I have a goal to circumnavigate Lake Sentani by motorcycle. Everyday as I go to Titip I pass the eastern and northern shore of Lake Sentani. On an extended trip I traveled over to the far western part of the lake and took a very nice road south into the hills and jungle.  Much earlier in our stay here, I traveled down the south eastern shore of the lake and found a road leading west. But this early attempt to circumnavigate Lake Sentani ended when, nervously low on gasoline, I came upon a steel and concrete bridge that ended abruptly as a foot path into the jungle.  So what has been lacking is the South West Passage connecting this bridge to the road that travels along the western edge of the lake.

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After studying Google maps I was convinced that it could be done, if I could find the right roads.  I made a couple of PB&Js, filled a couple of glass bottles with extra gasoline, had 1.5 L bottle full of water and so I made a second try.  I traveled south along the eastern edge toward Yokiwa, then the road east from Yokiwa that goes around the south side of Lake Sentani.  When I got to the concrete and steel bridge in the middle of nowhere (see above), I had to make a decision.  The road again looked like it turned into a foot path past the bridge, but to the right and left were dirt roads(?) one toward the lake and the other away.  I first went right toward the lake came upon a ridge and a beautiful view of Lake Sentani.  But I was convinced (and remembered from Google maps) that this just ended at the lake edge.  So I backtracked and followed the road away from the lake.  It went up the hills, got rougher and rougher and finally was nothing more that barely beaten down path through the 4 ft tall grass.  The scenery was wonderful, on top of the ridges swathed in tall green grass with surrounding ravines and hollows filled in with trees.  But after wandering around a while, I finally came to the conclusion that this couldn’t be the road either.  So back to and over the bridge onto the foot path into the jungle.  Lo and behold the path opens up a bit after a few dozen yards and I could see the remnant of a paved road. So on I go.  Again I get some great vistas of green swathed hills and Lake Sentani.  Cyclops was majestically wreathed  in clouds.

This road goes through a creek in a ravine where the bridge was washed out. There were steep embankments on each side of the creek, but the creek was just a few inches deep.  Just as I arrived, pondering what I should do, it appeared that a motorcycle driver for hire (called becak) was letting off a passenger at the top of the embankment.  I guess it was as far as he was going to go.  There were actually a couple of guys on the other side, and they yelled encouragement for me to cross.  Going down looked a little steep, but managable.  I just wasn’t sure if I was going to able to make it up the other side.   Channeling my inner adventurer (thanks, Paul Jantze and Chris Ellis), I took the plunge.  Crept down the one side, till near the bottom I gunned it to get through the water and hit the upslope with some speed.  Wheels spinning, rocks spitting I climbed up the slope and was back on the road.  On and on it went.  Now mostly through forest and jungle, until finally I come upon a village.  I remembered the village from Google maps, so I was encouraged, until I just got beyond the village and the road forked.

I was pretty sure I was to take the right fork, but… . So I drove back a little bit and asked an old woman next to the road which road went to Sentani.  She said right, so off I went, through more forest, broken bridges with just a couple of old planks over them, bumpy rutted roads until I came out where I could see the Lake.  I was getting excited now thinking I had to be close to the road that runs along the eastern edge.   I went over more hills and more rough roads until I get to a village along the lake.  Now at this point I’m a little puzzled as I couldn’t figure out how this road met up with the road that went along the west side of Lake Sentani.  Hungry, tired and thirsty I stop along the road to eat some more of my PB&J and drink some water, when this guy comes walking from the other direction carrying a little bag and a machete (they always carry machetes out in the jungle and forest).  He gives me a pleasant smile, so I ask him if this is the road to Sentani.  He then says a some things that I dont quite understand, but I get the jest that something’s wrong with this road and you can’t get to Sentani and that I would have to go around.  Sigh…  So I turned around and head back.

The problem was that I couldn’t remember any turnoffs except the one way back at the village, about one hour away.  I didn’t want to backtrack a whole hour with who knows how long it would take to get to the west road.  So I get to another village near the lake, see this shirtless man walking to his house and ask him “is this is the road to Sentani?”  He again says something I’m not sure, but this time I think I catch the word banjir or flood.  And says its a long way around.  It would be at least 2 hours to backtrack all the way to Abepura, who knows how long to go the long way around to Sentani.  As I pondered what to do, he said that a Johnson (boat with outboard) could bring me to Sentani city.  It leaves at 3 pm just at the lakeside and would cost Rp 200,000 (about $23).  It was almost 2 pm now, I had plenty of gas, but I was beginning to run out steam.  So I decided to can the trip and see what taking a boat would be like.

