Papua New Guinea is known as the land of the unexpected. The longer we are here, the more unexpected it gets.
“Sorry, the system is not working, and I cannot give you a price,” the fuel depot attendant informed me. He said the same thing yesterday, adding that I come back “tomorrow,” which is today. This mysterious system error prevented him from being able to print me a quote so I could purchase three 55-gallon drums of gasoline. The cargo ship which would carry our supplies three hundred miles across the gulf of Papua to our mission station in Kewa Village was leaving soon, and our fuel supply in the village was desperately low. Now we sat in the little waiting room for a second consecutive day.
Yesterday God showed us His merciful hand. Now that we have a newer car, we don’t often use our old truck, save for transporting fuel drums to the shipping wharf. Before leaving the house, I discovered that the registration and safety stickers for the vehicle were expired. To get the registration renewed, we would need to get the truck inspected, which would require we drive it on the road (illegally, of course) to get to the inspection station. We hoped and prayed that we would not see any police checkpoints. I’ve gone through many, and it seems like the police are just trying to get money.
About halfway into town, the traffic suddenly came to a stop. “There’s our police checkpoint!” my wife and I groaned. I braced myself for an argument with the police officer. As each car in front of us approached him, he held up his hand for them to stop so he could scrutinize their stickers. The truck in front of me approached the officer. Looking intently for a violation, the officer squinted, leaned over the windshield and waved him on. It was my turn. Here we go! I thought as Laurie and I shot up our last-minute prayer. I slowly moved forward. But to my surprise, he just glanced at me, looked away and waved us through. Praise God for that!
But here we were, sitting in the waiting room, wondering if we would ever get our fuel. I quietly prayed, God, You know our needs, and You have promised to provide. After sitting ‘patiently’ for nearly an hour, I got up, went to the window again and cleared my throat to get the attendant’s attention. He continued pecking away at his computer for another minute or so. Then he got up and came to the window, sadly announcing, “I’m still getting an ‘Error’ message, so we can’t sell you fuel right now.” Realizing the hopelessness of the situation, I told him I would go and try the other oil company, to which he said, “Yes, I recommend that you do that.”
Finding the other oil company was a bit of a chore since we had never been there before. It was much further out of town. To make matters worse, the farther we went, the worse the road got. Potholes were everywhere! We finally pulled into a dirt parking lot outside the gate to the depot. Four or five men, presumably company workers, sat on a log in the shade of the same tree under which we parked. It was lunchtime, and the office was closed until one o’clock. We would have to wait another half hour or so. I got out of our warm car and stood beside it, enjoying the breeze. Seeing me leaning against our car, one of the men came over and asked if we were trying to buy fuel. “Yes,” I said.
“How many drums?” he asked.
“Three drums of petrol.”
“I will go and get the office to print out a quote for you, so you won’t have to wait so long.”
A sense of peace came over me as I stood in the shade of the mango tree. God, You’ve got things under control. Thank You for this helpful man. There were more trials that day, like having to make a round trip to town on that bumpy road to pay for the fuel, but we eventually picked up our drums and got them to the wharf in time to be put on the ship.
God doesn’t promise us an easy road. But He does promise to be with us, to strengthen and help us (see Isaiah 41:10). He provides blessings along the way, like that depot worker sacrificing his lunch break to help us. We are to “count it all joy when [we] fall into divers temptations, knowing that the trying of [our] faith worketh patience” (James 1:2-3).
