To a Tribe -- or Bust

After a two-hour river trip, four-hour jungle and swamp hike, and a ten-minute Cessna 206 plane ride, a 39-year-old widow arrived in a Siawi village in Papua New Guinea. Was the NTM training worth it? I was about to find out.

 The Cuthbert and Lindsey families had already moved into Siawi village before me. They had built the airstrip and framed in their houses. Now they helped me gather jungle materials to build the rough frame of my house, and a five-man team of other missionaries came in to help get it up. Hard work through a four-day weekend saw my house standing with outside walls up, studs set for the inside walls and a functioning bathroom.  Everything was under roof and wrapped in screen wire. I could finish up the rest. And yep. I had used everything I’d learned.

The electrical wiring and solar panel tasks were also tackled.  Ron Lindsey teased me later that my electric wiring looked like a spider web, with the wires from each light running back to the one battery. But at least I HAD lights!

Even more important than the practical side of the training was the spiritual. What do you do with the stress of living so close with four to six other missionaries for long periods of time? What do you do, when you find someone’s habits rather irritating?  Do you just bind it up inside, letting it smolder? Do you say something to them?

During the training, I began to learn the balance between accepting differences, and trying to help a brother or sister change.  The biggest factor?  Did I want them to change so I would feel better, or so they would be a better servant for the Lord?  Was I acting out of love or selfishness?  Learning to accept that each of us has strengths and weaknesses, and choosing to make allowances for those weaknesses, was an important lesson to learn and one I have had to use regularly in Siawi.

Another important aspect of the training was learning to discern the Lords will for where and how to serve. What country do I go to? What ministry do I participate in? Where does the Lord want me? Where do I fit? These can be pretty overwhelming questions to figure out.

We would meet with the staff every semester to discuss progress and goals. To everyone else the staff would ask, “Are you ready to go into a tribe?” But with me they would ask, “Are you willing to serve in an office?”  Everyone thought it would be unrealistic for me to consider going to a tribe, given my age and gender. But going to a tribe was exactly what was on my heart. Did I have a misplaced burden? Should I consider office work? What did God want?

Knowing I was struggling with these issues, one of the staff members told me something I never forgot. “The Lord won’t play games with you, Linda. If you truly want His will, He will show you.”

And He did.

As I progressed through the linguistics course in the training, it became obvious that the peculiar twists and quirks of how my brain worked, something that had always been a source of irritation to my school teachers, was actually a gift from the Lord. I had always asked what were considered odd questions. I always wanted to “see around the corner” and know the “why” of things. Now I discovered my quirky kind of thinking would make it possible for me to figure out the twists and turns of a tribal language, learn it, and then translate the Bible into that language. The Lord was showing me His will and it didn’t involve an office.

 After the linguistics course, the staff began to ask, “Linda, are you willing to go to a tribe and use these skills there?” 

Finally, the right question! 

“Yes!” I was definitely ready to go and put all that training to use.

And I have – in a little Siawi village in Papua New Guinea.