I drove down to the lake and there was a little pier with a Johnson just letting people off.  This older man comes up and greets me.  I told him I wanted to go to Sentani, he smiled and said that the Johnson could take me for Rp 100,00.  I smiled and said “Great!”  So there was a lot of shuffling around as I drove Suzie (the name of my Suzuki motorcycle) onto the dock.  The older gentleman came up, apologized and reported that the boatman had said that the wind was against us and I did have a motorcycle so the boatman wanted Rp 150,000.  I agreed.  Then they told me to take Suzie off the dock and go along the lake wall.  The bow of the Johnson stuck over the wall and they lifted Suzie’s front end onto the boat, pushed, lifted and Suzie was propped up against one side of the boat with me on the other and a couple of other passengers.  Off we went.  About 200 yards out, the motor hits something, snapping a pin that keeps the propeller spinning.  It’s actuallly a safety feature on boats to protect the motor and propeller should they hit something.  No fear, the boatman lifted the motor and proceeded to make repairs as we bounced around in the wind-pushed waves.  One passenger, a young migrant, looked a little nervous, so I asked him if he could swim.  He said, yes, but looking anxiously at the shore, he said it was far.

After some time rocking in the boat the boatman completed his repair and off we went.  As we crossed the lake the Cyclops range looked very tall.  It occurred to me that from Sentani city and Titip, you can’t really see the top as it’s behind a ridge.  We docked on the other side near Sentani city and I easily made my way home, but my lower back was getting really sore and stiff.  When I got home, I realized I was completely exhausted.  I ate an early supper, was about to go online, when the power went out.  It was too hot to stay in the house, so I laid down on the front porch tile in the dark, with the Hobbit on my IPod and the sound of a neighbor’s gas generator.  Then I passed out.

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During Holy Week the children of the church participate in a church camp held at the church, in our case on the grounds of the school where our church is located.  Tents are put up and kids come from all around.  It seems that a lot of churches do this.

Easter’s festivities start at 3 am with the church bell (compressed air container with bottom cut out) is matched by our neighbor’s loudspeaker playing hymns to call the faithful to the church building.  Sleepy kids, tired from the week’s activities come with their parents, all collecting quietly and somberly.  The service starts by candlelight.  You can see that many haven’t quite cleared the slumber from their eyes.  Singing sounds a little tired, there is some special music by a string instrument group and by a choir and then  a short (by Papuan standards) sermon.  However, when the Amen is sounded, activity and excitement picks up.

People start collecting at the steps of the church, then file out onto the road that lines the church and school.  Torches are handed out – bamboo stuffed with frayed coconut husks soaked in kerosene.  Most everybody gets a torch, including small kids.  When the first one is lit, the fire quickly passes from torch to torch until the whole crowd, now filing up and down the street is lit with torches.

The musicians start singing, the crowd joins in and we start a glorious Resurrection parade!

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It’s an amazing amount of fun walking through neighborhoods, singing songs of praise, carrying torches to banish the darkness.  We walked at least an hour traveling through neighborhoods, down the main street, by the police station (where a cop directed traffic as there was another church’s Easter torchlit parade coming from the opposite direction), through the University.  To give you a little taste, here is a video clip I put together.

Easter is the great AMEN, where we remember the passion, sacrifice, but amazing resurrection over death and sin of Jesus!  It’s something to get up early, join the parade and sing and dance.

Now here is the the real reason I like living in Papua.

I commute from Abepura to Sentani just about everyday.  It takes about 40 minutes.  Ironically, that just about exactly the same amount of time I commuted when I was working in New Jersey.  I must say, though, this commute is a lot more beautiful and exciting.  And sometimes more refreshing, if I get rained on.

P.S. – 80!!?!! That’s 80 km/hr, not 80 miles/hr.

