NTM - New Tribes Mission | Planting Tribal Churches

Please continue to PRAY for Jujin. He didn’t show up for the Sunday meeting in order to ask forgiveness of his fellow believers for his going astray and quitting his teaching of the children.

We have mentioned how excited we were because there might be opportunity for an outreach to start in another province that we’ve been praying about for years. Mahan’s in-laws who are believers are living in a Manubu’ village there. We had been told by a believer who has visited there that it is in the mountains on a good gravel road about 6 miles from a town on the coast where we could possibly relocate to. We were all set to go there and check it out as soon as our road dries up. Mahan’s wife called her family asking for specific directions. It turns out that we were all misinformed about it’s location. It is about 100 miles further away! One of our considerations in relocating and taking a Bible translation helperBible teacher with us is that we need to be within a reasonable distance of the second dialect we work in so we can check out translation with translation helpers there. That place would not be within a reasonable distance.

We’re thank the Lord that we found out where Mahan’s in-laws are actually living before driving out and wandering around trying to find them where we had mistakenly been told they are living.

It is a bit of a disappointment that where they are living is not an option because it is much cooler there on the coast than our other option – and now only option – which is way inland and VERY hot and humid. It’s hot and humid where we live now, but not as bad as that place. But, if that is where the Lord wants us, that’s where we want to be.

We planned to drive out this week to check out housing possibilities, including in the town which is now our only option, but folks from our village who have traveled the road from our village for the first 25 miles via motorcycle say that because of the rainy weather we’ve been having even our off-road 4×4 wouldn’t be able to get through. Occasional palm oil trucks have left deep ruts and it is too muddy to straddle them. So, we’re waiting for a few days of dry weather before trying to drive out. With the winch on our truck not working we don’t want to take a chance on getting bogged down.

So, please PRAY for a long spell of dry weather so we can get out to the highway and also get back in again a few days later.

Some exciting things happening here. For years we’ve been praying that somehow the believers could reach out to a another province which adjoins our’s about 4 hours from here. Recently, Mahan’s in-laws relocated to a Manubu’ village in that province because of threats being made against his father-in-law. (His father-in-law has done nothing wrong.) Mahan’s father-in-law has been sending messages to him to come and teach the Manubu’ there. Could this be it? Could Mahan’s in-laws fleeing to that province be God’s plan to get an outreach started there?

Next month we and Mahan, and his family, and Pulding will travel to that province. They will go to the village to see if the Manubu’ there really do want to be taught. It is said that this is a solid Manubu’ village where even the kids speak Manubu’. We will look over a nearby town which is on the highway to see if there would be any possibility of our living there so Pulding could teach at the Manubu’ village and also serve as our translation helper. The town on the highway is just a small town so we need to see if there is a suitable house to rent and mechanics and carpenters there who could take the load of vehicle and house repair off from Gene.

If isn’t going to work out there then we will survey the housing situation in a larger town in our province near a Manubu’ village that Pulding and Piduy surveyed a few weeks ago and where an outreach could be started.

So, lots of travel and decisions to make in the coming month. Please PRAY for safe travel, vehicle working well, open doors, and wise decisions. To get there we will have to travel 70KM of terrible, muddy, road with our mud truck before we hit pavement.

Another exciting bit of news. We’ve asked you in the past to pray that government school teachers would be willing to use our literacy material and teach Manubu’ kids to read using Manubu’ rather than Filipino and English with Filipino and English following after they have learned to read. The school in our village has been using our material this past year for kindergarten and first grade and have asked for literacy books for 85 students next year! Some school teachers in the lowlands have heard about the success of the program in the school here and are asking if they can use our literacy material to teach Manubu’ kids there. And the department of education is in favor of it. Please PRAY that they will follow through on this so that Manubu’ kids can quickly learn to read in the own language instead of spending years learning to read in languages they don’t understand.

