September, 2016

Dearest Friends and family

BIRTHDAY MONTH
It was our month of birthdays. Kathy caught up with me Sept 4th and then I became the old man again on Sept 17th (68). That is over 60 years longer than my mother ever thought I would get.

GETTING THINGS BACK ON TRACK
Those things which plagued us when we arrived back have been mostly repaired, fixed or throw away.

I took apart the wheel cylinder on the back truck brake that was leaking and cleaned it and it worked for about 3 weeks. Jason had sent a replacement and I was able to change it out to fix it right. Nice to have brakes!

The hard drive on the surviving Mac Book Pro (the one I am using for this) sounds like a light airplane taking off. I guess I will have to replace that also.

The layer have started laying. They (47) started out laying 12 eggs (Sept 4th) and within three weeks we are getting 40-42 everyday. One day I got 47! I did have one not walking one afternoon so I gave it to one of the grand daughters of Rebecca across the street thinking it was going to die. The next morning I was told the layer was walking around and seems to be alright. I had the same thing happen with two more layers this week and figured out that it was heat related as they are housed with covered lower sides. I have since put in wind walls (knocked out the siding leaving the wiring) so they get a breeze most of the time. Our cooler weather is gone and we have not had any rain for several weeks. We are going into a summer season. We sell the eggs for $3.50 a dozen (which is $1.50+ less than the store cost) so we can get more feed for them. Last night I brought the healed chicken back to the coop and paid 4 eggs for the help.

We received our last lot of 200 day old chicks August 31st and they are now being raised by 5 of us. I only have 18 and we sent 25 to an Christian brother who lives on the island of Malakula to see how he does. They will have to get all their feed shipped out by coastal ships. He called and said he wants 100 when we reorder the end of October. We found out we cannot import any quail or chicken eggs from Australia due to quarantine restrictions.

I rebuild another antique for friends here in Port Vila. It was a dresser damaged by the cyclone of 2015.

NEW KIDS
Saturday afternoon September 3rd we became the proud grand parents of two new kids, twins. Born to our goat at the school. One was white and the other was black. The black one had an offset upper jaw bone and died within 36 hours because it did not have a palate to suckle with.

Grand parents are doing fine for the condition they are in.

MAN OF MEDAL
The older I get the more medal I acquire. My latest additions.

Papayas we got-

These come from our trees as well as a number of trees from Steve Felix's beach property across from the school. We take them in to town (Tues & Fri) and give them to a restaurant who serve them as fresh fruit as well as making juice from them, we get the occasional free lunch! Our chickens also get their portion!

I do not like the consistency of papaya but I like dried red papaya in the Mountain Trail Mix so I am trying to dry it. We have the sun!

LUMBERJACKS
After the cyclone in 2015 we tried to buy an Alaskan chain saw mill to cut up the fallen hard wood trees we have on the school property. The forestry department had a tax on the mill of $750 even before you bought it for $350. Well, I looked around and a Chinese shop had the mills with no tax so we now have a mill and will start getting the wood cut up. The big sawmill the village used to have is broken down and so we have not bought any additional wood for building. This should work out well. I set it up and have tested it on a fallen coconut tree and just know I will have to keep a very sharp chain.

SOME DAYS
Some days it does not pay to get up. Here was one such Monday his month. I got up a 6:00 am and went out to get the chickens sorted out. I have a hose on a 12 volt pump from an outside tank into the layer section of the chicken house. I have it hooked into the chicken wiring after I use it so the siphon effect does not drain the 500 liter tank. WELLLLLLLL sometime in the night one or more of the chickens dislodged the hose and the water in the tank siphoned out ALL OVER THE FLOOR. This meant that I had to clean it out as the chicken poop was now all wet as well all as the grass and straw on the floor being soaked. That was so much fun for the next hour and before I ate.

Then I took the motorbike down the road to a section of the beach where the winds blow the sands onto the road and make it dangerous when speeding trucks hit the drifting sand which can be as deep as 4 inches at times. Sometimes I will take the tractor up there and remove it (like I did today) but that day I just wanted a load of sand for the floor of the chicken coop as well as for concrete work. I filled up the back of the bike tray and started back home and not 100 meters down the road the right rear tire went flat. (I found out later the tube disintegrated.) I did not have my phone so I hoofed it back to the house (2 miles) and got the tractor. I was just going to hook it up and tow it back but was unable to steer the front tire once I had the back tray picked up. So I uploaded the majority of the sand into the front end loader of the tractor and then picked up the front tire and drug it home. Without the sand the tire had just enough air so the rim was not dragging. There was another 3 hours enjoying myself. Then there was the next day when the washing machine acted up. I just knew we were going to have to get a new one but was able to check it out and get it running again.

You may remember I have said we have wood nits in the ceiling of the house. I found a Chinese store with plastic ceiling (200 mm x 5.6 m). Over 18 hours of climbing and scampering like a monkey on ladders, desks, dressers, islands and cabinets I finished covering up the wood with the plastic. I ended up cutting the lengths in half for better control during installation. It was just as easy doing by myself as having help because the house is so small. I DID NOT FALL ONCE INSIDE THE HOUSE!

On Saturday after I finished and cleaned up I went to start up the generator after the sun went down and the pull rope broke. Fun fun!

No, the beard has not been trimmed it is just tied up.

EVERYTHING NOT GOOD IN PARADISE
Since the last newsletter three of the four congregations on our island have split. It is all based on the keeping of the 5 acts of worship that a traveling evangelist teaches and the fact that we were trying to get a coordinated leadership ministry in place to help ALL the congregations who are family connected on this small island. Of course this person harps on autonomy (which is never used in the NT) but then he comes over here and tells them how they should do everything according to his interpretation of New Testament principles. None of the members we had talked with about the coordinated leadership ministry (which had been agreed on in principle) had any feedback but after this person's trip they were all in an uproar about autonomy and "who made certain men the leaders".

