MY STORY - AS IF IT WERE YESTERDAY
Growing up as a child of missionaries and then one himself, I believe I was destined to experience life from the inside out. It seems as though I have just about had as many adventures as there are articles in National Geographic and have been in places I wonder at times if they might have been jealous. Although every life story is fascinating, mine happens to be a bit more on the unusual side, often by accident, more by choice, and mostly by Divine happenstance. The following are a few extraordinary snippets from my very average life.
I grew up a product of godly parents, the church and the mission field having lived in both Tanzania, East Africa and Papua New Guinea as a youth. These experiences shaped a heart love for missions and a life call to Papua New Guinea, which has been my home for over 17 years. “All the days ordained for me were written in His Book before one of them came to be”.
In my adult life I have lived in Hawaii, Germany, Kingdom of Tonga, Australia and Papua New Guinea. I have circled the globe twice, toured Europe three times and travel has brought me to over 47 countries. These experiences shaped a heart love for the unique beauty of the nations and the hidden treasures they hold. And I can surely say, “For God so loved the world!” and that the nations are “RIPE for harvest”. Wendy has shared many of these adventures with me.
I was raised Lutheran, got saved in the Evangelical Covenant, was trained in a Baptist college and received an Mdiv from the Evangelical Free Church. I then worked with an international interdenominational Christian Mission organization in which there are over 103 different denominations world-wide. ‘One Body many parts’! I have worshipped and ministered in more denominations than I can count on my fingers and toes ranging from Mainline to Pentecostal and most shades of Evangelical in between. I can surely say, “Jesus is the Lord of His Church”.
I have eaten about everything you can imagine and enjoyed every bight. Some of my meals have included bush rats (a favorite), flying fox fruit bats with 5-foot wingspans, green tree pythons, frogs, iguanas, grub worms as big as my thumb (I had 15 in one sitting once). I have had spiny sea urchins, octopus, large beetles, fresh and saltwater eels, seaweed, giant clams, and more. And they all taste like chicken! In fact, there are fewer things that I have NOT eaten. And I’m still alive! I have tried my best to be “all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some”, as the Apostle Paul said. (Some time, ask me for my recipe for fried green [endangered] sea turtle).
I have caught a 10-foot long 500 pound tiger shark at 600 feet deep on a 1 inch hook and pulled it up by hand. I have also gone scuba diving with these scary creatures, with schools of baracuda as well as with the dangerous moray eel. I have also snorkeled with deadly sea snakes and have touched the fatal blue ringed octopus. I have travelled deep into the earth in caves, where large snakes and wolf spiders blocked our way out. I randomly steered a small motorboat while surrounded by a pod of 400 dancing jumping dolphins many close enough to reach over the edge and touch.
I have witnessed tribal fights at dreadully close proximity. I have participated in innumerable cultural ceremonies and tribal festivals and I have stood guard through the night with friends armed with bows and spears over the new burial place of a fellow clansman to guard against sanguma - cannibal inhabited animals. I have climbed an active volcano and survived numerous intense earthquakes. I loved every risk and lived for the next one always remembering this is our Father’s world.
I sat as one white man in the midst of 3,000 black tribal friends at the funeral of a tribal chief – while hundreds of clansmen danced around me, their bodies and faces smeared with mud singing a death dirge with axes and spears over their shoulders. Later they flew ME in a helicopter around the territory of his ‘rule’ …with his dead body! I have been included in a highland rite as a tribal elder where I was presented a pig’s head on a banana leaf at my wooden pole. I have danced many nights around a fire with my black brothers and sisters in tribal singsings wearing almost nothing but a loincloth, feathered headdress and face paint. I wouldn’t trade these experiences for anything this world has to offer. “Let no one call unclean what God has made clean”.
Having never owned a home, my dwellings were always unique in their particular settings. We lived in a former premier’s home next to a crowded squatter settlement. Making friends with the rough and noisy neighbors, I was told by my friends after a break-in that they would kill the thieves for me if they caught them. In the highlands I had a large structure built mostly of bush materials high on a mountainside above a village setting. One could step out on the tin roof from the back, but yet was almost 4 stories high at the front and from the veranda one could view the entire Waghi valley and a vast mountain range on the far side. On the coast, we lived on a South Pacific Ocean inlet only yards from our back door where we could swim, snorkel, fish or canoe in my outrigger at any moments notice. And we had coconut, pineapple, papaya, guava, mango, banana, sugar cane – even a crocodile all growing in our humble yard.
