The light from the projector pierced through the darkness, illuminating the children’s faces as they stared at the movie projected on the large white piece of cloth.  

“This must be the part when Jesus calms the storm!” one child exclaimed to the another, a girl sitting beside her.

The MAF Technologies (formerly CRMF) team was staying the night at the village of Fifix in the Ketarobo area. One of our most recently joined staff member, Simeon Tom, had invited us there.

Carolyn (our Jesus Film/Weekend Ministry Coordinator) made the arrangement possible for all of us. The arrangement was for us to leave for Simeon’s village right after work on Friday and to show the Jesus Film and some short Christian Youth videos that night, then the next morning we would do a TechTalk on the “Advantages and Disadvantages of Technology.”

On Friday afternoon, around 5:00 p.m., we loaded up two buses with the equipments and MAF Technologies (formerly CRMF) staff and families, and headed about twenty minutes drive out of town. The buses dropped us off at Ketarobo near a river – now how to get all our amplifiers, computers, microphone, projector, and other equipment across? We watched as several young men and boys drifted toward us on inflated tubes. Once they reached us, they began putting all our equipment onto tree branches that have been laid out across the inflated tubes. Then off they went, down the stream following the river’s current which took them all the way to the other side of the river. After all the equipment were on the other side, we jumped aboard and was carried to the other side. Everything and everyone made it to the other side of the river without taking a dip in the river!

We carried our equipment, with the help of Simeon’s relatives, to the village where we’ll setup for the night session.  Emerging through the sandy river path and the tall grass, we stepped onto a small grassy green lane under a yara tree that spreads out its branches to give a nice cool shade on a small hill. We were welcomed by the  buzz of the bees and the flutter of the butterflies, as they did their afternoon choirs on the beautiful flowers surrounding a wide meeting area.

We were welcomed by all the families, the pastors and even the children with a wide grin that never left their faces all through out the time we stayed there. After leaving all our baggage inside of the prayer house, assigned to us to use during the week end. It was a massive round house made in the Highlands style with Kunai (long grass) on top and bamboo-blinds for the walls and floor with a huge fire place with three cut – out oil drum in the middle.

We were given a warm welcome ceremony with singing, tambourine music, words of thanks and encouragement which was very special and really blessed us.

When we went back to the prayer house, hot food was prepared and left for us to help ourselves by the sweet mothers of the community. The table was filled with cooked bananas, vegetables, fruits, and ash-baked kaukau (sweet potatoes), not to mention the delicious drum-oven-roasted chicken. After enjoying a hearty meal, we got ready for the night session – the showing of the Jesus Film in Tok Pisin.

A massive tarp was spread out on the lawn as we began to setup. While the community started to gather, we played short video clips. Caine Ruruk (Uncle Caine as known by all the staff and families) encourages the youths through the messages from the short video clips. When the God’s Chisel skit was played, it brought an uproar of laugh from our audiences, after the video stopped, Caine explained the meaning behind the skit and encourages the audience of the message that is behind the skit. With the nodding of heads and murmurs, we saw that they understood, taking in every word of encouragement that was given. Now that most of the community have joined us on the tarp, we put up the Jesus Film. It was 9:00 p.m. by than, the film went on to finish after 11:00 p.m. Even though it was quite late, the young children were still up just to reach the end of the Jesus Film. We went back to the prayer house and called it a night.

After her, Caine emphasis more on the disadvantages of Technology, speaking about the dangers of technology and the effects that pornography have in our lives and how it can destroy our lives.

After the TechTalk we went outside to the meeting area where a large crowd quickly formed to setup the volleyball court for a volleyball game. The youths were super excited to have the Wards playing with them as they were the only Missionaries who come with us and spend the night with us there. As the saying goes: “Time flies when you are having fun!”, and so it was soon time for us to leave. The youth boys with Simeon helped us carry our gear to the river’s edge, loaded them onto the inflated tubes and this time we went up the river and floated down to the other sides. This time most of us had a swim and swam all the way with the current of the river carrying us to the other side of the river. The afternoon’s sun was hot and the coolness from the river was refreshing, we had some fun splashing along with the kids. The community gave us several live chickens as departing gifts to take home with us. It was a fun, and enjoyable week end for all of us.

At MAF Technologies (formerly CRMF) we have recognized the need to talk about technology. Papua New Guineans have jumped from the traditional ages right into the technological age and use of technology is so numerous without a clear knowledge of properly using it and the awareness of the dangers that came with it. The Technology Talk Ministry awareness program is created to do that.