After a long period of silence and stagnation, our website is up to date again. There are new journal entries and many new photos. The photos are thanks to our new Panasonic DMC FZ-18, which arrived in Mozambique curtesy of Janice Peters, our team leader.

I can't think of any neat story to put here -- I'm just glad to have the website working again.

January is normally a hungry time in this part of Mozambique. The maize from last year is gone, the new maize is not yet grown. The price of a sack of maize normally doubles during January. Because of this, there are always portions of the various rural communities that are hungry. No one starves, but there are some very lean days.

So today we were trying to deliver 1.3 tonnes of maize to Chiuta today. It didn't work.

This was the road that we were supposed to following. To reach this point, I had already had to pull Steven's car out of the mud twice.

On the way back, things were worse. The ground that had supported the cars on the way in was now churned up. I managed to get passed most places, but Steven's Land Drover has a slightly lower clearance, and thus a lot more problems.

We managed to pull the Land Drover out of this bog, but at the cost of breaking my tow rope and burning out Steven's winch.

Not five minutes later, the car was bogged again, and this time it was stuck fast. We had to unload the 700kg of maize, dig the wheels and transmission out of the mud. Then we had to manually lift the car, at the same time as towing it and driving it to finally get it free.

We returned home sweaty and dirty, still with our maize in tow. The people in Chiuta are still hungry, and the only thing we can say is that we really did try. It has rained all this evening, so it is unlikely that we will be able to pass that road for at least a week or two.

Stories like this never make it into the glossy magazines.

How much can the truth stretch before it snaps? When is someone lying? When does a half-truth become a lie?

Is it OK to tell a half-truth (or indeed an outright lie) if that is the culturally acceptable thing to do?

A simple example: when someone makes a request of you, it is not culturally appropriate to simply deny them their request. It is better to say, "Maybe tomorrow," or "I don't have any." These statements do not have to be true, but they are understood to mean "No" in a polite way.

When we are not here, the person taking care of our house will almost never tell someone where we are.

Looking for a job...

The final instalment of Harry Potter was released on the weekend. I went to the imaginary local bookstore to see if it had arrived, but strangely enough, it wasn't there. I guess Cuamba wasn't a first release site. But just as interesting as the book itself, is the reaction of various Christians to the whole HP phenomenon.

Any Harry Potter release is bound to be accompanied by the usual clamouring from concerned Christians about the dangers that HP represents. Before I had read the books, these worries always seemed quite sincere. But having read all the books several times now, these worries simply seem misguided. Sometimes I wonder if we are actually talking about the same books.

Sometimes, it is painfully obvious that the worries are expressed by people who have not read the books. It is easier to reach neat conclusions if you have not having read the books - but it is hardly just. How can you give a fair appraisal of something you have not read? If you have not read the books, on what will you base your comments? At best, you will only be able to repeat what other people say, but you will have no idea if what they say is accurate.

There seems to be a large degree of fear behind many of the worries. Sincere pleas that Christian children not be allowed to read them for fear that they will somehow be infected. Anxious comments that anyone who had read them submit themselves to counselling to ward off the evil influence. Decisions based on fear are rarely God honouring. Rather, they reflect a mindset where the powers of evil are more powerful than the powers of God, and those who want to remain untainted must fearfully avoid a growing list of prohibited influences, including HP books. There are several figures in the New Testament who fearfully avoided anything that might contaminate their purity, but Jesus was not one of them.

So what are we to make of Harry Potter?

HP is not a Christian book. J.K. Rowlings is a non-Christian and she writes non-Christian books.

For some Christians, no further discussion is necessary: Christians should only read Christian books. For people of this opinion, the only discussion point is what is really a "Christian" book? To be accurate, the only truly Christian book is the Bible, since every author will have faulty theology at some point. For those who are certain they have no faulty theology... QED.

For the rest of us, HP books need to be treated as every other non-Christian book: use with care.

The HP stories are well-written yarns. They tell an intriguing story. There are honourable aspects within them: memorable examples of courage, faithfulness, bravery, wisdom, self-sacrifice. There are other aspects that are not in line with God's standards. Our duty as Christian parents is the same as always: to teach our children to distinguish good from evil. We want to bring up our children in the fear and instruction of the Lord. Part of that process is that we encourage our children to follow honourable examples, while at the same time pointing out where people have left God's paths. This training in distinguishing good from evil is the mark of Christian maturity.

Whenever we read any sort of book - be it novel, biography, history or textbook, Christian or otherwise - we must apply that same discernment. With the sole exception of Jesus, there is no one whose story we can hold up to our children as the uncritical example of how to live. Even Paul messed up from time to time.

Instead of wasting our time fearfully worrying about possible contaminating influences, let us teach our children to distinguish good from evil, and return to the primary mission of bringing the whole world, even those who have read Harry Potter, to know Jesus. In Him we have a hero whose example we can truly follow.

Our telephone bill arrived on Friday. Once again, our internet charges were more than double what they should have been.