Nancy Sabas, a YAMEN! participant from Honduras, allows her host mother, Sarah Fere Ansanay, Papua, Indonesia, to help her with a hurt knee. Nancy says she was faking a smile to not make her host mother more worried than she already was.

By Nancy Sabas, a YAMEN! participant from Honduras serving in Indonesia

Luke 10:27 (NIV) He answered, “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind;’ and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ ”

This is the verse the teacher used to introduce us to the story of the Good Samaritan. This and many other teachings of Jesus impacted me in such a way that I grew up convinced that a true follower of Christ must honor his neighbor with mercy, following the example of the Good Samaritan. And without a doubt, a follower of Christ was what I wanted to be.

To my surprise, my YAMEN! experience in Papua, Indonesia, has consistently demanded a reconsideration of the previous statement. As a newcomer, I found myself in Papua with a basic knowledge of the language, in a completely new place, with just a few familiar faces. After a vain effort to find my “neighbor” to serve, it became obvious that I might be the one who would play that role at the moment.

Even though becoming a neighbor comes from our finite human nature, it also presents a complex challenge. Being the injured man on the road means not having a sense of control over situations and fully succumbing to vulnerability and dependence on others. It is a matter of timing depending on the number of people who pass by, and living in the uncertainty of whether one of them will stop in a gesture of mercy and generosity.

Stripping myself of my fantastic self-sufficiency costume was not easy at all. Giving in to vulnerability meant letting a teammate take the trouble to come to my house every morning and evening for two long weeks to help me learn the way to get to the right place. Sometimes it involved discontinuing – or perhaps sacrificing – interesting conversations just to ask for exhausting explanations in more simple words that I can understand. It also involved letting my diligent host mother do the work of cleaning and changing the bandage of a scrape on my knee every morning for a while.

No doubt, yielding to vulnerability also involves asking for a re-explanation of everything in the spotlight of the new culture.

While it is true that through my YAMEN! experience I have the privilege of serving others, I’m not so sure I am to be the “Good Samaritan” of the story. I cannot ignore the fact that I have been honored with mercy by people while I was still a stranger; yet they offered me their generosity.

I dare say that this experience has given me back my forgotten humanity.  Honoring my neighbor with grace and humility, but also accepting vulnerability in waiting for the miracle of generosity, may more fully describe a follower of Christ.  And a follower of Christ is what I want to be.

AMEN! is a joint program of Mennonite World Conference and Mennonite Central Committee.  http://yamen.mcc.org/

During this holy time of Lent, Passion Week and the upcoming glorious Resurrection Sunday, our neighbors express their piety (and help us to participate) by playing hymns and spiritual songs through their stereo systems.

Their devotions often start around 5:30 in the morning.

Our neighbor up the hill had been silent for quite some time prior to this season.  Then early in Lent I noticed that their 4 foot cabinet speakers, which could project music half-way to the moon, had been replaced by a more humble horn loudspeaker, similar to the ones on top of mosques used to broadcast their calls to prayer.  I guess the old speakers gave up the ghost.

This neighbor has always had very good taste in music (according to our predilections).  And after repeated requests to turn down the music (so that Catherine and I could have a conversation in our house), they play their music at a comfortable level (for us who live 30 yards away).  Recently their morning playlist has been hymns in English performed by a beautiful sounding and balanced choir with full orchestra.  There are times when being gently roused by a beautiful rendition of Amazing Grace can be an unexpected grace.  Of course there are times when all I can think of is Proverbs 27:14.

Another neighbor, who lives a little further away have also taken up this act of devotion.  However, their equipment and playlists are not quite so refined.  Based on the warbling that comes over the air, I’d say they are using an old cassette player with speakers that are, well, overamped.  The playlist is composed completely of Indonesian praise music.  The two neighbors have shown Christian charity to each other by not attempting to play at the same time.  We thank God for small mercies.

One thing I really like about community life here in Papua is that people feel a responsibility to take care of community property–whether it be the greater community or a select one. A few weeks ago, a general work day, called a “kerja bakti,” was organized. Unfortunately, because I didn’t really understand what was going on (an all to frequent occurrence…), I didn’t take part. However, as Allan and I were driving around on the motorcycle in the afternoon, we saw groups of people working throughout our city. Some were cleaning out drain ditches (YUCK!), others were cutting grass or pulling weeds, while still others were painting the stone walls on the sides of the roads.

