September 21, 2013
Dearest Friends and family
RAIN
If you listen you can hear the rain. For the last three months we have not had
any substantial rain. We have had to water the garden daily and the crops don't
grow as well. We have porous soil and it does not retain water well so the soil
is dry down to about 2 feet. In fact while digging a hole for the corner posts
for the new classroom I found cockroaches about 18 inches down in the soil seeking
moisture. Starting last night we have received over 3 inches of rain so far
and expect another 3-5 inches before the front moves south tomorrow. The rain
is very welcome.
However we have been told that if it was warmer (November - April) we would be in for a cyclone, so to expect some gusts. And gusts we have had! (PS This morning dawned clear and sunny. We had over 3.5 inches (84 mm) of rain and wind gusts up to 25 mph which almost ripped off the storm door on the verandah last night.)
COMBINED WORSHIP
On September 1st we hosted the combined worship with all the congregations.
Again there was a good turnout from the other congregations. We had about 120
in attendance.
The oldest, the first Christian (he is 84 and was baptized in 1980) and who lives here in the village, Eddie Karris, called a meeting after the Sunday combined worship to declare that the other missionaries are not acting as Christians and that Tobey & Kathy are the first missionaries who have helped them and actually lived with them instead of just coming with a new set of rules to please God. He is going to tell them that he has personally seen how hard I work and how dedicated I am to Biblical truth (not necessarily coc tradition).
The other missionaries here, who came in 2006 after we left in 2001 and who are graduates of Bear Valley School of Preaching, have personally come to him (and others) and told them not to allow me to teach at Eton as I was a false teacher, but they have NEVER come and talked with us personally about anything I teach. These missionaries then started telling the other three congregations that Eton congregation was unfaithful and to not have fellowship with us because they were allowing me to teach, that really flipped his lid. Eddie is the same person, who has been a thorn in my flesh since 1986 because I did not follow the church of Christ party-line (tradition) as he had been taught. After working with him and helping him in other areas and answering a lot of questions of American coc culture with Biblical answers he has finally taken off the coc party (tradition) glasses.
He attended my recent class on Galatians and finally saw (I did not have to point it out) that the missionaries were really only trying to put the brethren here back under coc traditional (American) law and not allowing them to be saved by grace. I am currently teaching, on "Marriage God's Way" (a course I have prepared for my thesis for my Doctorate in Christian Counseling), and Eddie said he wished he had been in this study while his wife was still alive. He is ready to tell the missionaries they are no longer wanted here as they have only split the church during the 6 years they have been here (there are only two families now with both back in the USA currently on leave). JUST TAKES TIME for people to see through the smoke!
What exactly do you do........an
explanation
I have been asked my some "What exactly do you do for the spiritual well-being
of the people there? How many studies do you have and how many baptisms have
you had?
I have to say until you walk a mile in my shoes it would be hard for you to understand why we do what we do and how we do it. Working and living in another culture is not like just moving to another town. We have found (and studies have shown) that it takes two years for someone to be accepted when they move into another community, whether it be in the USA or overseas. That means if you want lasting results in whatever works you are doing you need to just put in the time and realize lasting results will take a good foundation, even more so when we are taking about spiritual matters and the church. Local preachers in the USA have a support team called the local congregation (usually). However missionaries are their own support teams for everything usually.
We have been back in Vanuatu less than 18 months and we have only been living in the village not even a year. It helps that we speak the language and have been here before but it still takes time for the people to trust and open up to us. The fact that I help them physically, have a weekly newspaper column, have letters to the editor published all the time about things that concern them as well and sit around and shoot the breeze with them whenever they drop by, shows we care.
We are going about helping the people here and understand it TAKES TIME to be effective with long term results. The following is a break-through that has taken time.
We came here to establish a Bible Training school from NOTHING! That means we have to build what we need, after we had to build what we are living in.
