CALLED to Papua New Guinea

My awesome Dad Growing up, my father always enchanted our imaginations with  stories of his adventures - throwing bulls and breaking brumbies in the Northern Territory, fighting off robbers in Peru, sailing through terrible storms, and the like. With the recent publication of our article in Samaritan's Purse "On Call" magazine, my father shared with me a story I'd never heard. In 1990, just two years after my father committed his life to Jesus,  his church group helped coordinate a massive revival assembly for Franklin Graham's crusade . The event took place in my hometown, Lexington Virginia, in the basketball stadium of the Virginia Military Institute. Many years later, the same facility hosted both my high school graduation, and four years later, my graduation from VMI.  The DeMoss outline of Franklin Graham Festivals As my father recounted each detail of the event, my heart and mind swirled with lost memories...feint glimpses of a special out...

About a month ago I wrote a post about my 4th to 6th grade students at the MK Elementary School. For the past few weeks, I have had the privilege of working with the 1st-3rd grade students as well. Their teacher, Judy Ralph, went on home assignment, and so I get to finish out the school year with a range of ages and grades. I have really enjoyed working with the younger kiddos and hope you can catch a glimpse of their wonderful personalities through this post. Ethan Goossens Ethan is seven years old and is finishing up first grade. When asked where he was born, he answered, “America.” (You can tell he has been in PNG for a while) : ) He has been living in Papua New Guinea with his family for four years now. Ethan’s favorite subject in school is “Activity Time,” which is a block of the video class where the students learn about Health, Safety, and occasionally do art projects. When he grows up, Ethan said he would like to be a “policeman.” His favorite parts of l...

Exciting news! Please select the following links to find an article about Rachel and me that has been published in the Spring issue of World Medical Mission's "On Call" Magazine. God is good! Full Spring edition of the WMM "On Call" magazine Just our Article For we are God's workmanship,  created in Christ Jesus to do good works,  which God prepared in advance for us to do.  (Ephesians 2:10)

Dear Family and Friends, Warmest greetings from sunny PNG. I'd like to say the "rainy season" has ended, which leaves us with more sunny hours to enjoy every day. We still have plenty of rain - an afternoon thunderstorm most days, and the drone of tropical rain on our tin roof most nights (which we love falling asleep to). The gardens (flowers, veggies, and MANY weeds) are happily overgrowing their designed boundaries, but I don't mind - it's an excuse to spend more time with my hands in the dirt. I've been back on A Ward for the last couple weeks, and really enjoyed seeing the admitted kiddos every day. Their parents are always so grateful, and if I'm not getting smiles on the first go round, usually the kids are also excited to say hi by the second or third day I see them. The stickers, tickles, selfies, and goofy faces probably help. Actually, I think I've made a name for myself here just with stickers alone... “Kid with a sticker? Yup - he...

As some of you may know, Teddy and I will be celebrating our TEN YEAR Wedding Anniversary in the end of May. Since we were both off of work on Good Friday for Easter Weekend, we thought it would be a great time to celebrate early and get-away for a couple of days! We were prepared with extra snacks, a picnic lunch, and comfy hiking clothes…so we set off to Rondon Ridge Mountain Lodge…located high up in the mountains just south of Mt. Hagen. The elevation was approximately 6,500 feet, and Teddy enjoyed driving the Land Cruiser up and around our winding mountain path. We arrived and were pleasantly surprised that we were the only guests there! We had the whole place to ourselves and it was wonderful! Teddy navigating us up the mountainside We made it to the top! We spent some time exploring all the tribal artifacts on display in the main building…some of which were for sale…but cost A LOT…so we took pictures of them instead. : ) After getting settled in our room, where so...