Also, please continue to PRAY for Jujin. Church leadership has asked him to come before the church and ask forgiveness for his worldly behavior which has brought reproach upon the church and to also stop driving his motorcycle illegally without driver license or motorcycle registration before resuming teaching the children’s groups he has been teaching. We’ve heard that he cries because he is not being allowed to continue teaching, but is disinclined to confess before the church. He has stopped attending the Sunday meetings.

Also, please continue to PRAY about our internet connection which hasn’t been working very well for a number of months now and also for the Lord’s provision of a vehicle for us for our time in the States this summer.

Lots to be thankful for, lots to pray for. Keep looking UP! He’s coming soon.

Piduy and Pulding are back from looking for Manubu’ villages where there are Manubu’ who would be interested in listening to the evangelistic phase of the teaching which takes a few months to teach. They motorcycled for nearly 1000km (625 miles), mostly on dirt roads – lots of mud and slippery trails – and visited 30 villages. Thanks for praying for their safety.

As we suspected, in most of the Manubu’ villages within 20km of the highway only the elderly people know Manubu’. Because of schools everyone else speaks only Cebuano which is the language of the non-tribal people in our part of the Philippines. And even most of the elderly converse among themselves in Cebuano even though they can speak Manubu’. It is only Manubu’ people who live back in the mountains where there are only trails going to their villages who have retained their language.

But, they did find 5 villages where there is potential to teach. In those villages older teens and up understand and can converse in Manubu’ even thought they usually talk in Cebuano. In the most promising village an old tribal leader and an elderly woman were very disappointed when Piduy and Pulding said that it would be months before they could possibly go there to teach. There are many churches of all kinds there, but she said that because the preaching is in Cebuano and English and not systematic, she doesn’t understand what is taught. In general, churches here (especially those in rural areas) teach eternal salvation through faith plus good works.

All of the land where they surveyed is privately owned by Cebuanos. The Manubu’ are primarily impoverished people with no land to grow food on eking out a bare existence. It would be very difficult for Pulding and Piduy to live there with their families. As Piduy has said, “There is no way, humanely speaking, that we could live there. Only God can plan this.” Both Piduy and Pulding have ‘hurting breath” – are very concerned that the Manubu’ out there have the opportunity to hear the true gospel of grace, be saved, and learn all of the other wonderful things God has in His Word.

In a previous update we said, “If it becomes clear that the Lord would have us relocate to another Manubu’ area where we can live in a town on the highway and have access to mechanics, carpenters etc then we would relocate. We would have to take at least one translation helper and family with us.” We would continue to pay them for working on translation with us – but it would have to be not an hourly rate as now, but a set amount equal to what they need to support their families. And, of course, we would like to relocate where they would be able to exercise their gifts as Bible teachers along with helping with translation. But, they need a way to be able to continue on financially even after we’re no longer able to carry on in the work (we’re hoping that will be a number of years yet, but only God knows how many).

This afternoon we had a meeting about with Piduy and wife, Lynlyn and Pulding and his wife, Charlyn. It was encouraging that the wives said they are willing to follow their husbands in whatever plan they come up with. The couples would like to plant their land here with 500 or more rubber trees and also coconut trees to provide income for the future and to also help other Bible teachers do outreaches. Grafted rubber tree seedlings they have heard cost about $.75 each and coconuts to sprout about $.25 each. If anyone would like to help them with the cost of purchasing these items funds can be sent to New Tribes Mission – not to our personal account – but to the 6MANU account and specify that it is for rubber seedlings and coconuts. Or funds to that account can be sent without designation to be used to help any of the Manubu Bible teachers doing far away outreaches with things such as building materials and seeds.

The positive and negative aspects and the possibilities related to our possibly relocating are too complicated to go into detail here – it would take a book! Please PRAY for God’s wisdom as we weigh all this, that he will open doors as He sees fit, and that we will know the way that God would have us to go.

These are exciting days as we look to God for His will about us relocating and for extension of outreach by Manubu’ to Manubu’.

Please also PRAY about our internet connection. It is via cell phone signal, and the signal has deteriorated so that the past few months we can seldom get connected, and often when we do we can’t do anything with it. We think that it is important that we have internet so we can keep you, our partners, informed as to what God is doing here and what you can pray for. We also use it for other important things such as searching solutions for computer problems. If we don’t relocate but stay here, our only alternative is expensive satellite internet equipment and monthly contract payments more expensive than we pay now .

