When God's Word Comes Alive

"Here we are," I announced with excitement as we rounded a corner around some bushes and found the church meeting under a thatched hangar. After following foot paths for a few kilometers in my giant vehicle, I began to think that I might have taken a wrong turn and ended up in the middle of nowhere, but it's always that way. Just when you think you are lost, you find a little gathering of believers meeting in their village in indigenous worship. It doesn't need an announcement really, because there is no doubt about it when you arrive. 

I pulled the vehicle under the shade of a tree and cut the engine. Suddenly, the joyful sound of singing, clapping, and a drum beat filled the air. The lively color of the sounds matched the vibrant color of the church - everyone dressed in the pagnes and traditional wear. Poverty in its Sunday best. 

We joined them, wholly participating yet wholly observing as both are equally important and holy. 

I noticed how their worship involved their whole bodies. the women danced their traditional dance - a bounce at the waist and in the knees that makes the shoulders bob forward and the babies bounce on the backs of their mothers. 

I noticed the syncopated clapping that I couldn't ever quite figure out but somehow seemed to work with the music. 

A man played the balophone: a xylophone-like instrument with keys made of wooden planks that sit on various sizes of hollowed-out gourds. He was really going to town with his sticks all up and down the instrument, but when you listened closely, his notes didn't really follow the song at all. It was completely nonsensical, but it didn't matter because you could barely hear it over the power of the voices. And the faces of the people - all smiling and sweating and singing at the tops of their lungs. 

The pastor, Patrice, presented a powerful message on living a transformed life. He bounced from subject to subject as if he had prepared an organized message but was just too excited to go onto the next thing that God had given him to say. He talked about the Christians call to be different from the world. He specifically called out drinking alcohol, commuting adultery, and practicing fetishism - things that Christians think they can get away with but in reality do not accomplish a God-glorifying life, he said. 

He talked about how we need to live our lives today like we are preparing to meet God. "Don't pretend like you always have more time in your life. Don't think that you can do good things later to make up for the bad things you do now. Don't believe that some priest or pastor will pray for you after you die. If you wait until after you die to make a decision, it's too late! You have to make a decision now!" 

Perhaps the heart of his lesson was about not being a Christian who says he loves God but then doesn't live any differently than the people around him. This applies particularly to fetishism because many Christians think they can go to church and follow God while still holding onto idols and fetishes in their homes because that is considered "culture" and not religion. "That's a lie!" Patrice exclaimed with a conviction that made people assured that it's true, yet a gentleness that made them want to change. With energy and passion in his voice, he pleaded with the church to accept the call to real life transformation and a life of holiness by being set apart. 

After his spirit-filled sermon, he passed the baton to us to share the children's lesson we had prepared. The parable, the story of two houses, fit absolutely perfectly with what Patrice had just shared. In fact, you would have thought we coordinated the whole thing. (God does cool stuff like that.) We shared the story with the whole church by acting it out and inviting audience participation. We talked about the house built upon the sand and the house built upon the rock, giving practical examples of what those bricks look like in our lives. 

They listened, all two hundred of them, pressed in with eyes fixed as the story unfolded. 

"This is a passion of mine," one short team member said, "seeing the Word of God come alive." You could see it on their faces as we watched them from behind the props. We had the best seat in the house. 

At the end, one man commented. "Now I see that trusting in idols and fetishes is like building your house on the sand, and I exhort all of you who are listening to build your house on the rock." The Spirit stirred among the crowd. They were getting it. 

A women came forward to announce that she wanted to burn her idols. "Like right now?" I asked, and Patrice laughed and said, "Of course! Right now!" She rushed off to her house with the pastor, collected the idols, and brought them back on motos like a caravan parade, honking and smiling as they arrived. They lit a fire, buried the fetishes and idols in it, and burned it all up while the church gathered around to sing, dance, and kick the bottoms of their feet toward the fire in order to shame the devil and kick him right out of his former habitat. The woman who had chosen to find freedom in the surrender of her idols led the way, and the others danced behind her in a circle around the fire. I bet the aroma was pleasing to the Lord. The small fire was a way to remind Satan of his final destination; he is already defeated, and he has no ground in the hearts of faithful believers in the family of God here! 

When we got back to the car, the shade had moved entirely to the other side during the four or five hours that we spent with the church. But it didn't seem that long. We were all so amazed and overwhelmed at the way the Spirit of God had moved that we were considerably high on the Holy Spirit. God had assembled a joyful, worshipful crowd of listeners. God had given Patrice a powerful message. God had aligned our story with that message. God had made the story come alive. God  had touched the hearts of the people with truth from his Word that suddenly made sense to them and called them to action. Light had overcome the darkness as the Holy Spirit moved and breathed and accomplished the will of God in the hearts of believers...right there in a village that felt like the middle of nowhere. 

The kingdom is coming in power. Salvation's tide is rising. Triumph sounds out loud and clear. Darkness flees. Idols are burned up, reduced to nothing, powerless. And Christ is victorious!