December 2022
Dear Praying Friends,
We praise the Lord again for His manifold blessings and care toward us. Nine weeks have passed so quickly since we sent out our last newsletter. Our time in Wau was very enjoyable, and we flew back to Kaintiba the 3rd week of October after 2 weeks of teaching in the Bible School. Upon our arrival back, we started getting things ready for the Revival Meeting that Preacher Tiwias was organizing. He had invited his pastor, Pastor David from Tengama, to come and preach the meeting. Pastor David is such a great brother in the Lord, and it was a joy to spend time with him again for the 4 days he was with us. His wife, Daina, was not able to come because she is a sickly woman. We pray she will grow stronger in body and recover from her sicknesses.
In the beginning of November after the Revival “Bung”, we had the Lord’s Supper. It was a time of heart searching to see who among us were true Christians, for it was apparent that several young men were attending with ulterior motives. It was my prayer that they would come around and get right with God. The Communion Service brought things to light and now these young men will not even pretend to be Christians. I pray that Father will draw them to a right relationship with Him so they can enjoy all the true blessings of being a true believer in Christ. So many among us are still young Christians and do not know how to “endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ”.
The first week of December, Father provided a round-about way for me to go to Ukarumpa to retrieve the 2 crates we had sent from the USA. A generator and a vanity for our bathroom also came, and I needed to go stage these things for the 2 flights that would bring these things out to the jungle. The route I traveled was Providentially set forth in a way I did not really plan. North Coast Aviation came into Kaintiba on Friday the 2nd of December, and I was able to fly with them to Lae. Brother Luther Smith met me at the SIL Guest House, and took me to the Bank and a few shops. The next morning he and his wife had to drive back to Wau. The manager of the SIL Guest House allowed me to use their vehicle to finish up my business before I headed up the Highlands Highway with my friend Willie. Willie drove almost 4 hours from Yonki to come and bring me from Lae up to Yonki and then on to Ukarumpa on Monday the 5th of December.
Along this route to Ukarumpa, Willie also had to bring another man from Lae up to Ukarumpa for a doctor's visit at the SIL Clinic. This man had worked for Immigration and his nephew was currently in the Immigration Office in Port Moresby where our Visa applications were waiting to be processed. This dear Christian brother (Stanley) said he would ask his nephew to check on our Visa applications and request for a Visa extension for Hadassah. By Tuesday morning (6 December), our extension request for Hadassah and Visa applications were approved and stamped into our Passports! Had I traveled the route (direct to Aiyura/Ukarumpa) that I had originally would have gone, this Providential encounter would not have taken place. Who knows if our Visa applications would still be in a pile of papers on someone's desk……still waiting to be processed.
Now that all is ready (as far as we know) concerning our Passports and Visas, we have secured tickets to go to Alaska for our son Titus’s wedding. We are overjoyed that Titus has obeyed the Scriptures in finding a wife and we go as a part of our ministry to promote a righteous and Christian event. We again seek Father to provide all that is necessary to accomplish this adventure, as He has in the past. If you are so Providentially led to help financially toward this, it would be greatly appreciated.
Christi’s Corner: As the Christmas season is upon us, we are thankful for our Saviour’s birth. We plan to make Christmas cookies with the ladies next week. This is a new thing that was my daughter, Hadassah’s, idea.
Hadassah is a very vital part of our ministry. We are thankful that she was granted an extension to be with us longer as she finishes her high school.
We also are getting ready for our annual Holiday Bible School. (VBS to those of you in the states.) It is just around the corner, 2-6 January. Please pray for us as we prepare and carry it out. The theme this year is “My sheep hear my voice, and follow me”. We are excited to work together as a family in this favorite event!
For His Glory,
Mark and Christi Helzerman
Hadassah,
Grace, Hope, Serenity, and Glory
E-mail: mhelzerman@gmail.com