This work for God’s glory is possible because you have chosen to partner with us. Thanks for praying.

Jujin is back! He is the teenage young man Bible teacher who had strayed from the Lord we asked you to pray for. Thanks for praying for him. He attended last Sunday’s meeting, the Bible teacher meeting this past Friday evening, and the Sunday meeting today. The church leaders planned to talk with him about asking forgiveness from the assembled believers because his behavior had brought reproach on the whole group. He didn’t do that this Sunday, but don’t know if it was because the leaders hadn’t yet been able to talk with him about it or if he is too shy to do it and needs to work up his courage. He is a very shy young man. Please PRAY that Jujin’s return to the Lord will be a permanent thing – that he will grow in godliness and go on teaching God’s Word.

We have received word from the Philippine Bible Society about the print quality problem with our New Testaments. They said that they looked over five copies that they have there, and the print quality in them is within their quality standards. They will send one of those copies to us so we can compare our copies with it just in case there is a difference. In the meantime they will print 200 copies of each of the two dialects using a different style of press. Thanks for praying about this. And please PRAY that these 200 copies will be a good print job.

Tomorrow, Pulding and Piduy are leaving. Leaving, that is, to do another survey of Manubu’ villages looking for places where there are Manubu’ who are interested in listening to the evangelistic phase of the teaching program. They expect to be gone for a week to ten days. Please PRAY for safety as they travel the highway and mountain trails by motorcycle – for good weather – and a fruitful survey.

We live is such exciting days as we see signs of the Lord’s soon return – let’s make the most of these days for His glory.

First, just a little sidebar on the life of tribal missionaries. For about three weeks in January we were out in town and for most of that time watching over our mission guesthouse here on our island while others attended our NTM annual conference. We flew back to our village mid January. Two days later Gene lost a large tooth filling. The plane wasn’t available for awhile, but we were able to schedule to fly out on February 3. But, when February 3 arrived the pilot was weathered in at another NTM tribal location. That really didn’t matter because our river was too high anyway for our truck to cross. The river is very fast flowing when high so we can’t safely cross with the truck when the water is deeper than 3 1/2 ft – it had been 20 ft deep the night before and was going down very slowly. We couldn’t drive out to the dentist (more than a 10 hour trip – the first 4 hours of off-road like travel) even if the river were down because our road was blocked by landslides. However, the next day we were able to fly out to town and then go on to the city for dental work. Normally when we fly out, Mahan would drive us in our 4×4 mud truck the 1/2 hour trip to our airstrip and then drive the truck with cargo back to our village. Mahan is a new driver that Gene recently taught to drive – the only one in our village who knows how to drive anything but a motorcycle. However, Mahan wasn’t available the day we flew out. So Gene drove us, along with Piduy and Pulding, to the airstrip. Then Carol drove the truck, with Piduy accompanying, back to the village – including fording the river. Then Piduy drove Carol back to the airstrip on a hard sprung, jolting motorcycle, crossing the river on a raft. Then we waited at the airstrip. And waited, and waited. After the plane had been about 1 1/2 hours late, we were just ready to phone the pilot on our satellite phone when we heard the plane coming. It seems that he had been halfway to our place when the alternator belt broke. The plane doesn’t need the alternator or battery to run, but if the radio were to run the battery down a bit the battery might not have enough power to start the plane when ready to take off from our airstrip. So, the pilot returned to his airstrip to replace the belt before coming to get us. He wasn’t able to contact us because our satellite phone system has a problem and will not accept incoming calls.

After landing at the pilot’s airstrip, we then had a one hour drive to our guest house. The next day we drove to the city where our dentist is. The 61 mile road to the city is full of construction with lots of one way traffic and torn up road in between. But, we did manage to average 21mph for the trip. As we write this we are back at our NTM guesthouse and due to fly back to our airstrip soon. And this time Mahan should there at the airstrip to meet us with our truck – if the river isn’t flooded so high that the truck can’t safely ford it. And, if it isn’t raining so the plane can fly.