I have spent many months in village bush huts, eating by the fire and sleeping under mosquito nets on split bark planks of a palm tree. Each time it was my castle (although by no means a feather bed). I have also slept many nights on ocean beaches, on ships, and even in a tree house. The Son of Man had no place to lay his head, but I should be so spiritually lucky. I have trekked hundreds of jungle miles going village to village and have often paddled my outrigger canoe to coastal islands to meet with some of the finest people this world has to offer, also those for whom Jesus died.
I’ve made pets of green tree pythons, hornbills, a flying fox, sugar gliders (flying squirrels), lizards, parrots, spiders in addition to dogs and cats. I have raised octopus, eels, sea lion and scorpion fish, including the Spanish dancer sea slugs in saltwater aquariums. I have seen the Superb Bird of Paradise and cockatoos beyond number. I have seen thousands of kangaroo and wallabies. In fact, I have shot and eaten dozens of kangaroo (even skinned and tanned their hides). And on rare occasions I have held the Blue Empress, Herculies moth and the Bird-winged butterflies in my hands. “All creatures great and small…our Lord Jesus made them all”.
I have 3 fathers, 2 mothers and 18 siblings with countless nieces and nephews. How so? Well, first I have my Father in Heaven. Then there are my biological parents and my blood siblings. But then there is Papa Bui and Mama Dobog and their 11 children who have always considered me their son and my brothers and sisters back in MY home village of Balin. My PNG brother Mal is about the best friend I have ever had. My family extends beyond any natural bound or border. How rich is that! And did not the Lord tell us that if we forsake ourselves for His sake that he would multiply our families one hundred fold?
I have caught the mosquito born Denghi fever and Malaria numerous times. I once had them both together. If you ever get a chance to do this, DON’T! I have also battled Giardia, shigella-salmonella, and had taenia corpus in embarrassing places on my body. I have also shared my aging body with numerous other parasites and worms, more than I care to count. I have dislocated my shoulder playing rugby. Yet my earthen vessel (this temple of the Holy Spirit) is still healthy and strong!
I have had more near-death episodes than anyone should have been asked to experience. I have been shot at by masked bandits at an uncomfortably close range. I have also had the unpleasant experience to have had guns pointed at my face, held to my head and even had a large sharp knife put to my body while I was being robbed at various jungle road blocks and have had lost many precious things to thieves. I have preached alone to hundreds of murderers, sorcerers, batterers and dangerous criminals – my captive audience at prisons, who I eventually won over as friends. Yet I am still alive and I can testify that the Name of Jesus is able to SAVE… to the uttermost.
My life has crossed paths with innumerable people from every station and walk of life whose stories have melded into mine. I had 20 minutes alone with Mother Teresa, having met her twice. She wrote something special for me on paper (which I lost along with my Bible)! My friend Maria von Traap and I were in a weekly Bible study together. Every so often, she would give me wonderful foot rubs. I have also walked side by side and fellowshipped with some of the most interesting and engaging people this world has ever brought forth, whose language and traditions were not my own. I have more close friends than I ever deserved who live on 5 different continents, and over a dozen nations, our skin colors together would challenge a decent rainbow. I know that I could call each one of them day or night if I needed a place to stay were I to pass through their country, province, city, town or village hamlet. So, I ask, why not? Well, just maybe I will... some day soon! God’s good family, the Church, is worldwide.
I have managed a mission station locally and regionally for Youth With A Mission. I have directed discipleship training schools, started a prison ministry, run provincial weekly youth radio programs, taught, preached and ministered in churches, schools, businesses and outdoor open air campaigns. I have led short-term mission and outreach teams, taught Bible in schools and businesses and was a university chaplain. Hasn’t the grace of God has always been sufficient?
Finally, I have a wonderful, loving and supportive wife, Wendy and 4 great children; Andrew 22, Emily 20, Noah 18 and Christopher 16. They are all fruit of the church and products of the mission field. They each love and fear the Lord and are growing to obey and serve Him more. Each one of them has a unique story not altogether different from mine. Perhaps we really needed the mission field as much (if not more) than it ever needed us.
Yes, I am truly a consequence of my past and a universe of God’s blessings that is still so alive within me. My parents and travel gave me that. And to those many hundreds, even thousands of friends, whose lives have touched mine, they have eternally enriched me and my future will never be the same because of my past.
And last but not least, let it be known that I love the Lord Jesus. I am eternally grateful that the Father grabbed me early in life, He took hold of me and made me His. It wasn’t until I was 17 years old when I made Him mine, and I have never let go. And as you can now tell, my life had never been the same since.