I wish we had $200,000 and I could contract out the building of what we need but we don't have it so we are doing what we can. This all takes time - and we live in an island culture that has a laid back attitude, an untrained labor force, more than their share of holidays and most everything we need to build with has to be imported and usually is not in stock when you need it! Hurry up and wait!
I believe we are setting the proper foundation so that the things we are currently doing will have long lasting results with the church even if we have to leave before we get a full-time Bible school started.
I do a lot of studies and talking but they are as I am working with someone or just sitting around (when I have those rare moments). I have seen the result of missionaries who come to baptize and find it very hard to pick up the pieces. Since 1980 preachers from the USA have come here and baptized people scattered on all the islands, after completing English Bible correspondence Courses, and left them. We have never been told who they baptized nor where. When the Bear Valley team came in 2006 the first meeting they had with the Christians in Port Vila, who I had worked with for 2 years, was "we don't care what Tobey or anyone else did before but we have come to baptize 100 people a year." In the past 6 years they baptized a number of people (less than 50) and the main congregation they worked with now has less than 10 of those baptized as faithful, only one man. It is easy to dunk um - harder to make disciples! We are trying to make disciples.
Why do we stay here and put up with what we do - because we feel that these people, to whom English is a second language at best, deserve a chance to hear the "real" good news after so many years of being dominated by denominationalism. I think God has empowered, equipped and called us to this unique ministry. Therefore we choose to be here and it just might kill me.
Rethinking Evangelism
(via Frank Viola)
With few exceptions, every traditional church I’ve ever been a part of
emphasized evangelism to be God’s grand goal. And every believer was divinely
obligated to share the gospel with lost souls.
This sentiment is fairly recent, harkening back to the teachings of D.L. Moody. Moody, who was a gifted evangelist, had his paradigm circulate through mainstream evangelicalism through Bible colleges all across America. (Moody Bible Institute was among the very first). His paradigm is now in the drinking water of modern-day evangelicalism.
Last year, I was flipping through the TV channels and came across a very well-known pastor telling his congregation about the desperate need for them to evangelize. He went on and on, warning them that if they didn’t tell others about Jesus and bring them into the church, the building they were all sitting in would be converted into a furniture store. He told stories about this happening with other churches he knew of. He then went on to tell them that his ministry as pastor is to teach the sheep and motivate them to go out and bring others into the sheepfold. The saving of lost souls was their complete responsibility. If the church failed in this and the building was lost, it was their fault.
With every word, the guilt and condemnation piled higher upon the heads of God’s people in that audience. I felt sickened. Yet they took it like good Christians, and I suspect that it wasn’t the first time.
Let me make a few observations about evangelism that, I hope, will help all believers seriously rethink the subject:
- People who use the number of souls saved as a metric for anything demonstrate that they don’t understand God’s eternal purpose. Einstein was dead-on when he said, “Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.” Think of God’s purpose for every human like a race track with a finish line. (Paul actually used this image.) The finish line is God’s intention, His goal. Every person is born 5 miles away from the race track in a dark forest. Bringing someone to the Lord is like taking them by the hand out of the forest onto the starting line of the track. However, many different people may be instrumental in that process. Let’s use you as an example. At some point, someone took you by the hand and brought you 1 mile closer to the track. Later, another person took your hand and brought you another mile closer. Another brought you a few feet closer. Another brought you some yards closer. Perhaps it took 10 different people at different seasons in your life and through different means to bring you to the race track. However, once you set foot on the racetrack – that is, you repented, believed, and were baptized thus becoming a disciple, a believer, and a convert (the New Testament knows no difference between the three), God hasn’t yet fulfilled His purpose in your life. There’s still the finish line which is 3 laps around the track! Someone else may come along and help you finish the first lap. Another may help you make the second, and another the third (which is the end of your life). Or more accurately, many people will bring you to various points in the track. Now here’s my point: It is utter blindness and absurdity to place special value on the person who brought you to the last leg of the forest to the starting gate of the race track. Each step and each person who has been and will be instrumental in helping you take the next step toward the finish line is equally valuable. God gets the most glory when you have finished the race. Nothing short of that is His goal. What many evangelical Christians have done is to make the whole ballgame bringing people from the last leg of the dark forest to the starting line. And they wrongly assume that this is the calling of every Christian.
