SEPTEMBER, 2004
The Touch of the Master's Hand
Twas
battered and scarred, and the auctioneer
Thought it scarcely worth his
while
To waste much time on the old
violin,
But held it up with a smile.
"What am I bidden, good
folks," he cried,
"Who will start bidding for
me?
A dollar, a dollar" --then,
"Two!" "Only two?
Two dollars, and who'll make it
three?
Three dollars, twice;
"Going for three --" But
no,
From the room, far back, a
gray-haired man
Came forward and picked up the
bow;
Then wiping the dust from the old
violin,
And tightening the loose strings.
He played a melody pure and sweet
As sweet as a caroling angel
sings.
The music ceased and the
auctioneer
With a voice that was quiet and
low,
Said what am I bidden for the old
violin?
And he held it up with the bow.
A thousand dollars, and who'll
make it two?
Two thousand! And who'll make it
three?
Three thousand, once; three
thousand twice;
And going, and gone!" said
he.
The people cheered, but some of
them cried,
"We do not quite understand
What changed its worth?" Swift
came the reply:
"The touch of the master's
hand.
And many a man with life out of
tune,
And battered and scattered with
sin,
Is auctioned off cheap to the
thoughtless crowd,
Much like the old violin.
A "mess of pottage," a
glass of wine;
A game -- and he travels on.
He's "going" once, and
"going" twice,
He's "going" and
"almost gone."
But the Master comes and the
foolish crowd
Never quite understands
The worth of a soul and the change
that's wrought
By the touch of the Master's hand.
Saturday is the Sabbath
J. Vernon McGee tells this story about a man who wanted to
argue about the Sabbath. The man said, "I'll give you $100 if you will
show me where the Sabbath day has been changed." McGee answered, "I
don't think it has been changed. Saturday is Saturday, it is the seventh say of
the week, and it is the Sabbath day. I realize our calendar has been adjusted,
and can be off a few days, but we won't even consider that point. The seventh
day is still Saturday, and it is still the Sabbath day."
He
got a gleam in his eye and said, "Then why don't you keep the Sabbath day
if it hasn't been changed?"
McGee
answered, "the DAY hasn't changed, but I have been changed. I've been
given a new nature now, I am joined to Christ; I am a part of the new creation.
We celebrate the first day because that is the day He rose from the
grave."
That
is what it means that the ordinances have been nailed to the cross, Colossians
2:14.
J.
Stolen Car
A man is
being tailgated by a stressed-out woman on a busy boulevard.
Suddenly, the light
turns yellow, just in front of him. He does the honest thing, and stops at the
crosswalk, even though he could have beaten the red light by accelerating
through the intersection. The tailgating woman hits the roof, and the horn,
screaming in frustration as she misses her chance to get through the
intersection with him.
As she is still in
mid-rant, she hears a tap on her window and looks up into the face of a very
serious police officer. The officer orders her to exit her car with her hands
up. He takes her to the police station where she is searched, fingerprinted,
photograph-ed, and placed in a cell. After a couple of hours, a policeman
approaches the cell and opens the door. She is escorted back to the booking desk
where the arresting officer is waiting with her personal effects.
He says, "I'm
very sorry for this mistake. You see, I pulled up behind your car while you
were blowing your horn, making an obscene gesture to the guy in front of you,
and cussing a blue streak at him. I noticed the 'Choose Life' license plate
holder, the 'What Would Jesus Do?' bumper sticker, the 'Follow Me to Sunday
School' bumper sticker, and the chrome plated Christian fish emblem on the
trunk."
"Naturally, I
assumed you had stolen the car."
The other
day, a friend of mine read that a methamphetamine lab had been found in an old
farm house in the adjoining county and he asked me a rhetorical question,
"Why didn't we have a drug problem when you and I were growing up?
I smiled and said,
"I did have a drug problem when I was a kid growing up on the farm."
I was drug to church
on Sunday morning.
I was drug to church
for weddings and funerals.
I was drug to family reunions and community socials no matter the
weather.
I was drug by my ears when I was
disrespectful to adults and teachers.
I was also drug to the woodshed when I disobeyed my parents or if I
didn't put forth my best effort in everything that was asked of me.
I was drug out to pull weeds in Mom's garden and flower beds and
cockleburs out of dad's soybean fields.
Those drugs are still in my veins; and they affect my behavior in
everything I do, say, and think. They are stronger than cocaine, crack or
heroin, and if today's children had this kind of drug problem,
received via e-mail
We Can
All Be Encouraged ...And Useful
The next time you feel that God cannot use you, just
remember...
· Noah got
drunk
· Abraham
was too old
· Isaac was
a daydreamer
· Jacob was
a liar
· Leah was
ugly
· Joseph
was abused
· Moses had
a stuttering problem
· Gideon
was afraid
· Sampson
had long hair and was a womanizer
· Rahab was
a prostitute
· David had
an affair and was a murderer
· Elijah
was suicidal
· Jeremiah
and Timothy were too young
· Isaiah
preached naked
· Jonah ran
from God
· Naomi was
a widow
· Job went
bankrupt
· John the
Baptist ate bugs
· Peter
denied Christ
· Paul was
too religious
· The
Samaritan woman was divorced, more than once.
