Missions

From: "Eamon Anderson" eamon@elsig.ro
Date: Wed, 5 Feb 2003 22:02:23 -0500
Subject: from eamon after ethiopia

Hey everybody,

What's more exciting than bouncing like a piece of popcorn on a DHC6 Twin Otter plane, flying through the Rift Valley of Ethiopia while the pilot reads a magazine? Well, there can't be a whole lot, but at least he was reading a magazine and not a flight manual. God is faithful! I have to say, I was unable to drink the half-can of Sprite they gave me to calm my stomach, but arrived on schedule to the town of Jinka, landing on a grass 'landing strip' where I stood among the cows until the plane had taken off again (a security measure), feeling pretty cool that my African skirt didn't blow off in the wake of a very first 'plane with propellers' experience. Next thing I know, I am getting into the truck with my hosts and feel a tug on my arm: voila, I turn to meet two Mursi people, the ones you have seen in National Geographic with huge wooden discs in their lower lips, bodies painted, and dressed in very little, except beads, spears, and automatic weapons on their backs. They wanted to give me one of their gold bracelets, which would have been ok if I had known for sure that I wasn't being bought as a third wife. Alas, I just jumped into the truck and left my new friends conferring with each other, banging their spears on the ground, me wondering how many cows I'm worth.

Day 1. I praise God for three and a half weeks in South Omo province of Ethiopia, working to put together some literacy materials for the Bunna people. The Bunna are a striking people who live in a remote place, and who desperately need the Lord. Though some have come to the Lord, many others still live in bondage to darkness, worshipping and sacrificing to Satan in fear for thier lives.

The first Sunday I went to church, I was sitting in the back feeling alien when I noticed that the men in my bench are under armed guard (uniformed guys at the back with guns and knives.) Yee-haw, the excitement never stops. I was cringing with every sudden movement, and later found out that my row-mates were murderers on the way to jail. The jailer was a Christian and wanted to stop at church on the way so they could hear the Gospel. Cool, huh? Apparently the Bunna people have a right of passage for men that they must kill someone from another tribe and run across some cows' backs. Anyone who has not done this is not considered a complete human being. But these 'real men' were real-ly on their way to prison, as they had murdered 6 people in the preceding months, including a game park manager who wouldn't let them hunt the animals.

One highlight experience was visiting an even remote-er (if that's possible) village for church one Sunday and being greeted by a singing and dancing congregation who ran a mile down the hill on the un-road to meet us. After the service, I was accosted by some children wanting to feel my hair, a stangely soft and straight and light brown novelty. Ultimately, even the elders of this little church succumbed to curiosity and came over to touch my hair! Though I have no idea what they were saying about it in between the gasps, I saw one old lady explaining in frantic hand signals the difference between my hair and theirs (flat against the head versus growing outward or some such riotous account.)

This same church had seven windows, three on each side and one at the back. It was very dim, and even though I couldn't see alot of the people's faces, it was packed and there were even people outside listening. Perhaps the most challenging moment of the trip: when it was time to take the offering, I fumbled around to find some Ethiopian birr, and when I looked up what I saw was a tangled mess of outstretched hands twisting like tentacles through each of those seven windows, fighting through from the outside to give their offering. Even those people who couldn't come in the church wrestled to give to God. Even the people whose faces couldn't be seen, dropped their anonymous coins in that basket. Even the short ones scrambled up the outside wall and pushed their fists through the crowd of others, refusing to be excluded. Even the ones who were ashamed and hid their faces when I smiled at them, stretched out their hands. Even the ones who would have had an excuse for not giving, gave.

What rose up in me looking at all those hands coming through the church windows was this: I want my life to be poured out like that. Whether in the limelight or in the shadows, from a distance or close to the Master,
whether given easily or given with a fight, I want my life to be spent like that, to give Him what He owns anyway, to stretch out that offering to Him even when it would be acceptable not to.

I thank the Lord Jesus for who He is to me. In Soard or in Alduba, 'He knows the way I take.'

I thank you for all your prayers and I pray for His continued grace in your lives.

One more thing: Isn't it great that we don't have to run over cows' backs to be whole???

praise Jesus

love you,
Eamon