- There is nowhere in the NT epistles to the churches where one word is said to them about the need to evangelize. There’s also not one word of command to evangelize. The silence is deafening, and it cannot be dismissed.
- The 12 apostles stayed in the city of Jerusalem
for at least 4 years before they began bringing the gospel to other parts of
Palestine. They weren’t trying to get the world saved in a
hurry, John R. Mott notwithstanding. That blows past and present movements to
“save the world in one generation” higher than a kite.
- Sharing Jesus Christ with others is not a duty, a religious obligation, nor something that Christians should feel guilty or condemned about if they fail to do it with instant results. You can’t find any of this in the New Testament. It’s a post-apostolic idea. Sharing Christ was and is a spontaneous thing that issues forth from one’s life in Christ and his or her love for others.
- Christians who love the Lord Jesus Christ cannot but share their Lord with others, when the season is right and when a door has opened by the Spirit. You don’t have to command or guilt a woman who is in love with a man into telling her friends about him. She just does it by instinct. Now a word to preachers and teachers. For the last 25 years, I’ve observed the following: If you preach to people that they “must evangelize, and if they don’t, God won’t be happy with them,” you’ll end up with people who aren’t very good evangelists and who live in guilt. But if you preach the glories of the Lord Jesus Christ to where God’s people are intoxicated with Him, you’ll have a group of fire-brands that will naturally share their Lord as opportunities arise. As I have often said, pursue Jesus Christ with others, get to know Him deeply, and evangelism and the like will take of itself. When this happens, God’s people won’t be found trying to sell something to others that they themselves haven’t been utterly sold on.
- In the first-century, the greatest evangelist was the ekklesia of God, a close-knit community of believers that loved Jesus, showed Him forth by their life together, took care of one another, and served others. Whenever she – the ekklesia – is functioning according to her spiritual nature, she trumps every other evangelism program known to man. That’s still the case today when she’s reflecting her Bridegroom as God called her to. I hope that those who love evangelism, but think that the way a church expresses itself isn’t important will give this point serious consideration. The way a church expresses itself is terribly important. Biblically speaking, the church is the premier witness to Jesus Christ.
- During seasons of revival, the salvation of souls happens quite effortlessly. In a revival, scores of people are open to hear about Jesus Christ and are ripe to receive Him. For instance, a massive amount of disciples were made from 1968 to 1977 in the USA. You could say the name of “Jesus” and people would be open to believe on Him. We aren’t in a time of revival right now. This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t share Christ if we feel the Spirit compelling us to do so, but it does mean that far fewer people will come to the Lord right now than in a time of revival. So don’t get befuddled when few people come to the Lord right now. A related, but overlooked fact is that the early church experienced seasons of outreach and seasons of in-reach. Churches that function as organisms today rather than human organizations experience this same rhythm of seasons. This is because such seasons are part of the DNA of the church. Those who pit evangelism against spiritual formation and vice versa do not understand the seasonal nature of the ekklesia.
- Sharing Jesus Christ with others can be done in many ways other than giving them “the plan of salvation” verbally. A believer’s life that is lived by Christ embodies the gospel. Paul and Peter make this clear throughout their letters. A life lived for Christ will often provoke open-hearted questions from others. It will be reflected in acts of mercy, love, care, giving, and kindness. Equally so, someone who shows the love of Christ to their coworkers (for instance) will often be sought out when a coworker is going through a trial. Their heart will be opened to hear about the living Christ, and what makes you so different. Such cases are often the best opportunities to share the Lord with others.
