People of Palawan

[Jeremy Gable]

Hello everyone!

 

Sorry I couldn't post anything last week.  I had some other very important business that needed to be done and couldn't get to it last week.  However, this week I've got the time.

 

Some of you have already received much of this information when I sent out emails to people individually a couple weeks ago.  However, this time I'm including some information about the people here, as well as more detailed donation information, so please don't just delete this email.

 

The people and culture here are very different from what we know in America.  For the most part, everything opperates at a very slow pace compared to what we're used to.  In general, the locals aren't in a big rush to get things done.  For that matter, they don't have alot of things that need to be done.  Most of their days consist of working in their fields—cleared from the jungle on the side of a mountain slope so steep that if you slip and fall, there's a very good chance that you'll keep rolling until you roll right off the end of the field (or in some cases, right off the mountain)—or gathering food.  Aside from that, some people make various types of crafts which they sell along with any excess food they might have.  There are a very wide variety of crafts that they make.  Some of the things include tukews [too-cows] (machettes), budyaks [boo-jacks] (spears for hunting wild boars), tinkeps [pronounced: tin cups] (various sized wicker baskets, some times very intericately designed), nigus [nee-goos] (large round wicker plate about 3 feet in diameter that's used for separating dehulled rice from the chaff), sepukans [suh-poo-kahns] (7 foot blowguns), and kudlungans [kude-loong-ahns] (a two-stringed instrument like a guitar but with only a few "frets").

 

The people are generally very warm and friendly, but very, very shy.  They value relationships more than anything else, and when conducting any type of business with them, it's rude to just go straight

to business without conversing a little bit first.  They love to have fun and enjoy life.  Yet inspite of all this, they live the majority of their lives in fear.  Satan manifests himself very openly here.  The native people live in constant fear of the spirit world.  Satan and his fallen angels keep a yoke of fear on these people all the time, so that they are always trying to appease the spirits to keep bad things from happening.  Some of the ways they try to do this is by wearing beaded jewelry around their necks, wrists, and ankles or, barring that, just some string tied around the same places.  When someone dies, they place in the gave a plate with some rice and 3 pesos so that the spirit of the dead person will be happy and will not come back to haunt the family.  In spite of this, the remaining family often still begins seeing "endud" [uhn-dude] (spirits of the dead) around the place where the departed family member used to live.  What they don't understand yet is that all these spiritual manifestations are no more than Satan's fallen angels taking on the form of the dead person in order to keep the people living in fear.  Another way that they try to please the spirits is by having "siburans" [see-bur-ahns].  This is a big party where the people beat on drums and drink rice wine until everyone is drunk senseless.  This drunkeness, of course, leads to many other sorts of problems including immoral decisions, fighting (sometimes with their machettes), and injuries along the trail as people try to walk home in a drunken stupor. 

 

Before coming here, I met a person who begged me not to come to help these people because he said they live so much closer to nature than we do.  He asked me to please not disrupt their harmious life with nature.  What he doesn't realized is that these people are living so close to nature that it's killing them faster than their people are born.  Within just a few months of being here, I saw every one of my friends among the locals come to the clinic to be treated for malaria.  Without us here, every one of those people would most likely be dead.  Any "spirits of nature" that might be reverenced here are once again, no more than Satan's demons and they gain reverence only by fear, and not out of any love from the people.  I long for them to realize that Jesus can free them from this bondage of fear, that He is stronger than any spirit in this world.

 

With the Georges (the career missionaries here) on furlough in the States, things are very different around here.  There's less rushing around trying to complete an ever growing, never decreasing list of developement projects in the immediate vicinity of our project, which leaves alot more time for me to go visit people in their villages, spend time helping them in their fields, and talking with them about whatever might come up.  This will greatly assist in learning their language and culture, and will open up many witnessing opportunities.  All of us missionaries still here have put into practice a plan called "Get Out of Kemantian."  This entails, well, getting out of Kemantian, which consists of our two "American" villages, plus the two villages that sit right up against ours.  We've all spent time praying about who God wants us each to target specifically.  I think that most of us have already received our answers on that, and have begun visiting those people as often as we can make the time to do so.

 

I feel that the Lord has impressed me to target two people (which, by necessity, includes their immediate family as well).  The first one is a young man named Ubri.  Most Pelawans don't know exactly how old they are, but most have fairly close estimates (give or take a few years).  Ubri thinks he's about 19, which I would say is deffinately pretty close.  He's one of the younger brothers of our church's primary lay-pastor.  He's a very friendly guy, very talkative and funloving, knows just about all there is to know about the bugs in these mountains, and knows the mountains very well.  His wife is about 13 and they have a very cute little baby (yeah, they all get married very young here.  Welcome to a primative culture.)  Unfortunately, Ubri is also one of the backslidden church members.  He has a strong personality and lots of charisma, and could lead many people to Christ if he put his talents to that use.