· Zacchaeus
was too small
· The
Disciples fell asleep while praying
· Martha
worried about everything
· Timothy
had an ulcer....and...
· Lazarus
was dead!
· No more
excuses now. God can use you to your full potential. Besides you aren't the
message, just the messenger.
· God wants
spiritual fruit, not religious nuts.
· Dear God,
I have a problem, it's me.
· Growing
old is inevitable, growing UP is optional.
· Do the
math... count your blessings.
· There is
no key to happiness. The door is always open.
· Faith is
the ability to not panic
· Silence
is often misinterpreted but never misquoted.
· A grudge
is a heavy thing to carry.
· Laugh
every day, it's like inner jogging.
· If you
worry, you didn't pray...If you pray, don't worry
· He who
dies with the most toys is still dead.
received via e-mail
Dr. Peil's
Science Corner
Creation -
24-hour days? The contention over how long the 'days' of Genesis 1
were, centers on the meaning of the Hebrew word for day: YOM. Consider
the following:
1) the word
'day' can have a variety of meanings: solar day (24 hours), daylight,
indefinite period of time.
2) Yom
occurs 2291 times in the Old Testament and it almost always means a literal,
24-hour day. Only 65 times is Yom used in the Old Testament to mean an
indefinite period of time.
3) When
used in the plural form 'Yamin' (845 times), it always refers to a literal day.
4) When
'Yom' is modified by numeral or ordinal in historical narratives (359 times in
the Old Testament outside of Genesis 1), it always means a 24-hour day.
5) When
'Yom' is modified by 'evening and/or morning' (38 times outside of Genesis 1),
it always means a 24-hour day. I like to ask the following question to
people that believe the 'days' of Genesis 1 refer not to 24-hour days but
rather to long periods of time: 'If God intended the creation days to be
understood as 24 hour days, how could He have rewritten the account to clear up
any confusion?' The answer you will usually get is silence.
The Struggle with
Worship
This
struggle with worship engages only Christians. The unconverted have no such
Pauline inner conflict expressed in the confession: “The good that I will to
do, I do not do, but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.” The
conscientious child of God wrestles with the problem daily, even when it comes
to worship. Even pastors and worship planners struggle with the dilemma. I
know!
I wonder how much
this struggle accounts for the revival of revivals, contemporary “alternate”
services, the rapidly changing styles of sacred music, the appeal of spectacle
and theatricality, the casualness and superficiality of some worship services
in the attempt to make people “glad to go to the house of the Lord.”
In fifty years of
full-time and part-time ministry, I wonder how often I was (unintentionally)
responsible for turning off the person in the pew with my style of preaching,
the focus of my message, my selection of hymns, the conduct of the liturgy - or
with some personality quirk or annoying mannerism.
Since my retirement,
I have discovered that I am not attracted to certain churches because I do not
agree with their theology, or because the services border on cultism, or I can
see through the preacher’s theatrics, or the predominate music is too shallow
to waste another Sunday of my life missing the depth and awesomeness of a
substantive hymnody that has nourished millions of worshipers for centuries, or
because the Lord’s Supper Christ prescribed is missing, or a fitting reverence
is destroyed by the attitudes and irreverent behavior of the churchgoers, or
because a particular church is exclusive or racist. Many of these reasons for
not going to church echoed ones I heard from members and non-members during my
ministry.
Also to be
considered: a person may be “glad” to go to the church for the wrong reason,
like the Pharisee who kept the Sabbath faithfully and contributed generously -
and still went home unjustified. Or worshipers who are “glad,” but bring
leftover sacrifices shamed by the widow’s mite, or are carried away by the
music and sing “Lord, Lord,” but their hearts are far from the God in whose
presence they stand.
The hymn writer must
be aware of this universal struggle with worship while taking into
consideration the essential elements of worship, the theological content of the
hymns, the language of the times, and the culture the Gospel is trying to reach
and transform.
Most of the
experiences and struggles of hymn writers influence their hymn writing in some
way. In preparing a hymn text, I have tried to reflect and honestly express
universal faith experiences common to all saints and sinners, thus making it
suitable for corporate worship. Anything less would be artificial or contrived,
not grounded in sincerity or truth.
(Missionary Terry Schultz,
Smoking with the
Devil
“This is how we
know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are:
Anyone who does not do what is right is not a child of God…” I John 3:10a.
Until we become
Children of God through faith, we are nothing less than Children of the Devil!
¨ I’ve stated that Biblical truth to every one of our Amazon congregations, and
it certainly gets everyone’s attention. Until we are completely
transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit, we remain in the Devil’s
domain. Of course with some people, their times in the domain of darkness
and later in the domain of light are marked with graphic and dramatic episodes.
Such was the case with Miguel.
Miguel is the 77 year
old Father of our Tarapoto church member Ramon. The son plays guitar for
our Services. Ramon’s wife Socorro teaches Sunday School. Miguel
walks a bit bent over, and has serious gaps between his last few teeth. His
scratched-up eyeglasses with hopelessly bent frames sit so askew on his face he
looks like he just came up out of a car wreck. His health in general isn’t
too good. And up until only a couple years ago, Miguel was as much a child of
the Devil as anyone I have ever seen. Let’s take his extraordinary,
bizarre story back to the beginning.
