Storytelling among the Kao Bu

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Orality

Posted by Justin Long ⋅ January 1, 2008 ⋅

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When the police pushed open the door and charged into our training center I knew my time in China was finished. After the five days with police “protection” I was deported to Hong Kong. Figure that one out? Little did I know God had another plan for me. He redirected me to an unreached people group that is incredibly hungry for God and simply waiting for someone to bring them the good news. After being deported I thought my world had fallen apart, but God taught me many lessons concerning who I am and why I am here, and showed me He can put me on the shelf whenever He wants to. As my wife and I sought God’s will we heard clearly that we were to relocate to Thailand.

During a vision/research trip in a restricted access country, God burdened me for the peoples of that area. You can ride for hours in the back of a truck and see village after village without any churches, without any missionaries working amongst them and without even one Christian who could tell them of God’s love and plan of redemption. My passion has always been to go where the needs are greatest or where there are unreached peoples who are not engaged or who are being overlooked. So, when I saw these people groups without anyone working amongst them, I knew what God was saying.

I tried to argue with Him, saying the populations of people groups in that area are so small it would be better to use my efforts among a bigger people group. However, He made it clear we were to target the Kao Bu people. I was a bit confused since I only spoke Chinese and didn’t speak the Kao Bu language, but I did know there were near-culture peoples who were Christian who spoke both Chinese (my language) and their language.

We prayed and asked God to send us a co-worker. He sent us a fine Christian man with a heart to reach the lost. Many Christians in this particular group only think about how they can get financially supported, but this man wanted to see the gospel spread. With him came two other brothers who had experienced a revival in 1996-97, where the Holy Spirit fell and brought conviction of sin, repentance and power encounters of many kinds. These guys are humble servants of God and I have learned so much working with them.

I had already begun researching where the Kao Bu live, how many of them there are. I was planning a strategy of how to reach them. I took these men into Kaobu land for their first ever trip outside of their country and showed them where their near culture neighbors lived. Over the next few months we put together the first cycle of oral materials that would be used to evangelize and teach the first believers.

We started with a standard 40 chronological bible story list and evaluated what was most appropriate for the target culture. The redemptive story of Christ told from Creation all the way through the Bible to the resurrection, ascension and promised return. We never spoke of Jesus but only of the redeemer that God has promised. We traced this promise through the Old Testament highlighting what each story taught us about God, about mankind and his inability to save himself, about Satan and his plan to destroy humans-and the most important point, sometimes called the “scarlet thread of redemption,” that we trace to the New Testament revelation of Jesus the Christ. After developing a four tape set of oral materials, we made a fast-track tape to be used by the prayer teams we were arranging to come and prayer walk and strategically and prayerfully leave these fast tracks in the villages.

We have found certain stories to have the greatest impact. With those who are heavily influenced by demonic activity and spirit propitiation, telling about the creation of angels and their fall is very significant. The Ten Commandments always brings about lively debate as the people are happy to point out where the guy next to them has fallen short. By the time we get to the end of the old Testament there is truly a sense of frustration and loss of hope. They see clearly their sin and inability to save themselves. We have even had heated discussions about where they might get a lamb, although they have never seen a lamb before.

When we get to the part where the redeemer is born, that is truly “Good News.” The people are so very happy to know that all we taught them about God’s faithfulness and love for the people of the world is true and that He would fulfill His promise and send a redeemer. In the New Testament certainly Jesus’ power encounters are very meaningful to animistic people, but I think without any question the story of Lazarus and the rich landlord is the most impactful.

The Kao Bu have always followed the ways of their ancestors, but when they understand that there are only two options of where they can go when they die and that their ancestors would be pleading with them to choose wisely and not end up in the same situation as the rich landlord, the people almost always choose to follow Christ.

They have seen their sin and inability to save themselves. This has historically been a problem with animistic tribal peoples coming to Christ: they don’t really understand who God is and their true spiritual need. One fellow missionary told me he has seen people from one particular people accept Christ in just 10 minutes, but it takes 10 years to find out what they were actually thinking when they made that decision. Unfortunately the motivations are not always the right ones if appropriate worldviews are not adequately addressed in the teaching/conversion process.

The amazing thing we have seen is how the Holy Spirit works in these people’s lives even without access to the written word or very much training. One young man who was to be evicted from his village because he had become a Christian stayed up all night and wept tears of joy as he walked around his village. When we heard this we were so sad, but he said not to be sad, because they were “tears of joy because the Lord was counting him worthy to suffer for Jesus”. We had never taught him this, but the Holy Spirit had.

Another exciting event was when a man in a village had a vision three days in a row of the risen Christ. The Lord told him, “I am the risen Lord and I have called you to be a witness to your people.” The man exclaimed “Okay, but I don’t know who you are!” The Lord then told him to “go down river to where My servants are teaching about me.” It just so happened that we were down river teaching people how to know Jesus.

Another man was very sick, so we took him to the hospital. He was so angry that he shouted at the doctor and tried to escape from the hospital because as he said “I came to hear the word of God, not to be treated for my physical ailment”. The man went home knowing the Lord.

Just recently we had a delegation from a village come out of their remote area because they wanted to know who God is and how to worship Him. They have been worshipping the sun and the moon, but felt very dissatisfied and empty in their hearts, so someone suggested, “Let’s go out to “a nearby country” -there must be someone there who can tell us who God is.” They had not traveled far when they met some of our disciples, who led them to our training center. They were told they had come to the right place! Five people went home three days later believing that Jesus is the true son of God and only redeemer for the sins of the world, and that they were going to obey Him. They began by being baptized and now they want to go to other countries to tell their relatives there about the wonderful news of a loving God seeking and finding those who desire Him.

We have had so many miraculous things happen these past three years-but by far the greatest is that we can verify 250 people have come to faith and expressed their faith through baptism. These people know that they will face persecution for their faith. We teach them immediately how to face persecution right after they receive Christ and are baptized. The gospel is spreading in this restricted country through these people and flowing into other peoples and countries. Near culture groups are being challenged by these young Christian lives to live their faith more genuinely in those countries where there is more religious freedom. The Lord is being glorified and to think what I thought was the end of a ministry was actually just the beginning of an exciting time watching the Lord reach an unreached group for Himself.