While we are waiting for the local telephone company to fix this problem, we will have to make some serious changes to our internet usage (sob!). We will have to limit ourselves to accessing the internet once or twice a week (more accurately, I will have to limit myself). I will still try to respond immediately to urgent emails, but please keep in mind I might not even receive them until three or four days after they are sent.

Welcome to the new look Piper family website. With this new design, we were aiming for a clean, minimalist interface in which the central texts were easier to read. Did we hit that goal? Let us know.

We also have a couple of new areas in the website. The Links section is predictably a collection of places that we find interesting or useful on the Web. The Factoids section is an eclectic collection of information tidbits, which are certainly interesting and possibly true.

In the same way that all property is theft, we can say that all history is deception. Both statements are pithy, arresting, usefully provocative though ultimately false. No one can own something without taking it from someone else. Similarly, no one can relate something without being deceptive. To tell the "truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" is ridiculous. There is not enough time. History involves selecting some facets to report and ignoring others. In the process of selection, the truth is distorted.

For us, this is painfully obvious when we try to tell others about what we do here. When I write about what we have been doing, which of the ten thousand things that have happened will I relate? And how will I express them?

When I record what has happened, which events will I include? Which of the following stories will I choose to write in my journal:

• the help we gave to a widow to help rebuild her house destroyed by the floods
• the Sunday lunch we had with Dave Mansfield at a little "restaurant" at the edge of town
• cramming 3 men, 13 ladies, 4 babies, 2 sacks of food and various luggage into our car
• my excitement at being able to buy vegetables, chocolate, and cheap fillet steak when shopping in Blantyre

[Even in choosing this list of possibilities, my vanity has prevented me from including things are too embarrassing, shallow, or ungodly]

All of these events occurred, but which will I relate to others? Which event I choose to report is determined by what I want to say, what impression I want to give. Recording the first event leaves a very different impression than recording the last one.

Even more important than the selection of events is the manner of reporting it.

If I write, "I prayed last night and God spoke with me", that gives a wonderful impression of godliness. But if I write, "God convicted me last night that I have been wrong in X and I have to change" my godliness is much more in doubt. If I say, "I haven't prayed for two week so I spent some time praying last night," the impression is completely different from the first report.

The trouble is that all these reports could be true for the same event. The only difference is in my manner of reporting it. How do I want to portray the event? All stories are told from a point of view. The question is how much does my point of view distort the truth.

Ultimately the question is one of integrity. The reader cannot verify the truth of what I relate. They can only rely on my integrity, that my process of selection and manner of telling the story have not distorted the truth too much.

This is important for us, and something that is obvious. It is not so obvious (and therefore even more important) in the West. Who chooses what events are reported in the news or newspapers? Who says how those events are reported? Is the person making these decisions a person of integrity, who can be trusted?

Think about that next time you are watching the evening news or reading the front page story of your newspaper.

Understanding Mozambican culture is a key process for our work. Our central tasks - communicating the Gospel and bringing about growth in godliness - require deep insight into people's lives. So, "understand the culture" is a critical piece of advice. But it's also a frustrating piece of advice, on par with "expect the unexpected." Culture is a shared web of understandings, many of which are deep, mysterious, and completely unguessable. The superficial aspects of culture are easy, but it's the deep aspects that jump up and bite you unexpectedly. We think we understand what is going on, and then "clang" something happens that shows we haven't understood at all.

For example, the relationship between Nicola and I. Our relationship is very different from most Mozambican husbands and wives. It's based on Christian ideals and on our own cultural background of chivalry. So, we help each other; I cook dinner and (sometimes) look after the kids; I carry the heavy bags. We're consciously trying to set a counter-example to the more common "economic-model" of marriage: the man gives food and security and, in exchange, the woman gives marital privileges and takes care of the house and children. We assume that when people see us, they see that counter-example. To us, it seems obvious. But, as we've discovered, what is "obvious" is cultural determined too.

Recently, someone explained to us that he understood how our (Nicola's and mine) relationship worked. Nicola regularly gives me drugs (from the curandeiros) to make me hopelessly in love with her. Because of those drugs, I am a pateta ("fool") for her, doing whatever she wants me to do. And Nicola does this so she can sit around and be lazy. To him, this was the obvious explanation.

We were completely surprised and a little amused: how could someone think that? Apart from not matching reality (Nicola is never lazy), his explanation simply made no sense to us. We would never have imagined that someone could look at us and come up with that explanation. Yet, for this person, that explanation made sense - more than that, it was obvious. It made more sense to him that a wife would bewitch her husband than that the husband would serve his wife. A husband voluntarily helping his wife was just as unexpected to him as a wife drugging her husband was unthought of to us.

Once we had digested this revelation, other questions naturally followed: what do people see in other aspects of our life? What do people really hear when we preach about grace, or forgiveness, or holiness? And most profoundly, how will we know? How will we know when people have misunderstood? We think we are being understood; they think they understand. But, because of some deep cultural differences, we have actually completely miscommunicated. With our relationship, we thought we were showing God's plan for marriage, but he saw an advertisement for the power of the curandeiro. It's daunting and a little discouraging to think that everything we do could be misinterpreted, and misinterpreted in a way that dishonours God.

