One of the things that I have noticed through the years is that the established tribe wants to keep what they have and they don’t look favorably on anything that might upset their apple cart.

The missionary has for centuries tried to make people become who the missionary is, for fear of being led astray by the traditions of the missioned peoples. They have been fearful enough to forbid drums, vocal styles, even meeting locations for fear of demonic intervention, rather than “taking on all comers.” I will speak of the native American, but with the caveat that they aren’t the only aboriginal peoples who feel this way. The path of reconciliation is well worn and bears little fruit. 

The modern church researchers have begun to recognize that people groups have sounds associated with both them and the ground that they inhabit. The Aborigine in Australia incorporates the sounds of their surroundings into the music of the didgeridoo. The Hawaiian dances in expression of the sea that gives them sustenance. The Native American calls out thanks to the animals that share the land and life with them. The Native American actually has a Trinitarian god who manifested in the earth because he was too great for man to comprehend as a spirit being… Sound familiar just a little bit? 

Their complaint is that the modern church (since its arrival) has judged them simple heathens and turned back their honest expressions of worship. The drum, the flute, their dance has all been judged as an expression of a baser faith which includes animism and reverence of dark spirits (all of which can be discovered to some degree in our church today). 

We MUST accept their identity in its full expression, which includes tobacco, sage and cedar which mirror elements of the jewish worship with what is indigenous to the region. All are used as incense. Their use of the drums communicates Gods heartbeat and they consider each time their foot touches the ground to be a prayer, especially when they are wearing a “jingle dress” which adds the texture of a tambourine to their dance. The sound of breath filling the air around the flute so easily represents the breath of the Holy Spirit being breathed over a group of people, and yet people have feared these exhortations, these expressions of the spirit and in the Spirit may have been used for a dark purpose or by the unordained and therefore insulting to the deity who, in fact, said, (New International Version) Mt 28:15&16 He (Jesus) said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.” 

Rev 5:9 And they sang a new song, saying: "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain, and with your blood you purchased for God persons from every tribe and language and people and nation.” 

 Rev 7:9 After this I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. 

He receives them. Who are we to be so bold and so proud as to “protect” Him from them. It is a lie that God cannot look on sin. A lie, pure and simple. Jesus was not abandoned by His Father on the cross, He was fully man in that moment, experiencing death crying out as any man would. Adam is proof and did what man has done ever since, until that moment on the cross. God came looking for Him. In His ability to shut off His omniscience so that Adam could hide from Him in His shame? I believe that He wanted Adam to come out and trust the friend that he had always walked with in the cool of the afternoon. 

Enough with the rabbits, Jesus is certain to redeem every tribe and tongue, and every means eery just like all means all. There is no “skiming the till”, He will get everything that He has paid for. All of it.

The New Man in Gadara

He had always, it seemed, lived in the darkness. Only a faint memory of light hidden in his memory under a pile of resentment fed by the cold and the smell of his own rotting manifestation and a feeling that he was once much more.

It had been eras since he had last syphoned from the light in a host. He had been happy until being discovered by a new man. up until that time moment he had it pretty good living as part of a horde within a man who would do our bidding in exchange for supernatural strength. Eventually we had him replenishing the lot of us with energy that was meant to sustain his mind and body to a glory that I resented- we all resented... and took great pleasure causing him to let his own blood, his own life force flow.

We found great sport in it.

Beyond being our source of the glorious energy that we fed on he was endless entertainment, pulling stones from graves and raising them high over his head, we would wager on how long he could keep it there before it landed on him. Or threaten passersby with threat from stick or stone or eventually even just a scream was effective in keeping him in isolation.

Those of us within were warm and safe reveling as we sucked all of the glory within that reminded me of a better time.

I was beautiful then.

This bone that you see when you look at my head? The large one that looks like a horn? It was once a crown filled with jewels, but as my manifestation was deprived of sustenance, the energy derived from the man in the graveyard, it has deteriorated through the last two millennia into what you see here.

Where once my eyes were a bright glowing red, red like the embers of a fire, now are hollow and for all intents and purposes I am blind.

The vibrant colors that colored my armor now monochromatic shades from grey green to a black.
Once smooth and creaseless, gaps between bones and joints separated by a coagulant viscosity that drips off occasionally like the flesh of the Gadara. the smell is far worse probably because it is my own.
The new man? We only knew him as master, wondering why he had come before it was our time to vacate the decaying flesh we inhabited.

Somehow our host caught sight of him and ran, although our resistance caused him to trip more than once as we fought for control.

We had taken intelligible speech from him, but one of our more fearful number darted for his ability to speak and asked if the New Man was here for us...

Knowing that he had brought disaster upon us one of the more powerful among is thought to negotiate our exit. He tried to negotiate for a new host, not nearly as delectable as the one we had, he asked if we could be released into a herd of pigs.

...This horde into a herd of pigs, a disaster at first consideration, but I think he thought it would buy us time and we could regain entry or find another host, but in the moment we left I felt the change.

The New Man had come to bring a change into this world that was my home... had been my playground, feeding ground, the land where I lived a life of leisure, and now into a herd of pigs that no matter how we tried to control them still managed to stampede into the river.

They had no thought for reasonable compromise, we couldn't dominate them we were stuck in our compromise with the New Man. Stuck swimming, crying, clamoring, the weaker pulling the stronger back down as they would reach a possible safety, all and each clinging to existence knowing that life as we knew it was over.
The New Man never gave us a glance.  It was as though in this moment a lesson had been taught. A victory recorded and a history rewritten.

Now I sit in the cold darkness. Feasting on memories of a time I cannot return to. Unless perhaps...

Come closer, how would you like the power to...