From childhood through
early adulthood, Miguel lived in a small mestizo village on a river in the
Amazon jungle. Like most young men of the river villages, he grew up to
feel completely at home in the jungle and, like only a few, became a renowned
hunter.
Life can be more than
a little crude in a jungle village, a place where most people barely eek out a
living growing rice or corn. A remote town often becomes a law unto
itself, and all manner of rough behavior becomes common. The hard life
often becomes an excuse for a lot of hard drinking. Early on, Miguel
learned to drink a lot.
Like most jungle
villages, Miguel’s had a shaman, and the people were steeped in superstitions
and witchcraft. As hunting at night in the jungle can be dangerous
business, Miguel learned all kinds of superstitious practices and charms,
thinking it would give him a little extra protection out there. After
all, one could easily encounter deadly snakes, dangerous animals, and dreaded
evil spirits in the Amazon jungle. Let’s go with just a couple truly
macabre examples of superstitious practices Miguel depended on:
Naturally, a great
concern of jungle hunters is to be bit by a deadly snake. Miguel rapidly
rattled off to me one day a list of the dangerous snakes that inhabited his
part of the jungle, names like gergon, cascabel, loro machach, nacanaca, and misho
gergon. The deadly venom of some of these exotic species will kill a man
in less than 24 hours. And even should a hunter that has been bitten by a
venomous snake somehow manage to stumble back to the village, an antidote might
not be available or even exist. Thus, Miguel and the village hunters
placed their confidence in an ancient magical concoction or potion they always
kept on hand. They believed it would ward off even the deadliest of
snakes: (Caution: Graphic description ahead. Unless you like
reading about severed snake heads, skip the next 3 paragraphs all together.)
Now the first thing
the hunters need to brew up their magical potion: A dead snake from each of the
deadly species they wish to be protected from. Obviously, this is the
tricky part. However once again, the village men have their
methods. Suppose one day you are walking to your marshy rice field, and
you spot a deadly snake on your path! And, you have no rifle with you,
only your machete! Not to worry: First, one would cut down a long
tree branch. Next, you soak the tip of one end of the pole with tobacco
juice. By carefully sticking this under the super-sensitive nose of the
deadly snake, he will fall asleep in a matter of moments. You then have
15 minutes to come up and hack the snake to death. The prized snakehead
is now yours!
Back in the village,
your snake head draws the approval of all the men and together, everyone heads
for the house of the village’s most expert hunter. Everyone watches as
the master hunter reaches for a large container the size of a water
pitcher. However, that’s definitely not water in the container:
It’s full to the brim with homemade, sugar cane alcohol. And, floating in
the alcohol are over half a dozen semi-decomposed severed snakeheads!!!
(Hey, I warned you!)
Your contribution is
ceremoniously plopped into the pitcher, and the pitcher carefully put
away. However, the next time any of the village men get ready to go out
on a jungle hunt: They will first stop at this hut and drink a small
glass of the alcohol-and-snakehead concoction! For the hunters believe
that the marinating snakeheads all contain a bit of venom which ends up in your
glass! So, by actually drinking snake venom with your alcohol, you will
become stronger than the poison – (so the theory goes). Furthermore, the
hunters are convinced that any poisonous snakes they come upon in the jungle
will actually smell the dead-snake drink on them! This makes the live
snakes fearful, and they will immediately slither away! The proof of the
potion is in the many midnight hunts people go on in which nobody has gotten
bit!
Fortified with the
strange brew, Miguel would often set out on a late night jungle hunt by
himself. And, he never forgot to pack a big, homemade cigar with him.
Now everyone in the village believed that the jungle was full of menacing, evil
spirits that may try and carry you away. (How else to explain the
occasional child or adult who wandered into the jungle and was never seen
again?) It was strongly believed that the Devil himself often roamed in
the jungle at night. One had to take some measure to appease him so he
wouldn’t harm you. That’s where the big cigar came in.
Early on during an
evening jungle hunt, Miguel would take the cigar out, light it, and smoke it
exactly half-way down, then put it out. He would then set the other half
of the cigar in a tree branch as high up as he could reach. The cigar was
an offering to the Devil, who they believe enjoys a good smoke. Sure
enough, Miguel said, he never once returned to the tree branch to find the
cigar still there.
Meanwhile, as if being
immersed in all the village’s superstitions wasn’t enough, Miguel recalls as a
young man, receiving a book from a friend on magia negra, black magic.
Miguel was convinced the black magic book gave him reliable information
on the character of the Devil and evil spirits; - spirits whose behavior ranged
from simple though mysterious mischief to actual bodily harm, including
dragging live victims off to the dreaded spirit world. After reading the
black magic book, Miguel believed he had somehow inadvertently opened a door to
more encounters with the spirits of the midnight jungle.
For example, Miguel
would be hunting all alone at night, when all of a sudden a monstrous-size wild
boar would come charging straight at him! Unexplainably Miguel would not
have heard it’s approach and gotten ready! He would frantically raise his
shotgun and actually get a direct shot off just as the huge wild boar leaped at
him, only to find that the animal would disappear into thin air!!
