When Stuff Goes Bad

A lot of stuff "goes bad" very quickly around here. It is hot and humid with no air conditioning and most foods are not packed full of the preservatives that make chicken nuggets last through a nuclear apocalypse. Fruits rot. Crackers get stale. Ants invade my sugar. And my flour smells really bad.

Food costs a lot of money in this country, so we have to figure out ways to make things last or use them even if they have gone bad.

Rotten bananas make great banana bread.

Stale cereal and crackers can be baked in the oven to revive their crunch.

My kids can have science class by checking out all the little tunnels in my clear sugar container.

And I can make play dough out of that gross flour...

I found the recipe on the internet. It was really easy and actually looks and feels like play dough you would buy in the store. And as you can tell from the picture was very hard for little fingers to resist.

A lot of other things have "gone bad" for us lately as most of you know. My kids are staying sick. My husband keeps having accidents. We are finding out that our house building fund is only half of what it needs to be now because of the cost of the helicopter. And the fact that there is only one New Tribes helicopter here is making our plans to move into the tribe stretch out longer and longer. Yesterday, I really felt like we were never going to make it. We would be sitting out here in Wewak forever waiting on timing or money or healing or whatever else my depressing thoughts wanted to fill in the blank. It felt like nothing would ever work out in our favor.

And it is not just us. We found out that our friends the Chens are having to leave in the middle of teaching the Biem people God's Word in their language for the very first time because after harsh rounds of chemotherapy and radiation and even being cleared to come back, they just found another lump.

Sure everything goes bad. It has ever since Eve took a bite of that blasted fruit. It ruined everything. Made the world stink and rot. And caused our very existence to seem stale. But since that time, God has been working in the lives of His children to make things new and useful again. To make them beautiful and fun. And His works taste sweet to the soul.

So right now, we are waiting and watching as God makes something way more beneficial to us than play dough out of the the things that have gone bad in our lives. And we are praying for a miracle for our friends, so they can return for the end of the teaching... as the people they have come to know and love on Biem Island hear about the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus for the first time.

We are thankful that we have hope in Christ that allows us to persevere. And we are praising Him that He makes all things new!