Dear Pastors and Friends,

Thank you for praying for us here in Papua New Guinea!

Wipim Baptist Church

In the Month of May our theme was “Increase Our Faith”, and we invited Pastor Daniel Kinaul and his wife + son to be with us from Daru Baptist Church. The Kinauls, you may remember, have a son who was stricken with Cerebral Malaria last year and it almost killed him. As a result it had been a “trying” year for them and they had plenty to teach. Our people responded well and we continued the theme into June.

We are now half way through the month of July and our theme for this month has been “Into All the World.” I will be teaching all through the month on Missions - Praying, Giving, Going with the Gospel. It is exciting for me to watch our people grab the concepts and recognize in themselves a lack of concern for the eternal condition of others. I can see the struggle that many of our people are having. They want to be soul-winners but taking that first step is difficult for most. We started an Evangelism course in June and it will continue for another 3 weeks. Two of our men have already won their first souls to Christ since the beginning of the course.

Wipim Developments

Wipim is supposed to be our new district headquarters. For the past three years we have been on the ground level of this transformation. In our town we have a Health Center with about eight staff, the District Treasury office with four staff, an Elementary school with about seven staff and our Local Level Government (LLG) with about four staff. There are no stores in Wipim where you can buy food stuff so most people still fly their groceries in from Daru. We do it every couple of months. From time to time we do get fresh meat to balance that which we would buy from the stores in Daru or the Capital city. (When we come home on furlough we hope to take a short course in butchery because quartering up a deer, pig or cassowary is more challenging than you think!) There is one phone that can call to Daru but that is about it most of the time, and we have a place where we have access to satellite based internet supplied by the folks who set up our town’s power system (Isn’t that wild?). Since we moved here three years ago, the government has built ten houses for their staff with ten more almost complete and another ten just about to begin construction. We are looking forward to having more fish in our sea to fish for!

“R.I.” Class

One of the highlights of my week is on Monday afternoons. The School gives churches the opportunity to have an hour of Religious Instruction for the students. The classes are broken up by denominations, and I have about 20 students in my “R.I.” class. They are all students who attend our Sunday school program. These students were just with my wife the day before, and she is teaching through the Bible using the A-Beka flashcards. Therefore, I use my time to teach Christian character. For the past several weeks, we have been memorizing Psalm 145:1-10 and many of the students this week were able to stand and quote all ten verses. They are really catching on to memorizing scripture, and we are seeing the fruits of hiding His Word in their hearts.

Please know that we love you and appreciate your burden for these in the uttermost!

Jason and Ana Russell

School Starting

Well after much work this winter we will start Wipim Baptist Bible School on February 11th. We have 5 students enrolled for our first year and several more applications in process.

Pray for these students as they learn the Bible, Biblical convictions and put practical application to what they learn in school.

Everything is going well in Wipim. There are the normal problems with power here, we would do better to give the power to the "private sector" as it would be run more efficiently.

Ana and the kids are doing well, little David is growing and we are looking forward to God doing great things this year....

Well until next time....Yawo (goodbye).

Preparing for Bible School

Currently, Jason is very busy preparing to open the first year of the Wipim Baptist Bible School. It has been our desire to see people saved and trained to take the gospel to their own villages.

You cannot walk into any village and say, "Here I am. Here's a gospel tract. 1-2-3, Pray after me!" Someone from that village has to invite you to present your message to that community. There are village rules, village elders, village court, etc. We are outsiders, and our motives and actions are often misjudged.

From Ana: About Wipim

We live in Wipim Station in the Western Province of Papua New Guinea. Wipim is a small inland community made up of mainly government workers. There is an elementary school, a health center, and a newly arrived treasury office. That is it. There aren't any stores, no post office, no police station, no telephones, no transportation services, etc. It is a difficult picture to paint for those who have never been here. The closest place to "civilization" as you would understand is Daru Island which is about 60 miles away via airplane. However, the main airline company that serviced our small community has stopped all flights to our area. Because we are missionaries, we are usually able to book flights with Mission Aviation Fellowship to travel to Daru where we can buy supplies or else catch a larger airplane to the capital city. Otherwise, Jason travels by dirt (or mud) road to a river where he pays a dinghy to then take him to Daru. Our only personal mode of transportation is on our tractor which takes him four hours to the river if the road is dry. Six months out of the year the road is nearly impassable because of the rain and mud so we try to bring in as many supplies as we will need during the dry season. Sometimes he is able to catch a ride on a government vehicle which then only takes one and a half hours to the river if all goes well. From the river to Daru via dinghy is another two or three hours depending on the size of the boat engine.

And there was communication!

Well we are pleased to annouce that for now...we have broadband internet in Wipim, PNG.

Yes, Broadband Internet. We can check e-mails on a daily basis and even check our blog page to update now.

To e-mail us in Wipim we have to use a web based e-mail program so we have set up jrussell.wipim@yahoo.com to contact us through.

We are rejoicing that God has allowed us contact to the out side world.

Work Day!

Hey, I am using internet in Wipim and it is Broadband! The technicin is a friend of mine who has come to finally hook up that Satelite Dish but (I think) just to prove that it can be done.

Anyway he is letting me try it out tonight and he will take the modem back with him. The company wants me to build a simple office for them... I might be willing to do it if they can get some communication in here!

We had a church work day the first Saturday of October when we hung the church sign board on the church building. On that day we also planted a power pole for the church. We should have power sometime within the next two months in preparation for Bible School.

Well I get more later! Bye from Wipim, PNG.

Jason Russell

In and out of The Bush

Well I couldn't imagine that the last time I posted was July 24Th, time passes so quickly.

In the process I forgot my password to my blogger account.

Well it is the beginning of October and I needed to come out because once again the tractor proves to be a challenge, early I had faxed an order into Lighthouse via Daru and Pastor Daniel.

Parts were DHL shipped to me for a leak I had in the axle and also I needed to take Libby into Port Moresby with me so we can have her fitted for a retainer.

After I received the parts in a little under a week, I flew back into the bush (the roads are just impassable after the recent winter here.) and went to install the parts only to find that I blew a wheel bearing.

So back out I flew and to my amazement they had the part in Port Moresby, even more amazing is that Pastor Tao was able to pick it up, put it on a plane and I had the part in Daru that same day.

I should be back out November 14th or so as Libby will go in to have her retainer put in, so we need to fly into Port Moresby.

Until then here are a few pictures......





Joy and Titus



Wipim Baptist Church