Through Jesus Film, 16 Surrender Their Lives to Christ Easter Weekend

Easter, a time when we celebrate what our Savior did for us. A time when we look and try to understand the horrors of the cross and see the great love Jesus has for each one of us. A love that took Him to the cross and kept Him there. It is also a time to look at the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and to realize that because of His resurrection we too can have power over hell and the grave, because He lives! It was with these thoughts and the knowledge that many still need to hear and know Jesus, which prompted Dr. Susan, Director of Medical Services for Kudjip Nazarene Hospital in PNG, to request and organize the showing of the Jesus Film in the hospital over the Easter weekend. Easter is about the hope that only Jesus can give and many patients at the hospital need to know that hope. Thousands of people are in-patients throughout the year at Nazarene Hospital and many of them still need to know Jesus. On Saturday evening before Easter the Jesus Film was shown to over 100 people. These people are patients and the friends and family who came to stay and take care of the needs of the patients while they are in the hospital. The Jesus Film was shown on the surgical ward the first night but was open to all who wanted to come and watch. Some were sitting or lying in their beds and others came and sat on the floor or stood in the door way to watch the film. At the conclusion Dr. Susan spoke briefly to those present and prayed with them. She also asked if there were any present who prayed the sinner’s prayer that was spoken at the end of the Jesus Film and had accepted Jesus into their lives. Hands went up saying, yes, I accepted Jesus into my heart! Several of the missionary family were on hand to pray with each of these people and to also pray with those who said that they were Christians but just wanted someone to pray with them. That first night 13 people said that they had accepted the Lord as their personal Savior!

Easter Sunday evening we set up and showed the Jesus Film again, only this time we set up on the medical ward of the hospital. Like the evening before we opened up the showing of the Jesus Film to all present in all 4 wards. On Sunday night around 75 people came to see the Jesus Film. Dr. Susan greeted the people and we showed the film. At the conclusion Chaplain Moses, Chaplain for Kudjip Nazarene Hospital shared a few closing thoughts and asked if anyone had given their hearts to Jesus that night. There were 3 more people who said that they had asked Jesus to be Lord of their lives and like the night before several others wanted someone to come and pray with them.

I ask you to pray for these 16 people who gave their hearts and lives to Jesus over the Easter weekend. Pray that God will strengthen them and help them to walk a holy life with Him. Thank you to Jesus Film for the Pidgin version of the film that they have created. Our Papua New Guinea Nationals were able to hear about God’s love in their own language and know that He died for them because He loves them. Thanks also to our missionary family that helped with set up and take down and who were there to help pray with those who wanted prayer. But most importantly thank you to our Heavenly Father for the victory of those 16 souls who now know His love.

Across the Ocean, the Final Chapter!

Leaving the Continental US we start the final leg of our journey home. Before we arrive in PNG we have one last stop to make, destination, Hawaii. Let me say right here that our visit to Hawaii was far better than we could have ever imagined! As our LINKS district they went out of their way to make us feel at home and make sure that we had a wonderful time. We spoke at Honolulu First Church and had a great time with the people there. They welcomed us warmly with greetings and smiles and the traditional Hawaiian Lea. We felt their love and support for missions. Sunday night we spoke again at Honolulu First but this time many of the 14 churches on Oahu were represented. Again it was a wonderful time of sharing, meeting new friends and seeing an old friend, Dr. Birchard, who has been a volunteer here at Kudjip Hospital. We thank the Lord for these wonderful people and the time that we could share with them what God is doing in Papua New Guinea. We really appreciate Pastor Rick and Vicki Power for going above and beyond the call of duty to help us have a great time in Hawaii and in opening their home to us! While in Hawaii we took in the sites and experienced a lot of firsts. For Jeff and the kids this was there very first time in Hawaii, Susan visited once on her way to PNG as a senior in college.

