God Loves All the Cultures in the World.
All the cultures missiologists have studied had “redemptive analogies:” cultural ways illustrating how God made peace with sinful mankind. Canadian missionary Don Richardson’s book Peace Child describes the way warring tribes made peace with each other by giving a baby as a “peace child” to the other tribe.
In our book The Great Adventure, I described several Canela ceremonies that picture what Christ did for human beings. One involves a young man who is about to receive a painful public punishment for wrongdoing, but suddenly another person, called the Place-Taker, runs up and takes the punishment instead. We described Jesus as our Place-Taker.
The Canela Easter Story
One of the heroes in ancient Canela stories is called Awke. (This story didn’t make it into the book.) Awke did not have a human father, but he loved people. He treated people well and taught them how to live good lives. The elders of the village, however, hated Awke because he was more popular with people than they were.
One time, the elders pushed Awke over a high cliff, but he turned himself into a leaf and fluttered down until he landed on the ground and then turned into a man again. In the end, they clubbed him on the head and then burned his body in a large fire outside the village: the traditional Canela way of executing a criminal.
Three days later, some women came to sit by the ashes and mourn his death. Suddenly, Awke appeared, fully alive, and said, “I am going home, and I will prepare a home for you and all those who are my friends. Someday you will live with me there.”
We praise God that He has put these types of illustrations into every culture to help people understand His great plan of salvation.
Important Announcement
After sixty years of service with Wycliffe, on Tuesday, June 30, I will join my wife in retirement and will no longer be a member of Wycliffe.
Our first major task with Wycliffe was the Canela Bible translation program in Brazil, which took nearly twenty-five years. Our last task was writing the story of those decades in The Great Adventure, which we finished late last year, and which we have promoted and distributed since then.
I expect to keep writing these blog posts, as well as newsletters and will keep all of you up to date on our future activities.