our move to the island (from a wife and mother)

We’ve made it.  To that place of our long-awaited plans, holding both dread and excitement for my heart.  We’re on the northern curve of an island in the Pacific, one of the furthest reaches of the country of the Philippines.  We’re 2 hours, give or take, from the nearest grocery store, and even that description is being liberal.  There is no real cheese on the island (and I hold firmly to the opinion that calling processed cheese “cheddar” doesn’t count as cheese), and many of the spices I need to make our kitchen table enticing are not available.  Of course, I had all the spices stored and ready for our move, but I forgot to get them, and we didn’t have room in our car for them, anyway.  But that’s just grocery shopping

Our refrigerator isn’t working, although the freezer is, so I’m able to keep from spoiling our meat.  The most dependable way to get it fixed is to pack it in cardboard, load it on a jeepney, and send it down to the capitol (the 2 hour drive), where it will be worked on at a repair shop there.  (Update: the fridge is wrapped in cardboard and waiting on our porch, in hopes that the jeepney, too loaded to take it today, will be able to take it tomorrow.)  Nothing is easy.

I knew that before coming here, which is why I was filled with dread.  What is life going to be like here, where if I don’t cook we won’t eat?  There are no fast options.  Yesterday I made two kinds of bread to figure out which recipe I liked best.  I didn’t like either.  Back to the drawing board.  I’ll probably have to bake bread every other day to keep us stocked.

While all our stuff remains in storage we’re borrowing the home and everything in it of our friends and teammates, the Buursmas.  They’re on home assignment while we get a taste of their life here in Panganiban (which, if that name is too hard for you, can also be called Payo).  They’ve lived here about 6 years and are coming back for another term.  I’m in awe of both they and the Martins, who have stuck it out in a place so far from familiarity and ease.  And while I’m glad for a chance to taste this life, I’m thankful it’s only a taste.  We’re moving to our more permanent location, on the southern part of the island, sometime in April (where there is still no cheese).  For one thing, we’re finally in a place that we can call “home,” even if for a short season, so that I can get our toddler back into a routine and get over some hurdles we’ve had, like a crazy and unsatisfying toddler-led feeding routine (about to change, like, now), and finally getting rid of his pacifier.  Both of which I wasn’t able or willing to deal with during our recent joyful Christmas tumble with family and friends in the States.

So here we are, officially in an “internship” to learn from the team here and see how we can apply some of their strategies to church planting in San Andres.  And while all this adjustment remains a struggle for me emotionally, especially since we’re adjusting right now to something that’s actually temporary, there is a bit of excitement in what we’re doing here.

There’s excitement for our family: yesterday we sandwiched Josiah between us on a moterbike and rode over some coastal mountains to catch a gorgeous jungle view of the ocean.  Then Edwin rode Josiah around on a pedicab bike (both motorbike and pedicab are generously being leant to us by the Buursmas while we’re here), which Josiah loved.  He sat there like a king while his dad peddled him around town.  Not to mention the chickens and roosters that graze casually into our front yard and give Josiah a show.  “Chicken!” he hollers.  (I’m hoping this will be enough for Edwin to give up his dream of us owning our own chickens.)

And then there’s what we’re really here to do, which is impact the community in the love of Jesus Christ.  I’ve been keeping Josiah at home the last few nights while Edwin attends some Bible studies.  I’ll go to some starting next week.  At our breakfast table this morning he told me a story about some of the local believers here:

Religion in the Philippines is a mix of folk religion/superstition and catholocism.  Unfortunately, the truth of Scripture gets diluted and people become misled to believe some things that are not true to any form of Christianity, catholic or protestant.  One of these practices is to keep traveling, seemingly powerful, idols in one’s house.  There is one, called the “Black Rosary,” an image of Mary, which travels around the Philippines.  People are chosen (we don’t know how) to keep this idol in their homes while it travels.  For the local people this is a big honor.  But when this idol came to town, the local believers, who have put their trust in Christ alone, and do not believe these kinds of images hold any power, were faced with a challenge.  One family was chosen to keep the idol in her home.  She decided against it, and faced persecution.  Many people couldn’t believe she would deny such an honor.  For others, it was as if she was denying hospitality to their mother.  How could she tell “Mama Mary” she wasn’t welcome here?  And one family, who was attending the Bible study of this woman, was forbidden by their mother to attend any longer.  They quit coming and since then their brother has been demon possessed.  Likely, the family believes the Bible study put a curse on the man.  But we believe that instead, the family chose to continue in the darkness of idol worship, and the result has been that that darkness has moved in.

That is the kind of spiritual struggle that exists in this place.  It is into that spiritual atmosphere that we’ve come to proclaim:

“He (God) has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.”  -Colossians 1:13