A special thanks goes out to Toby, from Honolulu First Church, who made Jeff's Hawaiian visit complete by knowing right where they used to film "Magnum PI". Maybe not so much for Susan and the kids, but for Jeff, he was excited. We saw the site of "Robin's Nest" the "Magnum Guest House" and the "Tidal Pool" the was used in the show. We even got to see where TC had his Island Hoppers office and where he landed his helicopter, cool! We also hiked up Diamond Head Crater to look around. What a fantastic view! We had a super view of Diamond Head Lighthouse and of Downtown Honolulu. We also visited Makapu'u Lighthouse. We made sure we had time for the sand and sea and had a blast with the crew of the outrigger canoe, as we rode the waves. The emotional high point was of course our visit to the Arizona Memorial. I believe that all of us left there with a sense of the sacrifice made by our men in the armed forces during the attack on Pearl Harbor. To all of our Service Men and Women, through the years to present, thank you for all that you are doing or have done to make our country the great country that it is!! We were also blessed to enjoy a 2 night stay at Waikiki Beach at the Hilton Hawaiian Village. It was beautiful and it was very cool to be able to walk out right onto the beach. We could go on and on because it was a wonderful time, a time to relax following the furlough trail and before we hopped on our next plane to continue our trip across the Pacific Ocean.

Alas, that time came, and as we winged our way from Hawaii to Australia our thoughts turned to PNG and our next term of service. We flew to Sydney, Australia and then on up to Brisbane where we spent the night before boarding the next flight to Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. We arrived in Port Moresby, made it through customs alright and passed through the inspection of our luggage with minimal questions and moved along to the domestic terminal for the final flight home to Kagamuga airport, Mt Hagen, Western Highlands Provence. We checked in with no problems and sat down to wait for our flight to the Highlands, which took a little bit of time. Finally we are able to board our plane and we take off for Kagamuga. Normally this flight is about an hour long but when storms are brewing and doing their thing in the Highlands it can make landing an option, not a forgone conclusion. So when our hour was about up the pilot came on and said we are getting close and as we got closer he began to circle around the airport area. You see when there are storms in and around Kagamuga the clouds can obscure the airport to the point that the pilots cannot see well enough to land. The pilot came back on the PA system and informed us of this. Well, I would like to say that after you have been traveling for the final month of your furlough and living out of a suite case and in the last 24 hours have been in the air many hours the last thing you want to do is fly back one more hour to Port Moresby to overnight just to try it again the next day! So, I prayed earnestly "Lord, I don't want to go back, I want to land! Could you part the clouds just like you did for Moses and the Red Sea?!" We flew in circles and finally the pilot came on over the PA system and said basically, "We will make one more go 'round, if we can't land we will head back to Port Moresby." Some where in all of this I am thinking to myself, "I can't believe this, this is the second time this has happened to us returning to Mt. Hagen!" But just like the last time it took place, the Lord parted the clouds and we were able to land! Thank you Lord! We were greeted by Mike and Dianne Chapman. It was good to see familiar faces! We loaded up the Land Cruiser and headed out for our 30 minute drive back to our home on the compound of Kudjip Nazarene Hospital in the Western Highland of Papua New Guinea, where we will serve another 2 year term.

Wrapping Up the Furlough Trail

I know that it has been a while since we last updated you on the happenings of the Myers clan, so the time has come to do just that. Since our last article much has taken place and many miles have been covered. As we started out the new year our first district tour of 2009 took us to Central California where we made some wonderful friends and had a great time sharing in the churches what God is doing in PNG. We spent a week with Luella and Damon Ashford at their home as we toured around Central California. Luella has served in the past as District NMI President and took excellant care of us!! We visited and had a great time sharing with kids and adults alike at 10 different churches across the district. We had a super day taking in the awesome sights of Sequoia National Park with Pastor Ron Fleming and his family! It is truly hard to believe that a tree could grow so large and be so incredibly old!! Only our Heavenly Creator could make something so fantastic! It was also neat to see all of the varous kinds of orchards hat grow in Central California. The Monday morning that we had planned to go the the coast and visit a beach with Jim and Christine Thompson, lovely folk of Pixley Nazarene, Susan received a phone call that her Dad needed to have immediate open heart surgery . Our hosts graciously loaded us up and made a trip to LAX so that Susan could fly home to be with her Dad and family during this time. Thanks! On that note, Susan's Father is doing very well and is currently (the last we heard) walking up to a mile and a half several days a week! We thank the Lord for His blessings!