Although I have shared some of the highlights of my life, please also know that there are many more “lowlights”; easily as much failure as there was success. And really at the end of it all, I can really only say “tis all of grace.”
I grew up a product of godly parents, the church and the mission field having lived in both Tanzania, East Africa and Papua New Guinea as a youth. These experiences shaped a heart love for missions and a life call to Papua New Guinea, which has been my home for over 17 years. “All the days ordained for me were written in His Book before one of them came to be”.
In my adult life I have lived in Hawaii, Germany, Kingdom of Tonga, Australia and Papua New Guinea. I have circled the globe twice, toured Europe three times and travel has brought me to over 47 countries. These experiences shaped a heart love for the unique beauty of the nations and the hidden treasures they hold. And I can surely say, “For God so loved the world!” and that the nations are “RIPE for harvest”. Wendy has shared many of these adventures with me.
I was raised Lutheran, got saved in the Evangelical Covenant, was trained in a Baptist college and received an Mdiv from the Evangelical Free Church. I then worked with an international interdenominational Christian Mission organization in which there are over 103 different denominations world-wide. ‘One Body many parts’! I have worshipped and ministered in more denominations than I can count on my fingers and toes ranging from Mainline to Pentecostal and most shades of Evangelical in between. I can surely say, “Jesus is the Lord of His Church”.
I have eaten about everything you can imagine and enjoyed every bight. Some of my meals have included bush rats (a favorite), flying fox fruit bats with 5-foot wingspans, green tree pythons, frogs, iguanas, grub worms as big as my thumb (I had 15 in one sitting once). I have had spiny sea urchins, octopus, large beetles, fresh and saltwater eels, seaweed, giant clams, and more. And they all taste like chicken! In fact, there are fewer things that I have NOT eaten. And I’m still alive! I have tried my best to be “all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some”, as the Apostle Paul said. (Some time, ask me for my recipe for fried green [endangered] sea turtle).
I have caught a 10-foot long 500 pound tiger shark at 600 feet deep on a 1 inch hook and pulled it up by hand. I have also gone scuba diving with these scary creatures, with schools of baracuda as well as with the dangerous moray eel. I have also snorkeled with deadly sea snakes and have touched the fatal blue ringed octopus. I have travelled deep into the earth in caves, where large snakes and wolf spiders blocked our way out. I randomly steered a small motorboat while surrounded by a pod of 400 dancing jumping dolphins many close enough to reach over the edge and touch.
I have witnessed tribal fights at dreadully close proximity. I have participated in innumerable cultural ceremonies and tribal festivals and I have stood guard through the night with friends armed with bows and spears over the new burial place of a fellow clansman to guard against sanguma - cannibal inhabited animals. I have climbed an active volcano and survived numerous intense earthquakes. I loved every risk and lived for the next one always remembering this is our Father’s world.
I sat as one white man in the midst of 3,000 black tribal friends at the funeral of a tribal chief – while hundreds of clansmen danced around me, their bodies and faces smeared with mud singing a death dirge with axes and spears over their shoulders. Later they flew ME in a helicopter around the territory of his ‘rule’ …with his dead body! I have been included in a highland rite as a tribal elder where I was presented a pig’s head on a banana leaf at my wooden pole. I have danced many nights around a fire with my black brothers and sisters in tribal singsings wearing almost nothing but a loincloth, feathered headdress and face paint. I wouldn’t trade these experiences for anything this world has to offer. “Let no one call unclean what God has made clean”.
Having never owned a home, my dwellings were always unique in their particular settings. We lived in a former premier’s home next to a crowded squatter settlement. Making friends with the rough and noisy neighbors, I was told by my friends after a break-in that they would kill the thieves for me if they caught them. In the highlands I had a large structure built mostly of bush materials high on a mountainside above a village setting. One could step out on the tin roof from the back, but yet was almost 4 stories high at the front and from the veranda one could view the entire Waghi valley and a vast mountain range on the far side. On the coast, we lived on a South Pacific Ocean inlet only yards from our back door where we could swim, snorkel, fish or canoe in my outrigger at any moments notice. And we had coconut, pineapple, papaya, guava, mango, banana, sugar cane – even a crocodile all growing in our humble yard.
I have spent many months in village bush huts, eating by the fire and sleeping under mosquito nets on split bark planks of a palm tree. Each time it was my castle (although by no means a feather bed). I have also slept many nights on ocean beaches, on ships, and even in a tree house. The Son of Man had no place to lay his head, but I should be so spiritually lucky. I have trekked hundreds of jungle miles going village to village and have often paddled my outrigger canoe to coastal islands to meet with some of the finest people this world has to offer, also those for whom Jesus died.
