In Training: December 2010

When God sold our home last month, we faced a huge new challenge: renovating and relocating our family to a metal pole building that had once housed a neighbor’s jam business. We had three weeks to remodel the old kitchen, office and bathroom into our new home and move our belongings into the attached warehouse.

Our new living space lacked sufficient insulation in its walls and attic. It required new electrical service and several new circuits. It needed a new water meter, water line and completely new plumbing because its pipes had frozen. It also needed a wood stove and chimney to provide heat.

As we began the renovation, it seemed impossible to complete the work and pass the required inspections by our deadline. But we sent up a fervent prayer for help and began to work, praising God as He provided funds, energy, subcontractors and inspectors just when we needed them.

As we neared completion, an obstacle arose. Our new electrical service and panel was installed, and everything had passed inspection. But when we called the power company only days before our deadline, they told us it would probably take 10 to 15 days to get connected.

A couple days later, with our deadline upon us, our youngest daughter, Alissa, sensed the urgency of our situation at the breakfast table and prayed a simple prayer for God to connect the power that day. A few hours later, the power company trucks rolled in, and the linemen made the connection. Soon after that, the inspector gave the final clearance, and we made our deadline. Praise God! He is so good!
—John Lello

In Training: November 2010

Even before we applied to AFM, my wife and I began to sense God’s spirit calling us to serve Him, and we decided to lay our home on the altar. Our little country homestead had been a wonderful place to live and raise our girls, but as we prayed for God to show us His will, we wanted to make ourselves completely available to answer His call. So, in September 2008, we listed our home with a realtor.

In February 2009, while serving on a mission project in Guyana, we learned of the need for a principal at the mission school in the local village. We prayed that if God wanted us to answer this call, He would cause someone to make an offer on our home before we returned. We returned home with great anticipation and asked our realtor if anyone had placed an offer, but no one had.

Disappointed but now sensing God’s call to foreign missions, we applied to AFM. A few months later, our realtor informed us of two offers on our home. After putting the matter before the Lord, we chose the stronger offer and made a counter offer, praying that if God wanted us to work with AFM, the buyers would counter at or above the amount we needed to be debt-free. The next day, they made a counter offer for the exact amount we needed.

We had our answer, but God had more to teach us. In the weeks that followed our buyers could not obtain financing. Disappointed again, we were faced with the choice of turning back or going forward. In November 2009, we chose to go forward and serve the Lord as AFM missionaries to Papua New Guinea.

Praise the Lord! I am glad to announce that God has sold our home. He led us to our own personal Red Sea and parted the waters. “Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord” (Ps. 27:14).
—John Lello

In Training: October 2010

One of the artifacts I use to illustrate the culture and beliefs of the people of Papua New Guinea is a 56-inch-long arrow. Like most arrows from the region, it is constructed from two pieces; a shaft made from a dried reed and a long, pointed head carved from hardwood and inserted into the shaft. Although it has no fletching, the arrow remains stable in flight because the light shaft naturally follows the heavier head allowing the skilled warrior or hunter to kill with accuracy and precision.

This weapon is remarkable not just for its functionality but also its artistry. The head is intricately carved and painted with spiritually significant markings. With these markings, the craftsman calls upon nature spirits and ancestors to empower the arrow to kill.

The Bible also tells of spiritually significant marks, but how wonderfully different they are from the marks on my arrow. Instead of hatred, they communicate love. Instead of death, they bring life. They were carved into the hands, feet and side of our Savior, and for time and eternity their beauty will draw us to Him.

Dear friend, won’t you help us explain those marks to our Ama people? Won’t you help us introduce them to Jesus? Through your prayers and support, God has already provided more than three quarters of our launching funds. We thank you for your faithfulness. Our prayer now is for more Christian brothers and sisters who will begin a monthly financial commitment to our mission. If God is working on your heart, let Him guide you. I am confident that, as you listen to Him, God will provide the remaining funds needed for us to launch to Papua New Guinea as well as the ongoing support we need to carry His work forward among the Ama.
—John Lello

In Training: September 2010

Recently, my family and I discovered a method of systematic giving that we thoroughly enjoy and would like to recommend to you. We decided to invest some family time each week in a small business venture and give the profits to missions. Our girls, Abby and Alissa, love to help in the kitchen, so “Mission Muffins” was a natural choice.

Our business plan is simple. Each Sunday, the girls and I drive into town and purchase ingredients for three or four batches of muffins while mom gets some well deserved down time. It’s a special time for my girls and me. Abby and Alissa enjoy pushing the grocery cart, selecting the ingredients, and paying the cashier, and I just enjoy being with them. On the way home, we often stop and play together at a park.

In the evening, the whole family mixes up the muffins, bakes them and wraps them in cellophane and ribbons. Monday morning, we take them to businesses in our little town where the girls offer them to the employees for a suggested donation of $0.75 to $1.50. Each muffin costs us approximately $0.50, so on average we expect to earn about $0.50 per muffin or about $18 to $24 a week, which adds up to a healthy monthly contribution of $72 to $96.