Following our time in California we had 2 weekend trips to churches that we had special ties with because of special friends who attend and pastor there. First up was Denton Maryland where we were able to spend some time with Pastor Hal and Joyce Parry. Pastor Hal was our pastor at East Liberty CON on the East Ohio District while Susan was in residency at Akron Children's Hospital. It was great to see them again and to be able to watch the Superbowl together even though the Cardinals lost to the despicable Steelers. (Sorry Steelers fans but I am a loyal BROWNS fan) Next up we traveled to Roxana, Illinois where we met up with, after many years, Doug and Jan Krasow. Doug was our district Impact Team Director when I was in high school and did a great job working with us. He was the right man to work with a bunch of angelic (OK sometimes ornery) high school kids. We were sad when the Lord moved him on to his next assignment. With both families it felt as if years had never passed and such it is with the family of God!

On February the 10th we said our goodbyes to family and friends back home in the "Great State" of Ohio and headed out to the West Coast again. We flew out to LAX where we were met by Gordon and Pat Johnston, former missionaries to PNG. They were a tremendous help as they stored 5 pieces of our return luggage, fed us and helped us find a place to stay over night. It was all fun and we had a great time visiting with them and spending the night at Casa Robles Guest House.

The next day we headed to the Northwest District, Washington. We had never been to this part of the country before so we were looking forward to it. It was beautiful! Come to think of it, I don't know if we have ever visited an ugly part of the country, if such a place even exists! We have a beautiful Nation to live in! I will say this, people from Washington and Idaho kept telling us there were Moose around, how they see them all the time. Well, let me tell you, we hunted high and low, spent extra hours getting from one church to another trying to find a Moose and never did! We believe that no Moose live in Washington and Idaho and who knows, maybe those who live there just tell visitors that so they can watch us drive all over the place looking for one little Moose! Or maybe it just wasn't our visit to see one, but it wasn't from a lack of trying! We did have a super time touring on the district. It was a gorgeous place to spend a couple of weeks.
We had fun visiting the various churches and making new friends.
It was an awesome privilege to visit Quest Aircraft Co. with Chris Grant, the NMI President at Sandpoint Nazarene, who is an engineer with Quest. We had our picture taken with the MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship) airplane that will arrive in PNG in the near future! MAF is importatnt to us here in PNG. They help make it possible to reach very remote places in PNG.
One of the greatest things about missionary life is all the great people we get to meet. When we get to visit and rekindle those friendships, that's icing on the cake! We got to have our "icing" as we had the privilege of spending time with our former Regional Director and his wife. It was wonderful catching up with Brent and Marty Cobb at their home and church in Lewiston, Idaho. Our next taste of the "icing" was when we shared lunch and the wonderful company of Brad and Nikolai Ballin and their daughter Cherith. Brad is a pilot and engineer for MAF and Nikolai taught our MKs here at Kudjip for 2 years, which is how she and Brad met. It is really neat how the Lord brings everything together. It was also great to see and spend time with soon to be arriving missionaries to PNG, the Kerrs. Dave and Rosie Kerr and their 2 daughters, Grace and Anna, will be arriving sometime within the next few months. They will live at Melanesia Nazarene Bible College here in the Highlands of PNG. Dave will be working at the Bible College and Rosie will be working part time as a Medical Doctor. We look forward to their arrival...and more "icing"!!
Last but not least before leaving the Continental US we traveled to Medford, Oregon to spend time with the Winter family and share at their church. We had a wonderful time together eating, talking, laughing, shopping, and playing! Jeff got to help pack a 20ft. shipping container with all kinds of stuff for Nazarene Hospital, too! Speaking at their church was special as they have had several W&W teams come to PNG and so there were familiar faces and good memories represented!
Next episode...the final journey...via the Hawaii District!