Apparently some form of supernatural mischief was at work. The same
phenomena happened so often, that Miguel started to wonder when to shoot and
when not to shoot. In the end he always shot, knowing that to make one
misjudgment would be fatal!
Miguel mentioned one
other hair-raising phenomenon that began repeating itself with disconcerting
regularity: While walking along in the jungle night, all of a sudden a
hunting knife, as if thrown from somewhere above him would come flashing down
and pierce the ground just inches in front of him. Had he taken one more
step, the knife would have certainly stabbed him! Miguel would bend down
to pull the knife out of the ground, only to have it disappear as his fingers
closed around the handle! Miguel was sure this was the work of the evil
spirits, so he would recite incantations to protect himself from being stabbed.
Eventually, Miguel thought it best to simply get rid of the black magic book
all together. He concluded that the more he studied about trying to
control the spirits, the more the spirits came after him!
Many years later,
Miguel moved away from the jungle village and into the big town of
Now it was only a
couple years ago when Miguel’s 70 year old wife, Berdilia, began attending
adult instruction courses at our Tarapoto church at the invitation of Ramon and
Socorro. It immediately became apparent that the Holy Spirit was working
in her heart. Berdilia came to every weekly class and was most anxious to
hear the good news of Jesus.
Berdilia’s regular
attendance infuriated Miguel. He loudly complained that she should be
home cooking and cleaning instead of heading off in the evening for
classes. Miguel would take to drinking heavily in the early evening when
he knew she would have a class. In his drunken condition he would hurl
down such coarse insults and abuse that she would sometimes leave for class in
tears. Not only was he verbally attacking her, but Bertilia was becoming
more convinced by the week of how spiritually blind and totally lost her
husband was. The situation hit rock bottom as Miguel’s scurrilous, drunken,
tongue-lashings took a new twist. He now screamed at Berdilia as she left
for class that he suspected she was having an ongoing affair with the
pastor!! - And, maybe an affair also with the gringo pastor who visited
monthly. For nearly half a year the abuse continued every night Berdilia
headed out for Bible class.
Berdilia never stopped
praying for Miguel. She prayed that he would repent and believe in Jesus,
and stop his heavy drinking. Nearly a year after she began classes, Ronal
and I had some of our Chayahuita native leaders from the Amazon jungle come to
Tarapoto to study at our Bible Institute. Our training classes always
started early in the morning. Naturally, we invited anyone from the
Tarapoto congregation to sit in on the classes also. Bertilia couldn’t
wait to come!
But then, a strange
thing happened. First of all, you must realize that having Amazon jungle
natives in Tarapoto was quite the extraordinary event for the
neighborhood. There was a lot of curiosity throughout the barrio.
Perhaps it wasn’t a complete surprise when Miguel, (sober in the morning and
with nothing much to do) figured he may as well wander over with Berdilia for a
morning class, to see these jungle natives close up. Well friends, that
little opening was all the Holy Spirit needed to go to work on Miguel!!
Miguel heard us
present the wonderful message of God’s love for sinners. He also heard us
describe Jesus’ defeat of the Devil and the evil spirits, (always a topic of
utmost interest to jungle-dwelling natives). Miguel came back the next day, and
the next, and the next. He was soon nodding in agreement as we taught of
God’s personal interest in saving every last sinner, regardless of their
past. A major transformation was underway!
By the end of the
week, (talk about the unimaginable) Miguel was quietly sitting beside Berdilia
with crayon in hand. He was helping color posters and pictures of Jesus
for the natives to take back to the villages to use when telling Bible
stories!! (You know I can’t write these words without my eyes really
misting up.) We could hardly believe what was happening! Miguel
just seemed to chuckle once in a while, perhaps as surprised as the rest of us
at his participation. Berdilia would sit beside her husband coloring away,
praying that what was happening was real.
Miguel, obviously by
the Spirit’s power, seemed to be vanquishing the demons that had plagued him
for so long. Almost immediately, his drinking diminished and with it the
verbal abuse. Vicar Ronal jumped in with individual counseling sessions
and the transformation continued. For as the Holy Spirit tells us,
nothing less than an entirely “new creature” must emerge, transformed by the
loving power of God Himself.
And so amigos, this
all brings us to an unforgettable event that occurred a couple weeks ago.
It was the second anniversary of the dedication of our Church building / Bible
Institute, and the Tarapoto congregation had insisted on a special celebratory
Service. (Peruvians love having celebrations!) Our service included
presentations by the Sunday School Choir, Youth Choir, a theater piece by the
youth, the Sunday School Choir from sister congregation El Eden, etc.
It happened about
midway through the carefully arranged program, right after the Tarapoto Youth
Choir had finished their two songs. All of a sudden, Miguel was shuffling
up the center aisle of the church, heading straight for the chancel and the
microphone! He was clutching in his hand a folded scrap of paper.
