We are back home and ready to report on our 4-week trip along the east coast up to New York State and Pennsylvania. We had thought of continuing on to Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas and Alabama. We could not get peace about it and later realized that we really were not physically up to it at this time. We’re sorry for having missed some of you in those states. We both came home with a cold, and Tom’s turned into asthma, as it usually does.
Hi, Friends and Family,
“For He shall give His angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.” Ps 91.12-13
To paraphrase that verse to fit our situation I could say, “They shall bear thee gently to the right at the right point, at the right time, lest thou dash thy car against the truck.”
Dear Family, Friends and Supporters,
We have not had much news to report, but it is time that we shared our latest with you. We are enduring, sometimes enjoying the hot summer of the Sunshine State. We say enduring because yesterday the temperature reached 95/75 – very hot and muggy. We say enjoying because it is a lot like Lae City, Papua New Guinea, where we spent the last 6 years of our time in PNG. We prefer it here to being in states where there have been tornados, floods, landslides, terrible fires and earthquakes. We are thankful that in the two years we have been here we have not had to endure a hurricane.
Greetings from Sunny Florida, where spring has sprung and it’s half-gone toward summer already. Time really flies when your life is full – yes, even in retirement. We haven’t had much news to write about, but it is time to update you on our activities and plans.
March-April was an eventful time for us.
Greetings from Central Florida. We here have been extremely blessed. The news reported that Florida is the only one of the 50 states, including Hawaii, that presently has no snow. Even Georgia as far south as it is, was recently shut down because of snow and ice. Thousands of airplane flights have been cancelled. Many sports fans who came to New Jersey to observe the super bowl game between the Seattle Seahawks and the Denver Broncos enjoyed the game in fairly nice weather conditions but missed flights home because of the storm that followed. Some of our nights have been cool, but we’ve recently had daytime temperatures in the 70’s and 80’s.
In our November Update we shared with you about our trip to Papua New Guinea for the dedication of the revised Hamtai New Testament. We extended our 2-month visitors’ visas to 3 months and were able to spend time at our village house in Hipaku to sort out our belongings, have a time of teaching and bid farewell to the believers there. As we considered the trip, Tom thought he would have to face the terrible road over the mountain to get there, but at our missionary conference our area leaders suggested we go instead by helicopter, and so they made our fare the project for the conference. The generosity of the missionaries covered the cost. What a blessing it was to have a one-hour flight, landing on the basketball court by our front door rather than having to drive five hours to overnight in Lae and then 6 or 7 hours the next day to our house.
“How many copies did you say you want us to print of the revised Hamtai New Testament? Ten thousand! The order of 5,000 in 1975 was not sold out for nearly 30 years. Some copies were damaged by cockroaches and others by moisture. Where will we store that many copies? You think they might all be sold the first day? Well, we will consider it.” So went our conversation with one of the church elders who called us from Papua New Guinea on his mobile phone. We were planning on having only 5,000 printed but finally decided on a slight compromise and had 6000 printed.
What a ride! Emotions ran high. We were on top of the world, being able to be “home” again and to see some or our believer friends in the Kapau area of the Hamtai nation; to see their love expressed to us, and to hear so many thank you’s for bringing the Good News and God’s written Word to them. We kept reminding them of all the other members of our team through the years who had a part. But we being the last ones brought tears of joy and thanks, but also tears of sadness that some of them would not see us again until we meet in Glory.
Dear Ones,
We have enjoyed our NTM Central Area conference here at headquarters, getting to know some folk we hadn’t met, co-workers in this tremendous task God has sent us all here to do – reach the tribes of this part of Papua New Guinea. Reports from the various works were very encouraging and challenging at the same time.
Palmers’ Independence Day Update – Sept. 16
Dear Friends and Family,
I don’t know where all the years (and decades) have gone. Today is Papua New Guinea’s 38th birthday. Also, today I just wanted to write a note saying how thankful I am to the Lord for allowing me to be here on this important anniversary of mine. It was 60 years ago today that I, when I was single, arrived in my adopted country which was then called T.P.N.G. (Territory of Papua & New Guinea).
My, the memories that rush through my mind. As I was taken by Ed Erke up the road to his house at Slate Creek, I exclaimed with the little Spanish I know, “Donde esta el camino.” (Where is the road!?) Of course Ed didn’t understand, or perhaps he did. Anyway, it was my introduction to NG roads.
Dear Family and Friends,
At long last we can write some news about the most precious of all cargos that has been on its way to Papua New Guinea. We received confirmation today that the ship with the container containing the revised Hamtai New Testaments arrived in Lae City port on the 5th of September. You, our dear family and friends, have been praying for us, and wondering how we fared in our journey to these parts.
Praise the Lord: After various delays with paper work and the lack of a container, the Revised Hamtai New Testaments are now aboard a ship heading for Papua New Guinea. Global Ministry Supply told us the estimated arrival date in Lae is August 26th. Since we will be entering PNG on 2-month visitors’ visas that may be extended for a 3rd month, we wanted to arrive at about the same time. So we waited to buy our tickets until we knew that date, because arrival and departure dates need to included on our visas. The Lord enabled us to buy our tickets last week with some gifts and by dipping into our savings. So we are now applying for visas, to leave here August 23rd via Hong Kong, and return November 20, 2013.
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