So, in the face of such potential miscommunication, what are we to do? Clearly, we're not going to curl up into a ball and do nothing!

• We have to work to form trust relationships with people. It is only when someone trusts us will they risk telling us what they really think. That is the chance we have to find out where our understanding is faulty. In that regard, please thank God for the gift of friendship between us and Pastor Marcelino's family. In them, we have friends whose advice and opinions we can trust.
• We have to also pray and ask God to cover over our mistakes and misunderstandings (as well as our outright sins) so that, somehow, people really see and hear the Gospel through us. We are limited by our faulty understand, but God is not. He can advance his Kingdom even through our mistakes.

While we were on home assignment last year, the church we were working with split. We have been to both of the "half" churches, and something is very different. There is a broke-ness, an out-of-sync-ness that has changed the character of both sides of the split. We're not comfortable with giving support to either half of the split. So, we have decided to put a year of space between ourselves and the split church. This has not been an easy decision, but we are praying that it will be a wise decision.

This has turned our previously fairly well-defined ministry into turmoil. The plans that we had made in Australia for our ministry here revolved around that church and its outlying satellite churches. Almost all my visits, teaching, preaching had been associated with that church — without it, I have found myself at a loose-end. There have been days when I just haven't known what to do.

But God has been good, and has brought us in contact with another church where we are quickly settling into ministry.

We've returned to Cuamba, and Robin Williams may well have been talking about here. The rains have started, but the temperature hasn't changed too much. Above 35C is normal during the day, and it hardly drops below 30C in our house at night.

But that's just a slight annoyance -- the real problem is hunger. The harvest last year was poor -- the worst for more than 20 years -- and there is real famine here. The year's first produce should be available by March, so people only have to hang on for five weeks. But five weeks is a long time if you're already hungry. We're taking 100 sacks of grain to two nearby towns next week, hoping to help 100 of the most needy families survive. There is still the constant flow of people at the gates.

Andrew Marvell had quite earthy (and not altogether honourable) pleasures in mind when he wrote those words, but we agree with his observation about the unstoppable passage of time. We can scarcely believe that we've already been home for more than nine months! There's less than three months until we return to Mozambique -- Lord willing. We're booked to fly out 10am on 1 January 2006, so there won't be any late night partying on New Years Eve.

During this year, the kids have had fun going to a normal school -- first time ever for Drew. They've also appreciated some of the advantages of home schooling, like not having to work after lunch! Isabella has just been loved to pieces by everyone, but especially the grandparents. And we've been loving family dinners, restaurants, and baby-sitters!

We have another "official" family photo, perfect for printing and pining on a missionary notice board. Again, there's a high res version that will still look good after printing on a reasonable quality printer.

The year is drawing to a close, and its ending brings with it more than the usual number of changes.

Most obviously, we're returning home for a years home assignment. We're looking forward to relaxing with family, eating nice food, seeing some movies and coming to speak in lots of churches :-)

But this year will also be the end of my discipleship group. All of the young men will have finished at school, and will be seeking employment or further studies in other cities. I was truly sad when I realised that these would be the last few weeks of studying with these young godly men.

As always, lots of things have happened, but I only had time to write about a few of them -- in fact, all of September passed without comment:

• dealing with dishonesty
• the making of more denominations
• Isabella meets an ENT

More mundanely, we have a new "official" family photo, perfect for printing and pining on a missionary notice board. There's even a high res version that will still look good after printing on a reasonable quality printer.

Welcome to the new look website, without banner or popup ads. No more inducements to buy Viagra, make your fortune through online gambling or enlarge various body parts by up to 30%! Many thanks to Figtree Anglican Church for kindly agreed to host our website.

Many interesting things have happened since our last update:

• dealing with fallen leaders
• how can we be wise when someone in front of you is in desperate need?
• when people work for you, how should Christians mix grace and deserts?
• watching a prison break live - better than reality TV

Our house was finished on Friday, and we moved in yesterday. Praise God! Both the house and the dependencia look quite different than when we first bought them, as you can see below.

before	after

Our big news is that Nicola is pregnant! All being well, the newest Piper-zinho will arrive in January next year. Our second big news is that we'll be coming home for Nicola to have the baby in Australia (a huge thanks to our folks!). And we'll be home for our first Christmas in almost 4 years!

It's been a couple of months since the page was updated and lots of things have happened:

• What happens when trust relationships break down?
• One more case of how do we know who to trust
• Should compassion overrule integrity?
• Phillip goes to prison

• Our annual church conference was held under an enormous mango tree
• Two little girls peeking nervously at the strange white man
• The smallest gecko you've ever seen
• Our car becomes air conditioned

Wouldn't you like to be sitting enjoying this view of an African sunset? Probably -- but not if you're sitting next to a car without fuel, stuck miles from anywhere, waiting for someone to come back with a full jerry can, fending off mosquitoes intent on using you as a local blood bank! Actually, it was quite fun/relaxing/peaceful for the first few hours. Only after nightfall did it become a little aggravating. At least, I got a nice shot of a sunset :-) [Read the whole story]