Names were put forth by each congregation (we thought was their nomination) only to find out that when the names were submitted to the whole group and accepted that some men in three of the congregations then started complaining that they wanted to be on the ministry and their names were not read off. Most if not all do nothing in the three congregations other than attend services (probably why the members had not put forth their names to serve on this ministry in the first place). This includes any leadership example of activity for the good of the groups. And heaven forbid they cut grass or clean the building!

In our combined monthly services we had been talking about trying to example our services after the New Testament church and that includes especially how we do the Lord supper, whether preaching should be the focal point of the service and whether the use of 1 Cor 16 to command weekly congregational giving is correct. So we had focused on the Lord's Supper with larger cups and larger pieces of bread(tortillas) the past two months. In the Eton congregation, which I work with mostly, we are now having Agape meals with the Lord's Supper during the meal with sharing of thoughts from anyone who feels he need to share. NO PREACHING! A basket is left on the table for anyone who wants to contribute to what small congregational monetary needs we have. Since this was not the 5 acts of worship the one man (the first baptized Christian) stormed out and the next Sunday his family line did not attend. Kathy and I went to the Epau congregation, as per our normal third week visit and some of the other men went and brought this man to services and he "preached" that morning condemning me and two other men of dividing the church with new finagled doctrines. He had not spoken to any of us of his concerns. I gave it a week and then went to talk to him about the concept of Matt 18. His answer was in my last report. Since then he and his family line have not come nor did they attend the monthly combined service in Port Vila this month. The majority of the men of this group have never been really involved and only come when they feel like it and are out of the building after closing prayer never to be seen until the next required time. They think the 5 acts of worship takes care of everything. When decisions have been made in regard to work and running of the congregation they were never there but were the first to object and ask why they were not considered as leaders. This also happened in the other two smaller congregations where men who do nothing want to be in charge of making decisions for everyone. Some from these congregations contacted the break away group here and have decided they don't like the way things have been going in their congregations (they were not nominated leaders by their congregation, the bigger cups, etc) and have broken away as well.

At both of the other congregations the main man who has been holding the congregations together finally told the other men (who were complaining about "who made you the leader") that they would sit back and let the other men lead the congregation. Neither congregation had services the week following this because none of the other men did anything.

The first weekend the "disgruntled" group here at Eton met as their own group, at the former church building before the current one was built in 1998, we heard they did not have communion because NOBODY thought to be prepared for it (like some of us have done every week here). The second week, since they did not have the small cups they used larger cups as well and crackers for the bread, what irony! This past Sunday they had a meeting and have decided to wait until those who baptized them come back in November and they can consult with them. That would be the traveling evangelist and he said he was bringing one of his elders with him. Should be a hot time on the old town that night!

It is the talk of the village - the group that left is the break away group! It is so sad but it also is a time of re-commitment for the majority of the baptized members who have never been challenged to be fully committed in their service to Jesus. When men like this legalistic brother have made a lifetime of hop skipping around baptizing and leaving babes in Christ it is not a surprise the converts cannot handle meat and need to still be fed milk (which they find offensive) because they were never encouraged to be a disciple of Jesus).

I was talking with a friend and she said it sounded like they just need more encouragement. My reply was "how do you encourage a rock????????" Rocks don't talk and neither go these brethren!

I feel that my (our) calling is with these people and if we can be the motivators of the next generation of disciples then it will be one at a time. (I feel more and more like an Old Testament prophet talking to God's people who are content to do what they want to do and do not want to hear what God wants. Move over Jeremiah!) We have been involved with this work since 1991 and very, very few of those baptized by come and go evangelists are disciples and they seem to drag the brethren who want to live a full, free in-Christ life down from doing anything.

I am a firm believer that if Satan is not trying to hinder your life then you are not living the kind of life that bothers him. Jesus did not promise roses and champagne. He said it would be hard. This has been a trying time.

As for the Bible School:  It has been very frustrating and a time of reflection as to "should we pull the plug or not". If we cannot get the school started we might need to leave. That was why we came here. This is only part of the reason we are here but we have been very hurt by this division because the women are wives of the men who refuse to attend and they cannot come either.

We finally got a reply from the Qualifications Authority and they point out that we do not fit their frame work (which we knew from the beginning). Steve Felix, Goman and I are going to draft our reply. It will be along the lines of - we knew we were not in your framework therefore we will go ahead and operate our school outside the framework of "providing secular employment for our graduates and facilitating international recognition of our qualifications for our graduates". We will probably do a four month course program twice a year. We can get study visas for overseas students without having to be Government qualified as long as we are registered as an NGO, which we are pursuing. More to come!!!!

Thank you for your prayers - God hears!

We are still looking for additional monthly support for the running of the Bible School. If you can help please do and especially remember us and the brethren here in your prayers - thank you!

God is good!!!!!!!!!

Onward and upward!
We especially want to thank all of you so much for praying for us, supporting us and have contributed to our needs so we can do what we are doing. God bless you! Thank you for your prayers and fellowship!

Thank you Lord for healing and providing what we need!

Grace & Peace

Tobey & Kathy Huff

Ph: +678 596-4821 (Vanuatu) We do texting.

Thank you for your prayers - God hears!

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Contributions for the Huffs, the Bible school, the Scholarship fund and/or cyclone/drought relief can be sent to:
Huffs/Bible School
c/ Mt Hope church of Christ
2830 Mt Hope Rd
Webb City MO 64870

or
Jason Huff
2730 E 24th St
Joplin MO  64804

(417) 396-9122
j13huff@yahoo.com