“We talk of the Second Coming; half the world has never heard of the first.” Oswald J. Smith
I began to reflect on the past 5 days as I stopped our Proton Saga at the familiar Sibu Airport traffic light after three hours of driving from Mukah. The Sarawak Mission Trip (SMT) this year has been both a challenge and blessing to the 12 of us. And how blessed we were to be able to witness God’s faithfulness for the past three years!
SMT is a journey which began in 2015 and it was meant to be a one-off “mission trip” to the longhouses in the Sibu and Mukah division in Sarawak. The trip was organised by a Kuala Lumpur church (with mainly East Malaysian members) to support the work of a local pastor who has just recently moved to Mukah to start a church. The people whom he ministered to were mainly of the Iban tribe, the majority tribe of Sarawak. Many of them are already Christians but there are still many who have never heard of the good news of the gospel. They are known for their hospitableness and friendliness and indeed, I could personally testify to that.
During our first trip, the number of Iban participants outnumbered the non-Iban so we left most of the communication to them. Some of the Iban people in the longhouses could speak and understand the national language but there were many who understood only Iban. Although Iban language bears certain similarities to Malay language in terms of vocabulary, grammar and structure (eg. makai means eat, pulai means return), communication can still be a problem because they would speak quickly and string words together. In this year’s trip, the situation appeared to be more challenging as there were only four Iban speakers among the 12 of us. However, God truly showed me that language is no barrier for Him and I personally felt that the interaction with the locals this year was at the deepest level yet. We tried our level best to speak to them, we laughed with them and we cried with them. And God has opened so many doors for us to enter and lives for us to share the good news with!
Speaking of lives, there was a couple who were suffering from marital problems when we first visited their longhouse in 2015. They put their faith in Jesus after listening to the message and we prayed for them. In our visit this year, their relationship has improved significantly and they were also baptised in our presence. As I helped the local pastor during the water baptism, I couldn’t help but give thanks to God through prayer for His faithfulness to this couple. It made me witness God’s work firsthand in the mission field and how He worked in this Iban couple has been amazing. However, we continued to pray for them as they were still suffering from poverty and illness.
So, from that experience, I discovered that mission is all about faithfulness and patience. We need to be faithful and patient to witness and taste God’s faithfulness. I personally feel that “mission trip” is inadequate as it connotes an excursion which is short-lived and temporal. As a matter of fact, it’s a journey which doesn’t usually end with only one visit.
For example, many Ibans still, secretly or openly, keep various charms in their houses to appease the dark forces. In our first visit, we could all feel a chilling sense of evil spirits in the first longhouse. We continued to pray for the longhouse and as we returned in the second and third year, the condition has largely improved – victory for and praise to our Lord! Also in our first visit, we went to a second longhouse across the river Igan. Although the people there have been Christians for decades, the passion of their faith has died down and they were just content to attend church every Sunday. When we were there, we did Bible studies with them on that year and the following year. In the third year, we could see the difference in the congregation as they were more responsive to the Word of God. Again, it’s the work of the Lord through His servants as He continued to open the hearts of those whom we served.
Our faithfulness and patience were regularly tested. As one of our KL pastors rightly put it, the evil one is not pleased with our plan and would go all out to disrupt our work. True enough, the team members experienced a sudden onslaught of illnesses, extraordinarily busy work schedule and personal matters before the mission trip. One of the members had to pull out a week before the trip and she was to portray the main character for the skit we have planned. Another member was feeling unwell for weeks before the trip. I myself nearly couldn’t make it due to my company’s project work. Praise the Lord however, the trip was a success and on hindsight, I felt that as we persevered, we learnt also to rely only on Him and not our own strength in doing His work the mission field. As Psalm 127:1 goes, unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labour in vain. Unless He goes before us, our preparations and effort are in vain.
On a personal note, the privilege of participating in SMT for 3 years has changed my life tremendously. Through my experiences in SMT, I have learnt to let go some of the proud ideals I once had, to follow and submit, to be flexible to changes in plan, to be sensitive to the needs of others and to not take for granted what I have in my life. I could go on and on in my SMT experiences but if I need to end this article, I thank our Lord for appointing me to this work and I hope to heed His calling next year again.
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Albert Khor
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