- Israel was called to be a light to all the nations. God said that through her, all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. The church is the new Israel. It is by the ongoing life of an authentic local assembly that meets under the Headship of Christ – through the reality of authentic community, mutual love, mutual sharing, justice, care, open-participation, and fellowship that the church reflects the kingdom of God to a watching world. There will be seasons where a local assembly will be called to serve their city, to serve the lost and to show Christ to them. However, it will only be effective if it is done “in season” and the Lord Himself is leading it. If not, the people will burn out, and there will be little fruit that will come from it. There are seasons for in-reach and seasons for outreach. There are also dry spells and wet spells. All come from the hand of God. For a church to always be in-reaching spells death. The same is true for a church that makes outreach its only focus. It must learn how to bear the light of Christ outside its own walls (metaphorically speaking). This gets into the subject of living by the indwelling life of Christ, which is the source of all things spiritual.
- Many Christian leaders today will argue fiercely that not all Christians are called to teach or to be pastors, yet they will fiercely teach that all Christians are called to be evangelists. The New Testament is clear that not all are called to be evangelists (see 1 Cor. 12). Philip was an evangelist. And Timothy, who was an apostolic worker, was encouraged by Paul to do “the work” of an evangelist. While all believers can evangelize and teach and shepherd, not all of them are called to be evangelists, teachers, or shepherds. This point is often overlooked and a double-standard exists when it comes to evangelists which is different from teachers, prophets, apostles, and shepherds.
- There’s an immense need to learn to read Scripture with fresh eyes instead of reading it through a 100-year old lens. N.T. Wright is known for arguing that contemporary Christians come to the New Testament and read it through the lens of the Reformers with respect to justification and the works of the Law. I submit that contemporary Christians come to the New Testament and read it through the lens of D.L. Moody with respect to God’s mission. It’s high time that this changed and we begin to explore the fact that God has an eternal purpose that’s been beating in His heart since before time. That purpose, in fact, preceded the Fall. It’s what provoked Him to create. And it’s not the making of individual disciples.
- The so-called “Great Commission” was an apostolic commission that Jesus gave to the 12 apostles – the men whom He lived with for 3.5 years, trained, and then sent out to the apostolic work. It is a huge assumption, therefore, to hang this commission around the necks of all of God’s people. Paul made clear in 1 Corinthians 12 that not all are called to be apostles. An apostle is a “sent one.” They travel. Paul said that not all are “sent ones” (apostles) in 1 Cor. 12:28-31. It is beyond dispute that the vast majority of Christians in the first century (and the second and third for that matter) did not travel all over the world preaching the gospel. Most of them stayed where they were. Does that mean they were being disobedient to the “Great Commission”? Not at all. Furthermore, that commission is often wrongly translated “go into all the world . . . .”, etc. In the Greek, the phrase is actually “having gone on your way . . .” It was a prediction rather than a command. Jesus knew that the Twelve would be going at some point, for that is what apostles do. They travel, they preach the gospel, and they make disciples. How do they make disciples? By planting churches. And they did. Modern-day apostolic workers fulfill the “Great Commission” by making disciples and creating communities where transformation organically takes place. The church evangelizes out of spiritual life and “in season.” Not as a program, a religious duty, or out of guilt.
Those are just some quick and cursory thoughts on evangelism. Please keep this in mind: I’m a strong advocate of sharing the gospel with both lost and saved (many so-called “saved” have never heard the gospel by the way). And the most potent evangelist in the earth is a community of believers who are living by the indwelling life of Christ together in face-to-face community.
THIS N' THAT
I finished the shelter. (Picture taken today in the rain.)