It is amazing how often over the years we have had a dental or medical need that needed to be dealt with as soon as possible just after getting back to our village. Dental work is quite inexpensive here compared to the States. For Gene to have a large filling replaced and to have a “wedge” made to help with his TMJ cost only about $200. But, to get to the dentist and back to our jungle village costs about $500, most of it in transportation cost. So cheap dental – once you get there.

That’s just a little insight into the life of tribal missionaries.

We don’t know yet what the Philippine Bible Society (PBS) has decided to do about the faint print on many of the pages of our translation of the NT in the Manubu’ language. We checked out the readability with Manubu’ believers, and they would like to have a better printing job done. We emailed that information to PBS. We have not received a response. A few days ago, after a number of text messages to the production manager, she answered saying that she had sent us an email with their response a week ago. We told her we had not received it. She said that she would send it again. We still haven’t received it nor answers to our text messages and emails about it. PBS has long had a problem with their email system so we’re not surprised. And the production manager doesn’t very often answer text messages either. She spends a lot of her time in meetings. Please PRAY that the issue of the poor print quality that PBS did will soon be resolved.

A while ago we asked you to pray for Jujin, a teenage young man who had been faithfully teaching children for about two years. A number of children have been saved through his ministry. We asked you to pray that he would not be tempted by the things of the world and peers who are either unsaved or not walking with the Lord. Unfortunately, he has stopped teaching and attending believer meetings, and like so many young men in our village, he has concentrated his life on buying an old motorcycle and driving it around unregistered and without a driver license. He also spends a lot of time in the lowlands doing things that he shouldn’t be involved in. Please continue to PRAY for Jujin, that he would see the futility of living life outside of serving God. It breaks our hearts to see a young man with such potential for the Lord having been tempted away from the things of the Lord.

Piduy and Pulding plan to do more survey this month of Manubu’ villages far from our village looking for potential villages to outreach to. Please PRAY for a safe and profitable survey. They will probably be gone on the survey for a week or more. It is so exciting to see them wanting to get God’s Word out further afield.

Also, please continue to PRAY for a vehicle for us for our time in the States starting late June through September. We need to book our flight to the States very soon as flights fill up months ahead, but our destination for the flight will depend somewhat on where the Lord provides a car for us. We would prefer something comfortable enough for long trips and not too expensive to operate. But, of course, we’ll take whatever the Lord provides. We will be having meetings from Maine to Florida and also visiting Missouri – so lots of travel.

Gene had blisters on his hands from fighting the steering wheel through and around mud holes and deep muddy truck tracks. Carol had sore toes and teeth from clenching them every time she looked out her window and saw that because of going around a deep mud hole her side of the truck was along the edge of a steep dropoff. Four hours and 45 miles from our village we were quite relieved to finally be on a paved road – until three days later when we reversed the route!

The reason for that trip in our mud truck was to take some Manubu’ believers out to the highway so they could visit some Manubu’ villages off the highway to see if there are villages where the people would be interested in listening to the evangelistic phase of the teaching – and of course beyond that if they listen and believe. (We call that a survey).

Three Manubu’ Bible teachers, Piduy, Pulding, and Sagli plus another believer, Bugoy, who has relatives in a number of Manubu’ villages out that way, did the surveying. Because it rained all the time and because Bugoy became sick the survey lasted for only three days. They found that the villages they visited would not be prime places to start an outreach as the younger generation is losing their Manubu’ language. However, through visiting those villages and talking with people along the way they learned of many more Manubu’ villages which are further off the highway so have more potential for outreach and establishing Manubu’ churches.

The guys who did the survey are excited about surveying those other villages when dry season starts which is around mid March and including any more villages they hear of.

While the guys were visiting Manubu’ village we were looking over towns along the highway. As we are without partners now Gene has been having to spend too much time away from translation and Bible lesson development in order to maintain the truck, the airstrip 5 miles away, motorcycle, generator, river crossing raft, solar system etc. Plus handling tools stirs up the arthritis in his fingers, and he needs to save them for typing on the computer .