He got to the microphone and simply announced that he had a song he had written
to his Savior Jesus and he would like to sing it now. With no
accompaniment for his wavering, cracking, 77 year old voice, he sang a song of
about 6 simple lines. Each line sounding like it was in a different key
from the last. Extra beats were needed as the old man tried to catch his
wheezing breath. No matter. I assure you, the holy angels in heaven
stopped in their sacred tracks the moment Miguel started to sing. If was
simply beyond belief. One year ago, no one would have ever imagined the
sight. Old Miguel, former drunk and spouse abuser as the entire
neighborhood knew now sang his own song to Jesus!
The song ended, and
there was a moment of stunned silence over what had just transpired. Then
the congregation erupted in huge applause! What a graphic image of the
Holy Spirit’s life-altering power! I had been standing in the back of the
church, taking it all in. Miguel headed back down the center aisle, still
holding his special scrap of paper, gray head down, smile of relief and
accomplishment on his face. I dashed up to him in the middle of the isle and
wrapped him up in a big bear hug. The congregation erupted even
further!! I spoke into his ear that God was so happy with him for powerfully
witnessing to his faith in Jesus. Miguel nodded in appreciation, then
shuffled over to his seat and sat down. I saw Berdilia, tears running
down her cheeks, quietly take his hand and squeeze it. A soft smile came to his
face. The man had finally found peace.
Until next time
Amigos,
Terry
Following is a
collection of crazy tales that an anthropologist might record. While they
don’t have a whole lot to do directly with our jungle ministry, they do reveal
just how strange, dark, even deranged, things sometimes get around here!
Yes, that is a warning to proceed with caution!
We always suspected
that the driver and car we regularly rented for the 6 hour run to Yurimaguas
may be hauling more than just our suitcases in the trunk. However, as his car
was one of the few whose back tires had even a hint of tread left, plus he was
the most experienced driver available, we had little choice but to use him.
Besides, we never actually saw any of the illegal stuff with our own
eyes.
What we did see were a
lot of whispered, clandestine conversations between the driver and shady
national policemen at the various checkpoints. And so we weren’t totally
surprised when we found out one day that our driver (name purposely withheld)
did get caught smuggling (details purposely withheld) and was no longer
driving. The honest policemen confiscated his car, his driver’s license,
and threatened to throw him in prison for a very long time…unless, of course,
the driver would cooperate with the police and reveal a couple of his fellow
driver-smugglers. And that is exactly what he did. It was only a
few months later when we saw our driver back at the car stop looking for
passengers. But by now, Ronal and I had found a new driver for our run to
Yurimaguas.
The new driver,
Wilfredo was a short, balding, pudgy, high-energy guy, greasy mustache,
impeccably clean white shirt, with one gold tooth that flashed when he broke
into his frequent smile. Wilfredo exhibited enormous respect towards
Ronal and me for being pastors, and seemed to take a special pride in
transporting two men on their way to do Evangelism work among the natives.
Wilfredo himself
professed faith in Jesus, while at the same time advising Ronal and me not to
discount the power of shamanism and sorcery. On one trip, Wilfredo described in
far too much detail a shamanic healing process he had undergone for a
life-threatening illness. Wilfredo was “cured” when he drank the shaman’s
magic herbal and liquor concoction and “spit up a giant hairball just like a
cat, except is was a lot bigger.”
Last month, after our
usual grueling yet exhilarating circuit through 4 jungle congregations, Ronal
and I found ourselves in Yurimaguas needing a return ride to Tarapoto. However,
a few phone calls revealed that Wilfredo was still down there, not in Yuri
where we needed him. Not to worry. Wilfredo said he would drive
that night, bringing a couple passengers up to Yuri, and then be able to take
us back in the early morning to Tarapoto. Ronal pleaded with Wilfredo not to
make a dangerous night run simply to help us out, but Wilfredo wouldn’t
listen. He should have.
Wilfredo started out
for Yuri around 6:00 PM, while it was still dusk, with one passenger in the
front seat and one in the back. By 10:00 it was pitch black out.
Winding around the dangerous narrow road that wraps around the steep mountains,
one has to drive ever so slowly. The drivers all know this… And so
do the highway robbers.
That night in the
moonless darkness, Wilfredo had just slowed to a crawl for yet another sharp
mountain curve. And then, like something out of a medium-budget horror flick,
Wilfredo’s headlight beams revealed the silhouettes of three ski-masked figures
standing right in the middle of the road! Each had a rifle in one hand pointed
at the car, their other hand insistently waving Wilfredo to come to a
halt. Wilfredo had but an instant to decide what to do.
He immediately ducked
his head under the dashboard and stomped on the gas.
The three hooded men
had a split second to dive out of the way, as the well-tuned car leaped
forward, nearly running them over. One of the robbers had the reflexes to
still get a shot off. The bullet hit the middle of the windshield,
cracking the glass to the edges. The sound of bullet hitting glass woke
the passenger in the front seat. Talk about a living nightmare: Imagine,
waking up to see your driver with his head under the dashboard amidst
splintered glass, driving at a high speed right for the edge of the
cliff! The passenger was too horrified to scream! Meanwhile, the
other passenger in the backseat never woke up.
