Gary and Esther Smith tribal church planting 
Our corworkers (the Schlegels) are currently out of the country on medical. So far it’s nothing serious, just needed to get some testing done. Yesterday I wrote them some quick points on what was going on here and it occured to me later that perhaps others would enjoy reading this. So here you go…
1. The Bible Teachers (BT’s) have taken it upon themselves to meet on Saturday mornings to discuss church business. They say they need time themselves to talk through things and weigh things, then for things they aren’t sure on they would bring them to our Monday meetings. How cool is that?
2. Another language group is still knocking on the door and really wanting us to come. Felix said that he would be willing to move there and work alongside a missionary family as coworkers! Everyone was really excited about this and said they would support this. This is obviously way down the road, but just exciting to see the guys opening themselves up to God using them in the Great commission! A few days after this, a guy who I met at MTC back in 2009 wrote me and asked if I had any allocation ideas for him as his family wants to come to the Madang Region and work with us! So I told him about this idea and he is praying about it. WOW!
3. Village M – all the guys decided it’s time to stop messing around. They are going to do a community service day in village M to build the literacy house. So we will speak to the church about this and set a Monday for as many as possible to go to village M and do this together with our sister church in village T! Another WOW!
4. Both T and S (sorry I’m not allowed to put village names on our blog) are going to (hold on to your hat for this one) tear down the old church buildings!!!!! They so for too long we’ve been sitting scattered around and after seeing how other churches meet they feel it’s time to build a similar structure!!! Another WOW! We need to discuss this further as we wonder if it might be wise to wait until after teaching in village M since an act like this may just drive a bigger wedge.
5. More people in T and S are ready to get baptized. (Sorry I can’t remember the names of people in T, but here it’s Wamane and wife and someone else, I forget now. Pray for this, b/c Erike and Jimingke are discouraging them big time from doing this.
6. Concerning the withholding of charging their batteries until the find the theif who stole from us. We asked the BT’s about what they thought and they were unusally quiet and only said, “It’s up to you guys.” So when we told them that we were thinking that we’ve handled it incorrectly and read Luke 6:30 they were extremely happy and said it was right to lift the ban. So we have done that. The good part about this is that it has made the talk about it come up again pretty big. They seemed to really appreciate seeing us respond to God’s word this way.
7. In church this Sunday Jinongke got up after the teaching and confessed his sin of gossiping and asked for forgiveness. Also about church there was probably about 20 people already there waiting for us! Another Sunday thing is that they changed the prayer time. Whoever has a prayer request then will actually say a prayer during prayer time. This is working well and last week a woman actually prayed! (Epepe)
8. There seems to be a different spirit among the BT’s especially since the Citizen Teacher Training Seminar (CTTS). They seem more committed and excited about serving.
9. I am going to another tribe with Nathan on Thursday for the weekend to help another missionary do a comprehension check on his lessons. The BT’s were very happy about this as they have developed a real heart for this place since having Ambox here and being with him at the CTTS. Jaspa even brought it up as a prayer point this Sunday b/f he knew about me going. Also they are concerned about and praying for Manam.
10. The day after I returned there was a community bung led by the elementary workshop people with Boomy and Rafael. They did a big talk about how to raise children! Lots of it was really good, like scheduling, and helping kids to succeed in their God given talents. But one thing was a little off. They said you should never spank your children. The heart of it was good because abuse and disrespect is rampant in this country, but still not consistent with Scripture about how to discipline children so we had a long talk about it with the BT’s yesterday and it was great! It’s nice to be finally teaching them these kind of practical things.
Ok, that’s enough for now. That’s some big stuff going on! God is moving. And it’s encouraging how people are responding, for the most part. I mean there is still those on the periphery. Sorry this is so long, but I figured this stuff would encourage you as you sit there waiting on reports.
Love you guys!
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Gary & Esther Smith
NTM – Private Mailbag
Madang Province, M.P. 511
PAPUA NEW GUINEA
web: www.ntm.org/gary_smith
). A church in the States donated the funds for us to be able to purchase a satellite dish and other hardware necessary to connect to the internet. 
Along this church planting road, there are many crossroads, where the basis of what you believe concerning certain Biblical doctrine will determine the grid through which you filter all the rest of the teaching. For example, if after hearing the teaching on the Garden of Eden, you didn’t believe that everything truly was perfect before sin, and you believed that death existed before sin did, then death (physical and eternal) as punishment for sin does not seem like a punishment for sin as much as merely a part of life. It would be impossible to understand the gravity of sin in contrast to a righteous and Holy God, and therefore even cancel out a true need for a Saviour. 