I’ve made pets of green tree pythons, hornbills, a flying fox, sugar gliders (flying squirrels), lizards, parrots, spiders in addition to dogs and cats. I have raised octopus, eels, sea lion and scorpion fish, including the Spanish dancer sea slugs in saltwater aquariums. I have seen the Superb Bird of Paradise and cockatoos beyond number. I have seen thousands of kangaroo and wallabies. In fact, I have shot and eaten dozens of kangaroo (even skinned and tanned their hides). And on rare occasions I have held the Blue Empress, Herculies moth and the Bird-winged butterflies in my hands. “All creatures great and small…our Lord Jesus made them all”.
I have 3 fathers, 2 mothers and 18 siblings with countless nieces and nephews. How so? Well, first I have my Father in Heaven. Then there are my biological parents and my blood siblings. But then there is Papa Bui and Mama Dobog and their 11 children who have always considered me their son and my brothers and sisters back in MY home village of Balin. My PNG brother Mal is about the best friend I have ever had. My family extends beyond any natural bound or border. How rich is that! And did not the Lord tell us that if we forsake ourselves for His sake that he would multiply our families one hundred fold?
I have caught the mosquito born Denghi fever and Malaria numerous times. I once had them both together. If you ever get a chance to do this, DON’T! I have also battled Giardia, shigella-salmonella, and had taenia corpus in embarrassing places on my body. I have also shared my aging body with numerous other parasites and worms, more than I care to count. I have dislocated my shoulder playing rugby. Yet my earthen vessel (this temple of the Holy Spirit) is still healthy and strong!
I have had more near-death episodes than anyone should have been asked to experience. I have been shot at by masked bandits at an uncomfortably close range. I have also had the unpleasant experience to have had guns pointed at my face, held to my head and even had a large sharp knife put to my body while I was being robbed at various jungle road blocks and have had lost many precious things to thieves. I have preached alone to hundreds of murderers, sorcerers, batterers and dangerous criminals – my captive audience at prisons, who I eventually won over as friends. Yet I am still alive and I can testify that the Name of Jesus is able to SAVE… to the uttermost.
My life has crossed paths with innumerable people from every station and walk of life whose stories have melded into mine. I had 20 minutes alone with Mother Teresa, having met her twice. She wrote something special for me on paper (which I lost along with my Bible)! My friend Maria von Traap and I were in a weekly Bible study together. Every so often, she would give me wonderful foot rubs. I have also walked side by side and fellowshipped with some of the most interesting and engaging people this world has ever brought forth, whose language and traditions were not my own. I have more close friends than I ever deserved who live on 5 different continents, and over a dozen nations, our skin colors together would challenge a decent rainbow. I know that I could call each one of them day or night if I needed a place to stay were I to pass through their country, province, city, town or village hamlet. So, I ask, why not? Well, just maybe I will... some day soon! God’s good family, the Church, is worldwide.
I have managed a mission station locally and regionally for Youth With A Mission. I have directed discipleship training schools, started a prison ministry, run provincial weekly youth radio programs, taught, preached and ministered in churches, schools, businesses and outdoor open air campaigns. I have led short-term mission and outreach teams, taught Bible in schools and businesses and was a university chaplain. Hasn’t the grace of God has always been sufficient?
Finally, I have a wonderful, loving and supportive wife, Wendy and 4 great children; Andrew 22, Emily 20, Noah 18 and Christopher 16. They are all fruit of the church and products of the mission field. They each love and fear the Lord and are growing to obey and serve Him more. Each one of them has a unique story not altogether different from mine. Perhaps we really needed the mission field as much (if not more) than it ever needed us.
Yes, I am truly a consequence of my past and a universe of God’s blessings that is still so alive within me. My parents and travel gave me that. And to those many hundreds, even thousands of friends, whose lives have touched mine, they have eternally enriched me and my future will never be the same because of my past.
And last but not least, let it be known that I love the Lord Jesus. I am eternally grateful that the Father grabbed me early in life, He took hold of me and made me His. It wasn’t until I was 17 years old when I made Him mine, and I have never let go. And as you can now tell, my life had never been the same since.
Although I have shared some of the highlights of my life, please also know that there are many more “lowlights”; easily as much failure as there was success. And really at the end of it all, I can really only say “tis all of grace.”