Wilfredo sat up at the
last possible moment after passing the robbers, and tried and get his
bearings. Meanwhile, another bullet now came whizzing by from behind,
this time shattering the driver’s outside rearview mirror. Obviously the
robbers were intent on killing Wilfredo. The diminutive driver gripped
the steering wheel with both hands, nearly rising out of his seat as he applied
all his strength to turning the car left to avert going over the cliff.
Mere inches away from plunging into a void of pure darkness and certain death
in the valley below, the car made the turn. The whole incident, which
actually lasted only a few terrifying seconds, was over as they sped away down the
mountain road.
The next morning,
Wilfredo picked us up at our hostel at the appointed 6:00 time. The
splintered front windshield and shattered rearview mirror bore testimony to the
attempted ambush. A slightly shaken Wilfredo greeted us with the announcement
that he was through making late night runs. However a couple hours down
the road and he was back to his usual cheerful self regaling us with a few
bizarre tales from his collection of Amazon stories.
This first story is
unbelievably strange, somewhat disturbing, and I almost didn’t include
it. However, I have never seen such an example of temptations creeping
into young people’s lives while parents went unaware, - temptations that
quickly endangered eternal souls. It is also the most unparalleled
example of poor parenting skills you may ever hear. We’ll just call this
story:
“…but a child left to himself disgraces his mother.” Prov.
29:15b.
As Wilfredo tells it,
we passed a point on the mountain road where, if you walked straight into the
jungle for about 4 hours, you would come upon a small, isolated mestizo
village, - a village that very much keeps to itself and likes it that
way. All the men have their fields of corn or rice, and make a humble,
respectable living.
It wasn’t too long
ago, that the youths of the village discovered that a strange man had moved in,
several hours away from the village, in an isolated, hastily-constructed
shack. Now it’s not all that uncommon for people to just live out here in
the middle of nowhere, as the jungle can supply all your essential needs.
But there was something different, fascinating about the strange man. He
had a mysterious glint to his eyes, and a smooth, assured way about him that
immediately attracted the boys. The boys loved hanging out with the man,
who always had time to talk with them and encourage them. After all, the
boy’s fathers were usually still in the fields when they came home from school
around 1:00. The fathers wouldn’t return home until after dark, often
after drinking with their fellow farmers. The boys, apparently starved
for adult male attention, started hanging out with the strange man a lot.
Now the man owned a
number of rather valuable items that he occasionally flashed before the teenage
boy’s eyes, - things like large knives, silver bracelets, nice wristwatches.
“Where did all this stuff come from, the boys finally asked,” their curiosity
getting the best of them. “Oh, you’d be surprised how much of this stuff
people keep hidden around, even in these villages,” the man said.
And that friends, is how it all began. Like a crazy Amazon version of
Dickens’ Fagin in Oliver Twist, the strange man turned the boys into his own
little band of thieves.
At first it was all
too easy. As the boys were known in all the surrounding villages, their
presence aroused no suspicion. With exquisite care, the man taught the
boys the rudiments of robbery: Where to look, when to look and how much
you could get away with. Of course, all the goods had to be turned over
to the man, who would give a little hard cash to each boy. That was how
the system worked. The real payoff for the boys was more in the
attention, approval, and sense of adventure and camaraderie they found in the
tight-knit group. Everything went well up until: One of the boys nearly
got caught, and decided he wanted out. And in a breathtakingly short
period of time, the entire enterprise went seriously out of control.
The strange man first
tried to take care of the “problem boy,” with physical threats. But that was
only temporarily effective. Even a few physical thrashings of the boy in
front of the other boys didn’t do the trick. The gang had a serious
problem on their hands. Finally, (and here, Wilfredo was a little hazy on
the details, not knowing whether the man actually ordered it or not), in their
eagerness to win their master’s approval, the boys took the problem boy far out
into the jungle and killed him. They buried the body where no one could
possibly find it.
Of course, the man now
had a huge problem on his hands. He had all the boys swear a blood oath
never to reveal what had happened or he would personally see to it that the
betrayer suffered the same fate. This scared all the boys out of their
wits. Meanwhile the village, needless to say, was up in arms. The
boys themselves were enlisted, along with every able body in the village, to go
searching for the missing boy. Astoundingly, up to this time the whole
“gang of thieves” operation was still unknown to anyone, - even though there
was great suspicion that something was afoot, given the rash of robberies in
all the surrounding villages. Finally, one of the boys could take it no
longer, and he confessed everything to his parents, from the robberies to the
assassination. The final dramatic collapse of the petty criminal enterprise
that had evolved into murder would now be swift and merciless.
What was about to
happen may not be that surprising, given the all-to-common occurrences of
vigilante justice in these remote jungle villages. However, what
qualifies for truly bizarre is the manner in which “jungle justice” was served:
As the first boy
confessed to everything that had happened, parents were quickly summoned, along
with their guilty sons. All the boys were put on trial as one, standing
in the middle of a ring of furious parents. Some fathers had to be
physically restrained from beating their boys on the spot, it was said.
No one knew any of this had been going on. Not a single parent had even
met the mysterious Fagin figure who had led all the boys astray.