New Zealand Trip
Kathy and I went to New Zealand September 4-14th. It was to celebrate her 64th
birthday (4th) and my 65th on the 17th. Since we lived there you would have
thought we would have been wiser. They were supposed to be going into Spring
but the day we landed they had a Southerly that night and it got down to 36
degrees with daytime highs in the upper 60's. They were having cool rains and
their high temperatures 17 C were not even our normal low temperatures (20-23
C). We wore multiply layers, jackets and had heaters going in the motel rooms
we stayed at night. Once we got to Tauranga we stayed with the Willis' two nights
and two nights with the Harnetts and visited with the Macleans as well. We worshiped
the Sunday we were there with the Otumoetai congregation. The first night while
saying at a motel in Hamilton we heard sirens going off and found out they were
for the volunteer fire brigade and not tornados. The same thing happened at
a motel in Thames on our way back to Auckland, and it was during heavy rain
and a thunderstorm!
The Willis' with overseas boarding students
Mark Willis teaches History at a High School (college). The class had studied
the Vietnam war and he asked if I would talk to his class. I did and really
enjoyed it. This trip showed us that we have no plans to return to New Zealand
to work or live anytime soon. It was nice to visit all the stores and be able
to get spares parts for some of the projects I was working on here in Vanuatu.
We were also able to
bring back some more seeds for our garden.
The Harnetts
The Macleans with Kathy
Gardening
While we were gone we asked Tal to water our garden as many of the plants were
maturing. However it was found when we got back he was not faithful in watering
and some of the squash, cucumbers, tomatoes and other plants did not survive.
We got stuck back into watering and were able to get most of the corn, tomatoes,
egg plant, beans and carrots back to maturing.
Kathy picking beans
Our foster chickens are growing and we have added 25 five week old broilers to the flock. We also picked up 5 more day old chicks from Stephen's house in town last week. They were hatched in his rubbish pile. The mother hen was not very happy with us taking them and put up a bit of a fight. The broilers will be ready for eating in another 5 weeks (after we have left - see Finally below).
CIBS COURSE - CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE
AND FAMILY
I have continued teaching my course on "Christian Marriage and Family"
on Sundays and have had some good discussions. We are not looking at Marriage
as it relates to Western or Island ways but what does God say about it. It has
opened some eyes. Several of the women have personally come up after the class
and thanked me. I am just sorry that their husbands have not been present for
the lessons.
There is still a need for a Christian counseling service to help with the increased spousal abuse and non-understanding of the different roles in the family as God sees it. This is something we plan to implement when we get back next year.
FINALLY
The Fayetteville Ark VA has notified me they require my presence sooner rather
than later and have scheduled the following that will be needed before I can
visit with the Doctors in Houston (for the prostate surgery):
All this will be at the Fayetteville Ark Veterans Administration
Clinic
10/23 - Bone Scan at 9 AM (no fasting required but they say no other work
can be done that day. They will need me for 4 hours)
10/24 - 8:30 AM Lab work (3 hour fast before, no food
or drink)
- 9:30 AM CT scans
- 10:00 AM X rays
So we will be leaving here (Vanuatu) October 15th to go to Fiji so we can be back in the USA before the 20th. We hope to be back in Vanuatu by January 2014 - cancer free, Lord willing!
Our plans - Lord willing
- your help providing
With the plans we have (Lord willing) we ask for your continued consideration
of the needs we have in this work. We see this as the Lord showing us that He
is still with us and perhaps "piece meal" building the school at this
time is the best way. We are building a classroom next to the building here
in Eton to use for children's classes (as well as for CIBS classes) and a toilet
block on the back of the building.
Perhaps the property for the school will be settled while we are back for the surgery.
Thank you so much for all of you who are praying for us, supporting us and have contributed to our needs. God bless you! Thank you for your prayers!
Thank you Lord for healing and what we have!
Grace & Peace
Tobey & Kathy
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Contributions for the Huffs, the Bible school and house can be sent to:
Huffs/Bible School
c/ Mt Hope church of Christ
2830 Mt Hope Rd
Webb City MO 64870
or
Tobey & Kathy Huff
c/ 2730 E. 24th St
Joplin. MO 64804
Ph: 678 596-4821 (Vanuatu is + 17 hours)
Web Site: http://www.oceania-outreach.com/Index.html