Holiness

Pal friends gather around us after each teaching session to go through the notes and to review the main points.

“Who among the gods is like you, O LORD? Who is like You – majestic in holiness, awesome in glory, working wonders?” - Exodus 15:11

Nate taught yesterday on the holiness of God. In our teaching time we have come to Moses at Mt. Sinai, hearing the regulations God made for the Israelites to keep them away from the mountain BECAUSE of His holiness. How do we describe the holiness of God? Nate held up Elias’ disgusting shirt from the previous day’s mud-play and compared it with his own (only minorly dirty J) shirt. “Hey, this dirt is like my sin. I’m doing pretty good, compared to THAT shirt!” Then he held up a perfectly clean and white pillow case and talked about how when we compare ourselves to God’s holiness, we see what we are really like. It got REALLY quiet when he did his last illustration.  He had made a steaming thermos of tea and poured it out into a big glass measuring cup, then added sugar.  He talked about how excited he was to drink it and share it.  Then he added…just a TINY…bit of pig poop that he got from off the ground.  Now, feces is one thing that really, really grosses out our Pal friends. “Does anyone want to drink this now? No, of course not. But it was such a miniscule amount! Isn’t it okay? What if I add a little more fresh tea, does that make it okay?” Of course he threw it out into the jungle. In God’s eyes, our ‘tiny’ sin is just like that.  Again, people are listening, thinking.

On Friday we were almost exactly half way through our teaching time. Attendance fluctuates a bit, but we are seeing that most are coming day after day to hear. On a ‘lighter’ morning last week (it was raining) I counted 170 adults, teens and older kids listening. Some of you are specifically praying for a Pal family daily. If you are, THANK YOU! This is HIS work and it will be by His strength that hearts are drawn to Him.

Our Pal friends are paying attention to the details of what we are teaching. They are checking to make sure that they understand what we are talking about. Praise God!

This week:

Monday and Tuesday: Nate will be teaching through the 10 commandments. We will be doing mini-dramas to illustrate what these things look like in our lives and in Pal culture. Please pray that men and women will be totally un-done by their sin and realize their complete inability to reach God’s standard.

Wednesday: Nate will teach on the golden calf and how quickly the Israelites turned their backs on God. Nate will be talking, again, about how we say one thing but then quickly turn our backs on it. Only God is able to make the way for people to come back to Himself. Even though the Israelites were a ‘called out’ and special people, each individual was responsible for their own choices and faced judgment. This will be a big new concept for our Pal friends who think of life in terms of ‘what we as a family/community do’ rather than ‘what we as individuals do’.

Thursday: Chris will teach today on the Tabernacle, the Ark of the Covenant, and the sacrifices that God commanded. They will have tons of questions on this day as they have heard some crazy things about these from various cults a few have come in contact with over the years.

Friday: Chris will teach on the 12 spies going into Canaan. Who will the Israelites trust? Their own strength, or God’s strength? We have been hitting this question HARD over these weeks of teaching.

On another note – thanks for praying for stamina and health for our family this week. Nate is working something like 60 hours a week and (a lot of that early in the morning or in the evenings, he’s making sure he has time with the kids and I as well) and we don’t expect that to slow down for another 6 weeks or so. I (Elizabeth) had fever for the last two days with strep throat – my third illness in 6 weeks! However, we have great JOY each day in the questions and hunger we see in men and women here and we are sharing that with our kids, who have had terrific attitudes and are praying alongside us.

THANK YOU for praying with us! We couldn’t do this without you!

Because of Him,

Elizabeth

If you have extra time – here are a few more stories from the week that I sent to our ‘on-the-ground support team’ of missionaries here in PNG:

On Wednesday everyone was silent as they watched Axel (the ‘Angel of God’) stop and look at the blood painted on the door frame of our friends’ Taligam’s and Atamok’s ‘house’ – then he entered the ‘house’ of the Hostetter family (who, as ‘Egyptians’ had rejected God’s instructions) and ‘killed’ their firstborn.

Later, many questions came up. 

“Why did God say not to break the bones of the lamb?  We have heard that the bones themselves had power and that the Israelites took the BONES with them to Canaan, along with the bones of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”  (In Pal culture, the bones of ancestors are revered and held to be powerful as they worship the ancestor spirits.)

“When we have someone who is very sick, we kill and animal and make an offering.  This (Passover story) is the basis of our thinking when we do that – we are trying to keep the angel of death from coming again.  Are we doing it right?”

“When we will hear about how to do these offerings?!!” 

Something we have said, oh, maybe 500 times now ;), is that what God wants is for men and women to ‘hang up’ (ie trust) on HIS strength.   And slowly, slowly, we are seeing folks start to make that shift in their thinking.  Last week, Chris said “When God said He was sending the Angel of death to kill any firstborn in any house that was not marked by the blood of the Passover lamb, if the Israelites had made a fancy prayer, would that have kept their firstborn alive?  If they had just followed their own thinking, would their firstborns have stayed alive?  NO.  They had to do it God’s way.”  The questions about the bones, the offerings, all are being carefully answered as we look back at the Word.  What has God said about this?  In some cases, we look ahead:  “We WILL answer this when we teach through this.”

Kulut gave Nate a letter yesterday, his own thoughts.  “I am SICK and tired of being in Satan’s pakal (family).  I can’t wait to hear how to become part of God’s family.  Please tell us soon!”    Nate sat this afternoon with a group of men on the porch and they discussed how the pictures we have hung up are not powerful in themselves, they are just to help people remember.  Apparently some are saying that the pictures themselves have power.  I came down as Nate was answering, “What are you going to trust in?  My strength?  (He pointed to his bicep and laughed)  Strength of pictures? Strength of bones of someone who has been dead for a long time?   Or the strength of GOD?!”   They laughed and talked together.  When the men left, they said, “We want to shake your hand.  Thank you!”  This kind of effusiveness is NOT normal in Pal culture, and these were NOT yes-men guys.

A lot of you know from your own experience how tired we are these days.  We are praying together daily as a team, meeting weekly to talk about the many issues and questions that have come up (not to mention planning ahead), and out in the afternoons and evenings talking with people.  WHAT a privilege to be a part of this.   Depending on the One whose Glory we want to make known!

Please, keep praying for men and women here in Pal to think deeply about these questions they are facing.  There are many who are sitting on the sidelines.  Today a half-circle of men sat facing each other at the back and talked quietly to each other!  However, there are MANY who are intently listening, and some who are blowing it off and only showing up for the community event.   We also keep facing prop after prop that our Pal friends are wanting to lean on.  The latest is ‘Universalism’ – ‘Well, after Jesus came, He got Cain back, right?  We’re all okay now, right?’  The easy answer to that is, “If you were all ‘okay’ would we have left our beloved families far behind to come and learn your talk and tell you what God says in His Word?”  Very, very sober silence in response.