After all the
confessions had been heard, there were whispered conversations between all the
parents, including the anguished parents of the dead boy. Still standing
in a huddled mass, the once proud, arrogant bandito boys were now just
blubbering away. The stunned parents finished their impromptu conference,
and suddenly all the dads broke away and left. The mothers turned to glare at
their wayward sons, who obviously wouldn’t be going anywhere.
Now it’s one thing to
hear an irritated, exasperated mom say, “you just wait till your father gets
home.” It’s another thing to get caught in the most serious criminal behavior
imaginable, and then see your father coming to see you with a shotgun in his
hand. And that is just what all the boys saw. A collective scream
of terror rang out from the ring of boys. The mothers sharply silenced
their sons with the words, “no your father isn’t going to shoot you, even
though it crossed our minds.” No dear readers, the plan was much too demented
for that. The fathers tossed his shotguns to their kids who, being jungle
kids, certainly knew how to hunt.
And with a nod of
ascent from the parents of the murdered boy, the fathers ordered their
boys. “Go out and shoot that strange man, and don’t come back until you
do.” So the boys took the loaded guns, and that’s just what they did.
“When I was a
boy in my father’s house, still tender, and an only child of my mother, he
taught me…”
(Prov. 4: 3-4a).
And just what did the
fathers teach their sons that day?
Here’s one last
spooky tale, made all the more macabre by the fact that it’s also true.
We’ll call this one:
Witch
Uncovered in Deadly Cemetery Plot
or
That
Gravedigger Was the Last Man to Let Me Down
Now as I’ve mentioned often
enough, the folks who live in these small, hidden-away villages are often
steeped in witchcraft and all manner of sorcery. A well-known witch or
shaman can make a very good living plying his or her trade among the scattered
Amazon villages. For the witches and shamans exploit the worst of human
instincts: Virtually every village will have it’s share of jealous
spouses, cheated lovers, swindled workers, spiteful neighbors, and people who
hate cats. Able witches offer their supernatural powers to help the
wronged party even the score.
In all of Amazon
witchcraft, the two most sought-after spells are: 1, casting a spell to make
someone fall in love with someone, and 2, casting a curse to make someone
die. Of the two, by far the more expensive service is having a witch cast
a death-causing curse. That will cost a couple hundred dollars, which, by
poor village standards, is equivalent to several months’ wages. (In terms
of a person living in the
Imagine, it’s the
black of night in a tiny village graveyard…where the only sound is the soft
crunch of a gravedigger’s shovel in the sandy dirt. Years ago the village
had made a strange rule: No digging graves except very late at
night. Seems the people had a peculiar problem with hearing a grave being
dug while everyone was going about their daytime work. Sort of a “for
whom the shovel tolls” thing I guess. By relegating all grave digging to
the middle of the night, folks could sleep right through that aural reminder of
their own mortality.
Now there were
actually two gravediggers down in the grave, working in the soft glow of their
insect-surrounded kerosene lantern. Their bodies were drenched in sweat,
and they often stopped to lean against the clayish walls of the grave to catch
their breath. That’s what digging a 6 foot hole in the sweltering jungle heat
in the middle of the night will do to you. And yet, the men were glad to
have work. Hours later, with only a foot or so left to dig, they climb
out of the grave. It’s break time! Time to head over to a tree
where their worn cloth lunch bags are hanging. (Can’t leave them on the
ground where the insects or animals could get them.)
As the gravediggers
sit under the tree digging into their sandwiches, followed by a short snooze, a
witch has silently entered the cemetery and passed by unnoticed. No one
is aware of each other’s presence. Apparently the witch has business to
attend to. Dark business. Business of the most evil intent:
The witch has been hired to cast a death curse on a cheating spouse. The
wife wants him dead. She was willing to pay. The witch has agreed
to do it.
Now in order for the
curse to supposedly work, three things are needed: First, a “personal
item” from the person, such as hair, fingernail clippings, or, best of all
these days, a photo. (Apparently it is far easier for the evil spirits to
simply look at a snapshot versus analyzing hair or fingernails in order to
identify the intended victim.)
Secondly, the photo
must be placed in a grave. And thirdly, the witch, using her secret,
magical incantations, must summon the evil spirits to do her wicked bidding.
As the witch passed
rows of graves, she comes upon a pleasant surprise: How convenient, a
freshly dug grave! No need to claw through a mound of dirt in order to
bury the photo. Instead, the witch carefully lowered herself into the
open grave. She sets the photo down, and places a clod of clay on it to
keep it in place. The witch then invokes the evil spirits to swiftly come and
bring death to the unfaithful spouse. Wrapping up her incantation of
doom, the witch climbed back out of the grave, and floated back out of the
cemetery, unseen by anyone.
Meanwhile, the
gravediggers had finished their break, and were dragging themselves back to the
grave. Only a foot or so left to dig they agreed, as they climbed back
into the hole. But as they take their first couple of scoops, what is
this? Did you see this before? No, what is it? It’s a photo!
