Answered prayer!

Praise the Lord!! It’s been a long time in coming, but we now have my PNG work permit and have been informed that our visas have been approved; and we should have them in hand tomorrow.

We are thankful for the many of you who have continually encouraged us during the past month and a half while we waited with bags packed.

In retrospect, His timeline now seems so much better than the one we thought we were on. God has shown us a number of reasons why we weren’t able to leave by early June as the Ukarumpa Bible translation center in Papua New Guinea (PNG) had requested. One reason is that my father will have back surgery in a week and our delayed departure means I can be with him during and after the operation. We also had issues with our cars and our home in SC that needed extra time to attend to. We’re sure that the network technician at Ukarumpa who has been covering everything during our delayed arrival is equally learning to trust God more.

Should we be surprised that God knows our every need? God has faithfully provided the financial support we expect to need to join the Bible translation effort in the highlands of PNG. Every dollar for travel expense was provided solely through the Holy Spirit’s prompting upon His people and not through any request voiced by us.

With visas on the way, we now need prayer for help in deciding exactly when to leave and which of several routes to take.

We couldn’t get tickets earlier without our visas in hand. We are now looking for a reasonable itinerary probably leaving around July 29th.

We are so excited to be ready to leave for PNG. All the time spent preparing is only “the end of the beginning”; and we know that many experiences and lessons lay ahead of us, along with many more opportunities to trust our trustworthy God.

We hope you will stay involved in all of this by once again using the blog that I kept on my trip to Nairobi, Kenya. We’ll try to post an entry every day or so in the beginning, then eventually post updates at least once a week. We hope to give you a glimpse of what “the ends of the earth” look like through our eyes. We hope to share in ways that enable you to pray more effectively for all missionaries who have left their own culture for the sake of the Gospel.

We so appreciate your part in our ministry. We feel so cared for…In a very real way as you pray, you will be there with us.

Serving Him together,
Jon and Julie