It’s exciting when the gospel is taught :)

I recently received this email from my friend, Jeremy Gable. He gave me permission to reprint it on my blog. He’s serving as a missionary in the jungles of the Philippines.

You can see Jeremy’s updates on his mission life at groups.google.com/group/Palawan.

Also, you can write him at missionary7@gmail.com. I’m sure he would appreciate some emails. It can get lonely out in the jungle away from family and friends.

THE PEOPLE OF THE MALIS

Jungle greetings again to you all!

Praise God, I have another chance to send out an update to you all, and within only a couple weeks of the last one!

This update, I’d like to tell you about my experience yesterday, Sabbath afternoon.

As church and Sabbath School were finishing up yesterday, all the church members regathered as usual to decide where everyone was going to go for Branch Sabbath School (BSS) that afternoon (this is our local outreach evangelism program). I usually wait on saying where I’m going to go until most of the Palawanos have decided where they’re going, since they sometimes tend to base their decisions on where the Americans are going (i.e. deciding not to go someplace because there are already Americans going there so there’s obviously no need for them to go there too). This doesn’t always happen, but it does happen sometimes, so most of us usually wait until after they’ve decided. Over the last month, some of our church members have been showing growing interrest in going to a lowlands village called Malis [Mah-lease] for BSS. Yesterday, I overheard Niksun (an 18 yr old member and one of my good friends) mention to someone else that he wanted to go to Malis, but he didn’t have anyone else to go with him (in this culture it’s rare for people to go places without having a companion as well, especially if it’s someplace they haven’t been before). Of course I’m always interrested in exploring and visiting new villages, so I turned and asked him if he was going to Malis. He said he’d like to but didn’t have anyone else to go with him, then asked if I wanted to go too. I eagerly accepted the invitation, and told the head lay pastor, Sublitu, that Niksun and I would go to Malis. By the end of the meeting, four other people had vollunteered to go to Malis bringing the total to 6! This is quite a bit for one location when there are only about 25 baptized members in our church.

As soon as pot-luc was over with, those going to Malis gathered at the church, we radioed to Chris Heally (our new logistics SM) in the lowlands that we were starting on the trail and to pick us up at the lowlands trail head to take us to Malis. The trail was very good and we all had a great time hiking out of the mountains together. In fact, we were having such a good time that we made it out in 1 hour 15 minutes! As we arrived at the truck at the trail head, we had a short meeting to decide who was going to do what (i.e. who was going to tell a story, who was going to have opening/and closing prayers, and who would lead song worship). The question was also asked what story topics would be good for them since there had been only a couple BSS visits to their village thus far. It was decided that the story of the war in heaven and Satan and his angels being cast down to Earth, the first sin of humankind, and Jesus’s love for us shown in His enacting of the plan of Salvation would all be good topics. The palawanos decided that I should tell a story about those topics, and that our new nurse, David, could tell his allegorical story illustrating God’s love for us. After that, we had prayer that the Holy Spirit would go before us to prepare people’s hearts to receive the message we had for them, and that He would also give us the right words to speak and teach us all what we should do there. Then Chris started up the truck and we were off.

About 15-20 minutes later we arrived in Malis and were greeted with many bright smiles and waves as we drove by to turn the truck around. As we pulled to a stop and climbed out, many bright-eyed children rushed up to us to stare at the truck (they probably don’t see many trucks along their poverty stricken back-road) while the adults came with many smiles and afternoon greetings with handshakes. Everyone seemed very pleased to see us and eagerly welcomed us into their little village, choosing the best house for us to come sit down at. Since the porch of that house was too small for everyone, we decided we’d just sit in a circle outside, so they all grabbed wood stumps for us to sit on, giving up their own seats to offer them to us. I chose to just take off my sandals and sit on them so someone else could use the seats. We chatted a little bit, and then Sublitu began the BSS. We sang a few songs that related to the topics we were going to tell stories of, and after each song, Sublitu told the explanation of each one. After that we had opening prayer, followed by special music by myself and Niksun. I played “Amazing Grace” on my harmonica and Niksun played a beautiful worship song in Tagalog on a guitar he had borrowed from Dyi-Dyi (who was also with us). He then told the meaning of the song he’d played and sung.

Now it was time for my story, so I assumed the sitting posture that I’ve seen so many Palawanos take when telling a story, and using much expression, told them of the fall of Lucifer, the temptation and fall of man, how sad God was that mankind had sinned and that the price of sin is death, and showed them how much Jesus loves us by volunteering to pay our debt from sin for us. I finished the story with a brief summary of Jesus’s life of helping, healing, and teaching, followed by His crucifiction and submissiveness to it, even though He knew what was going to happen and could have refused if He’d wanted to. I concluded with His resurrection on the 3rd day, 40 more days of teaching the disciples and His promise to return, His ascent to heaven, and that if we give our lives and our hearts to Him, even though we might die, when He returns again we will live again and go to live with Him forever.

Afterwards, David told his story (which I don’t have time to type now). Throughout all the songs and both stories, people were highly attentive, hanging onto every word we said. Then came another surprise to us all; Dyi-Dyi gave his testimony, talking about how he used to be such a bad person and all the bad things he used to do, but how God kept talking to him and showing him his sin, and has since then helped him to give up his sins and is changing him and making him into a new person, and how much happier he is now because of it! We then had a closing song and closing prayer, and then visited a little bit. The people expressed to us how much they enjoyed having us come, and that they want Pastor George to come this next Sabbath, and want people from our church to come have BSS in Malis EVERY SABBATH from now on! Praise God!

We all wanted to stay there and visit longer, but we received an emergency call from our clinic nurse, Wendy, that there was a 4-day old baby close to death and his parents were brining him out. So we took our leave in a hurry, and headed back to the trail head so Chris could pick up the patient and take him and his family to the hospital.

Overall, it was a very blessed Sabbath, and I look forward to seeing the mighty work that God has in store for the people of Malis!

I wish I could write more, but, as usual, my internet time for today is up. I’m hoping that I will have time to write again over this next week, since I need to fly to Malasia and return in order to be allowed to continue to renew my visa until my time here is over. God bless you all, and keep the people of Malis and Kemantian in your prayers!

With love in Christ,
Jeremy Gable