So, after more prayer and survey if it becomes clear that the Lord would have us relocate to another Manubu’ area where we can live in a town on the highway and have access to mechanics, carpenters etc then we would relocate. We would have to take at least one translation helper and family with us and support them as they would be away from their land. As our translation helpers are also gifted teachers of the Word of God we would want to locate where there are Manubu’ who want to listen to their teaching – hence the surveys.

We’re country people so prefer jungle over town. But, servants don’t say when or where so whenever and wherever the Lord leads we’re ready.

So PLEASE PRAY that as the guys do more survey in the coming year the Lord will lead them to Manubu’ villages where hearts are prepared to listen to God’s Word, and we would see many saved and go on to serve Him.

One idea the translation helpers have is to plant rubber trees and coconut trees on their land here so they will eventually have an ongoing source of income. Please PRAY that the Manubu’ believers here in our village would be willing to take care of the rubber trees, coconut trees and rice farms of the translation helpers who relocate with us if we relocate.

PRAY for safety for the guys when they survey as they will be traveling via motorcycle on the highway and some rough trails.

PRAY too for wisdom and endurance for us as we push on to do a final revision of our Bible lessons and then on to more OT translation and making a topical concordance and other study and teaching aides.

If the Lord opens doors for relocation we’ll be glad to do that. If he doesn’t, we’ll be content to continue on where we are now.

Isn’t it exciting to think that the Word of God might spread out now to Manubu’ in places farther away than every reached before?

We plan to be in the States July through September this coming year and are presently scheduling our visits to our supporting churches and individuals. Hope to see you then . Please PRAY for the Lord’s provision of a car good for a lot of traveling while we’re in the States.

Both of our Manubu’ dialect New Testaments have been printed and sewn and are now awaiting covers. After that they will be shrink wrapped and shipped to us. Philippine Bible society expects that we will have them in hand before the middle of December.

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We have mentioned that while in Manila we would go to a clinic that might be able to help Gene with his chronic Malaria. We went there today and left poorer and praying that the remedies will work. Please PRAY with us.

First, Thanks for praying for Pulding and Telmon – Pulding was able to get his license to drive a motorcycle, and Telmon was able to upgrade to professional. It took three days and a lot of money, but they have them.

We have mentioned in our last two updates about Telmon and his wife planning to move to the lowlands where he has been teaching the Word of God on weekends. They have started building a house there, and they plan to move when it is finished.

Mahan has had three sessions at the airstrip learning to drive our mud truck, and he has now driven it back and forth twice between our village and the airstrip on the old logging road including fording the river. He’s still learning where the wheels are tracking when driving, especially the right wheels, but he is doing well. A couple more trips and he will be ready to solo.

We’ll be flying out to our NTM guesthouse in town as the final proofs of our mountain dialect New Testament are due to arrive there tomorrow or the next day. The lowland dialect is scheduled to arrive later in the week. We’ll look them over to make sure the page margins are okay and then fly to the city and be there for when the printing starts. If there are no changes to make then the printing could start as early as Oct 24 .

While in the city Gene will go to a clinic to see if they can help with his chronic malaria. And our mission computer guru, Joe, who is at our mission office there in the city will work on getting our new Windows 7 laptop to network with our older laptops which have Windows XP.

So, please PRAY for safe travel, production of the New Testaments to go well, that the clinic will be able help Gene, and that Joe will be able to get the laptops to network.

Just a couple of items for prayer. Pulding, our primary translation helper, is the one who checks out our Bible lessons and scripture translation (now it will be Old Testament ) with Manubu’ in the lowland dialect. Because he doesn’t have a license to drive a motorcycle it has meant that Mahan or Telmon has to drive him there about every 10 days. It is a 50 mile round trip over mud hole roads. Therefore, Mahan has been teaching Pulding how to drive a motorcycle, and this coming week Pulding plans to try for his license. It will probably involve a seminar and test which is not in their language, although they know the language used somewhat.