Naturally, we hope the Lord impresses your family to support our mission through a business venture of your own. Your plan will need to fit your family’s situation and interests, but we suggest you maintain three key elements. First, before you do anything, ask the Lord to guide your plans and bless your efforts. Second, make a plan that draws your family together around a common interest. Third, tell your clients the purpose of your business. This will provide opportunities for witnessing and allow you to introduce our mission to them.

Please pray for “Mission Muffins” and be sure to write and let us know of your own mission businesses so we can pray for you, too.
—John Lello

In Training: August 2010

The child lying next to Kelli in the dugout canoe convulsed as another seizure racked his small body. “Come on, let’s keep going!” she yelled to the pilot of the canoe and the boy’s parents over the noise of the outboard motor. In a desperate whisper, she added, “Oh God, let him live!” If they could just get him to the airstrip, he had a chance.

Since arriving in the remote upper reaches of Papua New Guinea’s Sepik River valley, Kelli, a young AFM missionary nurse, had struggled with the overwhelming task of singlehandedly running the May River medical clinic. On call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, she had faced a barrage of wounds, problem pregnancies and unfamiliar tropical diseases. How much longer could she go on like this?

The seizure ended. The little boy’s breathing stopped, and his pulse weakened. Kelli struggled awkwardly to reposition herself in the canoe and began rescue breathing. Not knowing what Kelli was doing, the boy’s parents became agitated. She checked his pulse again. It was gone. She added chest compressions. Now distraught, the boy’s parents begged her to stop. “He is dead! Let’s go back. Let’s go back!” Unwilling to admit failure, Kelli continued CPR for a time before slumping over her lifeless little patient exhausted, drained and defeated.

Now in the full grip of grief and despair, the boy’s parents broke into an awful wailing chant, swinging their arms up and down and banging them against the sides of the dugout canoe in an effort to exorcise their pain and express to the spirit of their son how sorry they were.

There on that jungle river, Kelli felt an overwhelming weight of suffering and death pressing down and threatening to crush her, an experience shared by many missionaries before her and likely to be shared by those who walk in her footsteps.

But let us remember that Christ has already drained the cup of suffering and death and has risen victorious. We stand on the threshold of a time when we will say, “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” Please help us bring this message to the Ama people.
—John Lello

In Training: July 1, 2010

As I flushed the toilet, three small creatures sprang out toward me. I jumped back against the wall with a shriek, eyes wide and heart pounding. “Mommy! Mommy! Are you okay?” Abby burst into the bathroom.

Speechless, I pointed to the green tree frogs clinging to the wall. “Lissa!” Abby called, “Come see what jumped out of the toilet!”

Cautiously, Lissa entered, “Oh! can we keep them?”

This was the first of many surprises during our mission service at Davis Indian Industrial College in Paurima, Guyana.

As our family walked down a grassy path to breakfast one morning, I felt suddenly compelled to leap aside. Turning around, I scanned the ground behind me, and my heart skipped a beat. There in the grass lay a poisonous snake in the spot where I had been about to step. “Abby and Alissa, watch out!” John warned them as he proceeded to kill the snake with a stick. As we continued on our way, we all thanked God for His care and protection.

It was Friday morning in Paurima, and everything seemed to be going wrong. Bedding and clothes hung damp on the line where I had put them two days earlier. The rest of our clothes lay in a dirty pile on the floor, and I was headed out to help build a water line. What was I going to do? Though I prefer to do things myself, John suggested hiring a girl from the community to do our laundry, and I gave in. Late that afternoon when we returned from our work in the village, I discovered the clothes on the line were completely dry. What a relief! God is so good.

Whether it is a funny experience, life-threatening danger or just everyday practical needs, God is always there to help us through each day. When we are in Papua New Guinea, I know God will be there with us, too, no matter what we encounter.

In Training: June 2010

Recently, my friend Dale Goodson told me the story of how, as an AFM missionary, he shared Christ with a man from a village deep in the jungles of Papua New Guinea. The man had no written language, couldn’t count higher than two and had no concept of history other than a knowledge of his parents, his ancestors and their traditions.

As Dale struggled to think of a way to explain the biblical account of creation, man’s fall, the history of God’s people and Christ’s incarnation, life, death, resurrection and second coming, his eyes came to rest on the rough floorboards of the man’s hut. Pointing to one of the boards, he said, “This is you, and the board next to it is your parents. The next board is your grandparents.” Continuing the floorboard analogy, he told him it would take most of the floorboards in the village to count the generations back to creation. Then he told the story of man’s fall and God’s promise of redemption. He recounted the stories of God’s people. He opened the mystery of Christ’s incarnation, life, death and resurrection and concluded by saying, “Here we are in the last board before Christ’s return.”

The man began to weep inconsolably, deep sobs shaking his whole body. Finally, as the man began to regain his composure, Dale asked him what the matter was, and he replied, “Here we are in the last generation, and my people do not know. We are the last to know. Why has no one told us before this?”

For decades, the Ama people have waited for Seventh-day Adventist missionaries to return and complete the work our first missionaries began. This is the work God has laid on our hearts. Please, won’t you help us proclaim the gospel among the Ama people in this last generation?

