PNG Milne Bay Day 9: "Matthew & Mayhem!"

We're here with our teammate from New Zealand, Matthew, whom all our PNG staff and students love.  This is his last day here with the team, as he travels back to Auckland tomorrow...and what a last day!

In the morning we split into two teams to cover two different primary schools.  The goal: to read through a children's tract explaining the gospel to assemblies of students, then pass out the Jesus Film DVDs.  Dan and I went with one group,  Matthew went with the other.

Our group went pretty much as planned, except that instead of talking with an assembly, we went into 4 classrooms.  Since there was 8 of us, that meant 2 of us went to each classroom.  We had a delightful time...the children were excited to have us there.
 
Matthew's group was another story...nothing went to plan.  They thought they were speaking to one assembly, then the next hour, another assembly.  Upon arrival, because of miscommunication between the upper and lower primary schools, no one was expecting them right then.  Matthew's group waited 2 hours...then ministry mayhem (or in Matthew's case, "heaven") broke loose.  The principal wanted our team to speak to ALL the classrooms...and it's a huge school.  Bottom line:  the team, divided up, spoke to 4 classrooms at a time.  They ran from one classroom to another, with Matthew acting as a go-between (introducing teams and passing out supplies).  By the end of the morning, they had spoken in 16 classrooms and one of assembly.  (The assembly was 400 of the youngest kids.)  Because of God working through Matthew's group, 1000 kids heard the gospel.  (They thought they would speak to only 300.) 

Matthew's talk on God's "call."

In the afternoon, Matthew gave a talk to our whole project team on "finding God's call."  By the end of the day, two of our PNG students came up to Matthew and told him they felt God wanted them to become full-time missionaries. One  of those students was so excited that she couldn't eat dinner or stop smiling!

Elton (Staff) taking notes

   What a way for Matthew to end his time here!