Team Allocation

So much has happened in these last two months, it is hard to know what to say in this update. On July 13th, after months of planning, preparing and waiting, our team moved into Lembena! The men had flown in two weeks earlier to frame up our house and get it as close to move in ready as they could before the families moved in. It was an exciting day and Lembena People from all around our community came to welcome the wives and children to their new home. They lined the path from the airstrip to the houses with colorful bushes and spread flower petals along the path for us to walk on. They covered our houses in flowers and colorful leaves to make it more beautiful for the ladies. A group of Lembena ladies, dressed in traditional clothing with painted faces, banged on drums and tambourines as they sang to welcome the plane full of wives and children.

It was awesome to see the community so excited to have us there! They placed a flower necklace over each of our necks and crowded around us as we walked down the trail to our new home. We all gathered in a large clearing between the three newly built missionary houses as the community leaders stood up and each gave a speech. Most of what they said was lost on us as they spoke mainly in their own language but those who spoke in Tok Pisin spoke about how good it was that we were there and how they would look out for us and help us, and that this work we are doing is for them and therefore it is their work as well. Praise God for the excitement they have and for the openness to this message we are going to bring!

First Impressions

Since the families moved in, our focus has been working on the houses, which has included putting up plywood walls, painting, setting up cabinets and counters, wiring our electrical system, setting up our water system, building the deck, putting up our metal siding, and many more things. When we can (which is more often for Laura and Addy) we spend time outside getting to know the people and exploring our new home. We have had many meals and conversations with the people and they are more than willing to teach us Lembena words and phrases (most of which are much too long for us to comprehend and learn at this point.) Addy is getting more and more comfortable in Lembena and would spend all day chasing chickens and baby pigs if we let her!

Our team was able to provide the food for a community “thank you” gathering, in which we thanked all of the people who helped us with our houses, whether by milling, carrying lumber, framing, or watching over the houses before we moved in. People came from many other Lembena villages to attend the gathering, and there were at least 350 people there in total. It was a good time for us to say thank you as well as remind them of the reasons that we’ve moved to Lembena. We are there to learn their language, teach them to read and write in their language, translate “God’s Talk” into their language and teach them God’s Talk in their language. We reminded them that this is why we left our homes, that this message is very important and that we want them to understand it clearly in their own language.

Big NEWS!

Some of you may have heard by now, but we are expecting baby #2 at the end of December! We are so excited and thankful to be adding a BOY to our family! Addy can’t wait to be a big sister!

What are our delivery plans? Well, with our organization’s policy on not delivering in-country, we plan on delivering back in Washington State and are hoping to head stateside early November for our “baby home assignment” which will last 4-5ish months, depending on how long it takes to get paperwork and baby’s passport processed. We are so excited for the opportunity we’ll have to spend time with our family, friends and church while we’re home.

As of now, we are in need of a place to stay for our time in Washington (November-March) so if you have any leads on an affordable 2-bedroom (preferably) house or apartment in the Sumner/Bonney Lake/Puyallup area, we would love to hear from you! Please be praying with us that something would become available. We just learned of a car that will be available for us to use for our time home, which is a huge praise!

The Next Two Months

At the end of August, our team has language consultants flying into Lembena to lead our team in our TCLA (tribal culture and language acquisition) kickoff! This will be when we transition from working on our houses and being out with the people learning language informally, to officially beginning to learn the Lembena language and culture full time. This will include meeting regularly with language helpers, observing culture events, recording words and phrases, transcribing our recordings phonetically, and studying what we’ve learned. This is what our next two months will look like in Lembena until we leave for our baby home assignment in November. We will then resume language learning when we return from our home assignment.

Our first month in the bush, we had no way of consistently communicating with people outside of Lembena as our email wasn’t set up and we don’t have internet or consistent cell service out there, but Lord willing, our email should be up and running when we get back in there Thursday! So if you are wanting to communicate with us, you can email micah_myers@ntm.org and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.

Ways to Pray for us &
Praise God with us

• Pray that we will be able to spend our last week and a half before our CLA kickoff getting our house to a point where we can function well as we get into language learning.
• Praise for the money raised for a lawn mower to help cut our airstrip! Thank you to all those who gave towards this!
• Pray that our plans to travel to Washington in November won’t be affected by COVID (cancelled/postponed tickets, unexpected quarantines, etc) as routes are closing and it’s getting harder and harder to travel.
• Pray that the Lord would provide a place to us to stay while we’re home.
• Praise for a healthy growing baby!

In Him Alone,
Micah, Laura and Adalia