In our last update (just a couple of days ago) we mentioned Telmon and his wife planning to move to the lowlands to teach the word of God (a different part of the lowlands from where Pulding goes to work with translations helpers). Telmon will be using the Bible teacher motorcycle to go between the various places he teaches. It would be a big help if he could carry fare paying passengers as the fares will help to pay the expenses of running the motorcycle and also perhaps give him and his wife a little income. However, Telmon’s class of driver’s license doesn’t cover carrying passengers for hire. So he will go to the Land Transportation Office (more than 3 hrs from here) with Pulding to see if he can upgrade his license to a professional one. It also may involve a seminar and test.

Gene has started teaching Mahan to drive our 4×4 mud truck. Presently, when we fly out to town Gene drives the truck to the airstrip 5 miles away, Carol drives the truck back to our village, and then Mahan drives her back to the airstrip on a motorcycle. The motorcycle trip is hard on Carol’s back. When we fly back to our airstrip from town, the whole process is reversed. It will be much easier if Mahan can return the truck to the village when we fly out and also come and pick us up when we fly back in. Mahan’s driver’s license covers his driving the truck, he just has to learn how to do it. In our western culture we grow up watching our parents drive so by the time we are ready to learn we have some idea of how it all works. But, Mahan hasn’t had that experience. So going from a motorcycle to a truck is quite a step. He’s not always sure which way to turn the wheel, especially when backing around in order to turn around. Fortunately, we have a long, fairly wide, smooth airstrip for him to learn on before trying the mud hole road and river crossing.

So, please PRAY for these three guys. Pulding to get his license, Telmon to upgrade his license, and Mahan to learn to drive the truck – and for Gene not to panic when Mahan gets the pedals confused and the truck heads for the jungle at full throttle =-O. (Gene does for sure keep his hand close to the ignition switch ).

We finished proof reading and revising some things in our two Manubu’ New Testament translations this past Monday and have sent the revised files to Philippine Bible Society (PBS). They expect to have new films made of those pages and new proofs ready to send to us to check over in about two weeks. It will be primarily a matter of our checking the page sequence. We don’t know yet when the printing will fit into the press schedule.

Two lowland Manubu’ Bible teachers, Dani and Charlitu, are hoping to be able to travel to the province of Surigao del Norte to talk with a relative of Charlitu’s and other Manubu’ about listening to the evangelistic phase of the teaching program. It is more than 200km from where they live. Please PRAY that they will soon be able to make that trip and that there will be many who will want to listen to the teaching. It would mean that at least Charlitu and his family would need to move there, and they would need either land or work or both in order to live there and teach. So, please PRAY for that too. It is more difficult for them to move and live 200km from home than it is for us to move and live across the ocean.

And there is another exciting development. A few months ago we featured in an update Telmon and Maricel. They had left a note to us saying (in Manubu’), “Older sister and older brother, we will have been married 13 years tomorrow, Feb 8. Help us by praying that we will be faithful to what God wants, and that Telmun will continue to spread God’s word because that is what he likes to do.” They are seeing answers to that prayer request.

While we were out in town for six weeks waiting for proofs of the New Testaments to arrive and then proofreading, the Lord enabled them to buy three hectares of land in the lowlands near Maricel’s home village which is not far from the village where Telmun has been traveling to by motorcycle to teach each weekend – a rough trip of about two hours each way. There are more and more people in that lowland village wanting to listen to the teaching of God’s Word, and Telmon is also teaching in another lowland village so it would be a big help if Telmon and Maricel could live there in the lowlands.

The Manubu’ don’t work fast on developing plans and carrying through on plans so it could take months or even a year or two before Telmon and Maricel actually move. Please PRAY that it will work out for them to move to their land and also have a way to earn a living there, at least until they can prepare and plant the land and have a harvest.

Isn’t it encouraging that we can bring our requests before the creator of the universe, and He answers according to His perfect will? He knows what is best for the accomplishing of His purposes and the perfect timing.