In Training, May 2010

Our pilot, Gary Lewis, opened the throttle of the small single-engine airplane, and we surged forward as we bumped along the grassy strip. With a final shudder, the airplane lifted into the air, cleared the jungle treetops at the end of the runway and began to climb, leaving the village of Paruima, Guyana, behind us.

As the village dropped away, John and I wondered whether we would ever see this place again or fellowship with the gentle people we had come to appreciate so much during our four short weeks of service. The plane continued to climb. Soon, the dense jungle spread out beneath us like an endless green carpet interrupted only by small patches of savannah, mountain outcroppings and the Mazaruni River, a thin, dark ribbon woven through it all.

The monotonous drone of the engine quickly lulled our daughters, Abigail and Alissa, to sleep. Not long after that, I also succumbed to drowsiness. Then Gary’s voice woke me. “We’re at 8,000 feet and still haven’t reached the top of these clouds. I still don’t see any way through them. We better start to pray.” The plane was circling and climbing. “I’ve already started,” John replied, himself a pilot in his younger days.

As the plane continued to labor upward and the wall of clouds in front of us mushroomed, our earnest prayers ascended. “9,500 feet, and we’re nowhere near the top,” Gary reported. “Wait a minute, there’s a break in the clouds developing over there. We will have to try to get through.” As we slipped through that canyon in the clouds and emerged on the other side, we praised God for His deliverance.

As the challenge of raising financial support mounts up before us like those towering clouds, I recall God’s wonderful deliverance in the skies of Guyana and His promise: “Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it” (1 Thess. 5:24).

In Training: April 2010

Early-morning light dimly illuminated the jungle as my native friend and I quietly entered a clearing. We were visiting our third home of the morning near the village of Paurima, Guyana where my family and I served the Aracuna people for about four weeks at the beginning of 2009.

As we approached the home, we could see the cooking fire burning low in the outdoor kitchen and various family members engaged in their morning routines. This would be one of our last visits. By 8 a.m., almost everyone would be walking or paddling to their farm plots miles away in the jungle.

My friend greeted the family members and introduced me, and they gathered around us. I began by asking about the health of the children, parents and grandparents and listened carefully to their responses. I enquired about their banana, dasheen, eddo and cassava crops and admired the home they were building.

Then I stepped out in faith and asked a question. “Do you want to know why I am so happy today?” It was an honest question. I was happy, and as I began to explain my joy in Christ, a wonderful thing happened. The joy I had known in my mind flooded into my heart and overwhelmed me as never before. I gave a simple, biblical account of what Jesus had done for me and the difference He had made in my life and the life of my family. I offered a heartfelt prayer on their behalf, presented them with their own Bible, and we were on our way again. A seed had been planted. After that experience, I knew my life would never be the same again. I had to keep on sharing Him.

How about you? Will you share Him, too? You can share Him right where you are. You can cross an ocean and share Him with the unreached, or you can lend your prayers and financial support to us and help us share Jesus Christ. But please don’t miss out on the experience.

Introducing the Lello family

Fourteen years ago when I prayed earnestly for a wife, I asked God for two things—a woman who would love and serve Him with all her heart, and a loving mother to our children. In Pam, God gave me all this and much more. She is the joy of my life, and our two girls, Abigail and Alissa, have only added to our happiness. God has also supplied our needs and provided me with a ministry through a career as a mathematics teacher and more recently as a builder.

Some time ago, it occurred to Pam and me that life is not like money. We can’t save it; we can only spend it. We will spend every second of every hour of every day of our lives on something until all our time is gone. Looking back on our lives, we can see both wise and foolish choices with a pattern running through them. When in submission to God, we made wise choices. But when we failed to submit to God and spent our lives selfishly, we made foolish choices. It really is that simple.

Recently, we seized the opportunity of a lifetime to submit to Christ and spend our lives unselfishly. We answered God’s call through Adventist Frontier Missions to minister to the Ama people who live along the upper reaches of the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea.

God has called us to a remote location that we will reach by traveling 90 miles over rough roads and more than 24 hours by dugout canoe. I will travel out of the interior once every three months to get food and supplies, and Pam and the girls will only travel out about once a year. He has called us to a difficult location where we will live in a rough structure built from jungle materials and galvanized steel. He has called us to a place plagued by malaria, pneumonia, dysentery, tropical ulcers, skin diseases and many other health problems. He has called us to a place of great spiritual darkness where the people live in fear and bondage to demons masquerading as departed ancestors and nature spirits.

So why do we look forward to this challenge? Why do we find it hard to imagine doing anything else? Because God’s light shines most brightly in the darkness. Because He has prepared the way before us by miraculously inspiring the Ama people to build a house of worship to a God they don’t even know. Because He promises to go with us and never leave us. Because we are “looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame” (Heb. 12:2).

Jesus said, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it.” (Luke 9:23, 24)

Friend, will you lose your life for Christ? It’s your only hope of really living. Won’t you join us in answering God’s call? Perhaps He is calling you to give your life for the unreached. Maybe He is touching your heart with our mission to the Ama people and calling you to support us with your means and prayers. But one thing is certain—He is calling you, calling you to give your all.