessing to them all week and when he got up to go to church this morning both of the other boys decided to come along and see what this gospel is all about.  Both came forward this morning, along with 3 other teenage girls who have been coming regularly for a couple of months.  Almost as exciting as seeing these souls saved was the reaction of Kaiape and some of the other teenagers who have been witnessing and praying for these 5!

Kirsten had 3 visitors in Junior Church this morning.  They seemed to enjoy being there.  We pray that they will come back again.