 

The other person I feel called to connect with is Mingguy.  In the AFM video for this project, there is a man who the missionaries at that time had prayed for, because he had stopped attending the bible studies in order to go up into the mountains to collect bagtik [bahg-tick] (a tree sap that looks like crystal which burns very well and people buy it to use as a light source).  The next day after they prayed for him, Mingguy came running back to Kemantian and told about a vision he'd had that night, in which Jesus has appeared to him, taken him (in vision) to heaven, and showed him the Tree of Life.  But in the vision, when Mingguy went to take a fruit from the tree, Jesus gently stopped him and told him, "Mingguy, it is not yet time for you to eat that fruit."  Then he told him to go back and continue his bible studies with the missionaries.  Later, Mingguy was baptized into the church, but sometime since then has backslidden and now rarely attends church.  This is partly due to the influence from his parents, who have been discouraging towards their children coming to church.  In the past, he has simply been of the mindset, "I don't care what they say.  I'm an adult and I can go to church if I want."  But his wife has told us that the reason he hasn't been coming to church lately is largely because of their influence.  A couple days ago I spent some time with Mingguy in his uma [oo-muh] (rice field) and very early in the conversation he began talking about God and Satan.  I couldn't understand everything he said, but what I could understand was something along the lines of:

 

          'Satan says he wants me to follow him.  But I said, "Mendi' ku!  Gaay ku Empu' Isus!"

          (translated: I don't want to!  I like (or want) Lord Jesus!)  Satan says, "I want you." but

          I told him that I don't want him.'

 

This conversation gives me hope that his heart is still with God.  But in this culture a person's elders hold alot of influence over him, especially when it's his own parents.

 

Soon I'll be taking a one-week trip through the mountains, visiting every Pelawan village that I can find, and placing them on a map that I'm making (all I have is a military compass, a protractor, and a pencil, bu the map is coming along nicely).  Ubri was going to take me around, but has changed his mind a few days ago.  However, I mentioned it to Mingguy the other day and he agreed to take me instead.  So I will have many opportunities to encourage him and help him to push past the influence of his gunggurangs [elders].  Also, Wendy Guptil has been visiting the village of his parents, so he'll be receiving support from that side as well.

 

These are just some of the plans that we have for winning ground for Christ here in the midst of Satan's territory.  The call I accepted is a two-year call.  I still have $1,734 to raise yet in order to stay for the second year, and it must be in by July 1st.  More than anything, I want to finish the job that God has sent me here to do, and the potential for doing so is looking very bright with the plans already laid.

 

However, God chooses to work through people for the salvation of souls.  He gives us the opportunity to participate in His plan of salvation in many ways.  Some people He calls to mission service.  Other people, He calls to the support of those missionaries.  God's work will go forward regardless of our participation (because somewhere, someone will be working with Him), but with ALL of us working with Him, many more people will be saved than would otherwise be the case.  I've recently received an updated donor report, and for those of you who have recently donated towards my second year, you have my deepest thanks, from the very depths of my heart.  For those of you who haven't yet donated, I want to encourage you to please take a little time to pray about it and see what the Lord is leading you to do, and then follow His lead.  Won't you please work with Jesus and us to show these people that there's a better life available to them?  Won't you please help them to give their hearts to Jesus, and call upon His strength and protection so they can experience all the joy that He has in strore for them, without fear?

 

There are several ways that you can donate:

 

1.  To donate with a credit/debit card online go to www.afmonline.org.

     From the home page, click on the "Give" link at the right of the page,

     then click the "Donate Now" link, followed by "Sponser a Student

     Missionary".  From there, just follow the steps.  Also, here is the

     link that will take you directly to the donation page (though I'm not

     sure if it will work):

https://dnbweb1.blackbaud.com/OPXDONATE/AddDonor.asp?cguid=77A86696%252DE553%252D40DC%252DAA71%252D1C744D32FCED&sTarget=https%3A%2F%2Fdnbweb1%2Eblackbaud%2Ecom%2FOPXDONATE%2Fdonate%2Easp%3Fcguid%3D77A86696%25252DE553%25252D40DC%25252DAA71%25252D1C744D32FCED%26dpid%3D1269&sid=EEDB31D8%2D87CD%2D4BFE%2DB115%2DEC739582BFD5

    

2.  To donate with a credit card over the phone call 1 (800) 937-4236.

3.  To send a donation by mail, the address is:

     Adventist Frontier Missions
     PO Box 346
     Berrien Springs, MI 49103

     Be sure to include your Name and address (though you can request

     that the donation be made anonymously), state that the donation is

     for the Student Missionary Jeremy Gable at the Palawano Project.

4.  If you have access to a Frontiers magazine, there should be a

     donation form/envelope inside which can also be used to make

     donations.  Again, be sure to say that it's for the Student Missionary

     Jeremy Gable at the Palawano Project.

 

Obviously, the simplest way to donate is online or over the phone.  If anything is unclear, or you have any other questions, please feel free to email me and I'll do my best to help.  Also, questions can be directed to afm by calling the toll free number above.

 

Thank you all for your generous support!  May God bless you richly!

 

 

With love in Christ,

Jeremy