Thursday, October 15, 2020

Move complete... Moving forward!

Greetings from Papua New Guinea! We thought it would be a good time to check in and catch you up to date on the latest with the Mibu Ministry!

If you recall from our last update we were getting ready to move again. That move is now complete, and we're mostly settled in to our new place for the next 7 months. We're so thankful to be here, if even for just a short period. Since we moved into a place that already is furnished, we decided it was a good time to simplify our lives a bit and sell off a bunch of our furniture so we don't have to store and deal with quite so much when we come home on furlough this next year. We also packed up quite a bit of our own personal belongings (the ones we aren't selling yet) as if we're going on furlough now, so that we don't have to do it again later when we do get ready to go.
School was originally slated to start up again in September here, but due to all the cancelled flights because of covid, the school staff just hasn't been able to get back. So the next date they're going to try to start is in Jan some time. Till then Shannon continues to homeschool all four kids, and has even volunteered to help a local neighbor with one of their kids who is in Abby's grade. So five kids altogether! Shannon is a rockstar, people! The kids' school is all laid out on a computer program that they follow. Definitely different than what they're used to!
Speaking of school. Next year when we're home, we're planning on putting at least one of the kids in a Christian school (hoping we can get in at Valley Christian). Arizona has a wonderful tax credit program called ACSTO where families can get a tax credit (not a deduction, but full tax credit) for giving toward a child's education in a private school. We'll be putting some more information out as the time gets nearer, but we'd appreciate anyone willing to consider giving toward this next year of education for our oldest at Valley.

And speaking of coming home, Shannon and I have been enjoying getting a head start on shopping for a house for our time home, and have even found ourselves fascinated by the world of real estate investing. We've been learning a lot in our evenings particularly in the realm of creative financing and rentals since we'd like to be able to rent this place out as an investment when we're away.
Other than about a month long interruption for moving, the translation project continues along nicely. I've managed to draft up to ch 20 in Revelation! Getting so so close to the finish of that book! I should be working with my translation helper at this point, but all our communication with Mibu has been cut off because of an issue with the power out there. We've been unable to get out there to fix it yet, so it's been about a month without much communication at all. The latest has us hoping that either Chris or myself can get out there in November to fix that and get the system up and running again. It just highlights again how many cogs in the machine all have to be working in order to get our work done! So while I can't work with my translation helper at the moment, I continue to draft ahead. I hope to maybe finish drafting the book before I work with him again, maybe toward the end of the year.

The little bit of communication we have had has been all positive reports of how the church is doing. We've heard some little tidbits that sound like there may be some rising persecution in a couple of the outreach areas, but we haven't been able to determine for sure. But overall the church remains strong, people continue to meet and encourage one another in the Lord and to move forward in hope! This is such good news to us to hear even just little tidbits from leaders who remain encouraged in their service! Yes!

Thank you all for your continued prayers and regular monthly support! Your partnership means so much to us! We're so humbled to have you all a part of the team! For those who may not have had an opportunity yet, you can follow this link which will give several tax deductible options for how to give. https://ethnos360.org/missionaries/geoffrey-and-shannon-husa