A photo of Javier! Did it drop out of your pocket? No. Did
you bring it? No!! Dead silence… The gravediggers stared right at
each other as the realization of what had happened sent a chill racing up their
scrawny spines. These men were no strangers to witchcraft. The village
witch was trying to kill Javier! Neither gravedigger needed to say a word
as they immediately threw their shovels into the air and fairly leaped out of
the grave. They both had but one thought in mind: Get to Javier in
time. In their superstitious minds, they were now in a veritable race
with the grim reaper for Javier’s life.
The two gravediggers
burst into Javier’s humble shack, grabbed him by the shoulders, and yanked him
right out of bed, frantically telling him the news that the witch had placed a
deadly curse on him that night. Javier’s wife screamed, her evil plot
discovered, knowing Javier would soon deal with her. Meanwhile, the three
men, now joined by a couple neighbor men awakened by the racket, instantly
became a midnight lynch mob. For everyone knew there was only one way to
break such a spell: Kill the witch before the evil spirits kill you.
Immediately the mob was off to see the witch.
All this, by the way,
exposes the twisted logic of Amazon witchcraft and sorcery: Witches and
shamans ply their trade while the majority of the village permits it.
Yet, if the sensitive balance is upset, (i.e. the balance tilts toward too many
innocent victims of spells, while the beneficiaries of the witchcraft are
deemed unworthy), the village will extract a deadly price.
Meanwhile, more and
more village men were joining the angry mob on the way to the witch.
Again, in the macabre order of these dark things, it was critical that many
joined in the deadly attack. That way, no one person would be to blame
for the killing, nor would one person be the target of the witch’s final dying
curse. Machetes and sticks were the weapons of choice. The witch
was dragged from her bed out to the trees at the edge of the cemetery, and
immediately done away with. The whole group then joined in digging a shallow
pit, and threw her body in.
And with that Alfredo
finished his story. Ronal and I sat there in stunned silence, trying to
figure out if it were all true or not. For you see, all the evidence has
now been buried, and the villagers would never say a word. Yet the story
of the witch certainly brings forth that sobering reminder:
“He who leads
the upright along an evil path will fall into his own trap.” Prov. 28:10
--Terry
Dear
Brothers and Sisters of
What a fabulous blessing to receive your latest donation for
our work in
Secondly, we need to prepare a couple hectares of grazing land.
(Don’t worry, we are not destroying any endangered plants or animals!)
However, we do need a lot of insecticides to eliminate particular jungle
insects that can reek havoc on the health of a milking cow. Your generous
donations will help with these costs.
Also, I am continuing to translate African Spiritual songs into
Spanish. These are extremely popular at our Drug Rehab center in
Thanks again for thinking of the Lord’s work in
Your Brother in Christ, Terry
From The Women’s Guild
A big THANK YOU from the Women’s Guild to George and Marlene
Semling for their hospitality and invitation to spend an afternoon at their
lake home to complete our summer outing. The weather was perfect, the view
beautiful and relaxing, the pies so delicious, and the pontoon ride a great
treat for many of us. Thanks for making our 2004 summer outing so special.
Highlights
From The 2004
Youth Rally
Fun In Serving Him
In July, our Mt. Olive Youth Group attended the
The rally kicked off with a group lunch on Thursday and led into the
first of four large group speaker settings. The group speakers generally
lasted about an hour, to an hour and a half and focused on using the gifts God
has given the teens in their church, school and home. On Friday morning,
the teens broke out and attended two workshops that were assigned to
them. The teen workshops were anything from “Stupid things men/women do
when dating” to “Faith Challenges” to “Talking up Jesus.” The leaders
headed off to different workshops that were geared toward leaders. After
lunch, they broke out again to do the service projects. Everyone was
wearing their rally t-shirts to identify them and as an outreach tool.
Some teens worked on organizing the national youth rally, others distributed
flyers for a nearby church, or worked on cutting felt characters for Bible
stories for the Jesus Cares Ministry, or cleaning a park near a local church.
Saturday we closed with a large group speaker and music by a Christian
rock band. Afterwards, our group went mini-golfing, shopping, and ate
burgers in the Dells. Besides the workshops and service projects, there was
plenty of time to meet new and old friends, and to enjoy the Kalahari resort
and water park. Our teens were busy from 8am until lights out at nearly
11:45pm. Again this year, we had a great time and the youth were
well-behaved and courteous.
These rallies are a chance for our youth to meet new friends and become
reacquainted with old ones all in a Christian atmosphere. It really is an
energizing couple of days! We would like to thank the congregation for
their continued prayers and financial support, the Chinese church for the use
of their van for a few days, and Victoria Peterson who offered to chaperone for
the rally.
Highlights From The 2004 National LWMS Convention
Fields Ripe For Harvest
Gardening and farming take a great deal of careful
preparing, planting, nurturing, and patient waiting. These laborious tasks
oftentimes require a great deal of blood, sweat, and tears, but in the end the
harvest is worth it! At the 41st Annual National Lutheran Women’s Missionary
Society Convention held June 24-27 in
1,432 registered women and men from 59 of our 60 circuits, 35 states
and 12 countries attended to see and hear how Jesus has blessed the efforts of
our missionaries, their families and each of us. We were shown how the seed of
faith was planted and has grown for many in
THANK YOU
We thank our gracious God for giving us a glimpse of the bountiful fields, both at home and throughout the world, which