Last week there was a smaller kerja bakti called by the student association of our seminary to clean up our campus. Now that I knew what it was, I armed myself with my camera and went out to take pictures. Hum….. guess I could have lent a hand, too. Well, next time….

Ezekiel 1:26-28  … there was the likeness of a throne, in appearance like sapphire; and seated above the likeness of a throne was a likeness with a human appearance.  And upward from what had the appearance of his waist I saw as it were gleaming metal, like the appearance of fire enclosed all around. And downward from what had the appearance of his waist I saw as it were the appearance of fire, and there was brightness around him.  Like the appearance of the bow that is in the cloud on the day of rain, so was the appearance of the brightness all around.  Such was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. And when I saw it, I fell on my face...

Revelations 1:12-17 … Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking to me, and on turning I saw seven golden lampstands,  and in the midst of the lampstands one like a son of man, clothed with a long robe and with a golden sash around his chest.  The hairs of his head were white like wool, as white as snow. His eyes were like a flame of fire,  his feet were like burnished bronze, refined in a furnace, and his voice was like the roar of many waters.  In his right hand he held seven stars, from his mouth came a sharp two-edged sword, and his face was like the sun shining in full strength. When I saw him, I fell at his feet as though dead.

The tropical sun is an awesome power to behold.  Unfiltered by cloud or dust is shines with a glory that places a pop and sizzle in the colors that almost hurts the eyes. Greens deepen, reds vibrate, the sky’s blue is amplified, highlights glisten off of leaves and water, even the blacks and grays of shadows serve to intensify the colors with surreal contrasts.   From time to time I try to capture this riot of color through my camera.

Sometimes, I like to think I come close.  Now that I’ve lived here I better understand the riot of colors Gauguin used while he painted in the tropics.

But as magnificent as these colors are, they are just a reflected glory. The greens, the reds and yellows and blues derive their splendor from the sun.   Without the sun, they fade to gray and then to nothingness.

It is the sun that is the source of glory.  A glory so grand and powerful that even after 93 million miles it will fry this poor white boy to a painful crisp. I simply can not stand naked before the glory of this radioactive sun.  In its full glory, I must hide from the sun.

Now bear with me while I draw my analogy into something that may sound a bit silly.  The only way I can dare the glory of the sun at its height is by applying to all parts of my exposed flesh industrial strength sunblock. (To the tune of Rock of Ages) Glorious sunblock applied to me, let me hide myself in thee, let your SPF screen me and be my shield from UV Block from me the burning beam to bask secure beneath its gleam.

But, of course, this is just a temporary fix.  If I don’t apply early and often … .

When I reflected on this I began to better appreciate the prophets of old and their awed descriptions of the Glory of God.  The language used by them borders on the incredulous that speaks of a halting, feeble attempt to describe the indescribable.   And the glory that they see always brings them to their knees in fear of their life.  Given no place to hide, bearing the full brunt of this Glory, they become undone.  Surely, unblocked, unfiltered no mortal can see God and live.

(Allan begins to channel his inner old-timey preacher)  If the sun can bring forth glory and power how much more its Creator.  If being exposed to the full might of the tropical sun will fry us through and through, what about unadulterated exposure to the holiness and glory of God!  If sunblock is the only temporary means by which we can survive the unblinking gaze of the noonday sun, how much more do we need the holy sunblock of Jesus to survive that unquenchable glory which is the Almighty God.  Can I get a “AMEN?” (to which the audience will commence to boo, groan and throw things).   No reapplication is required!  (more boos, etc, etc, etc…)

Yeah, I know it sounds corny.  But actually it makes a lot of sense to me.  If I get out from underneath Jesus, I inevitably find myself feeling more than a little naked and afraid.  The biblical analogy, of course is not sunscreen, but the sacrifice of Jesus.  It’s His blood that covers me.

But I want to wrap this around to His Kingdom.  Listen to this:

Revelations 21:9-10, 18-23  “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.” And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God,  having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal… .  …the city was pure gold, clear as glass. The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every kind of jewel. … And the twelve gates were twelve pearls, each of the gates made of a single pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, transparent as glass.  And I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.  And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb.

The Bride of Christ, His People, His Kingdom is and is becoming and will be fully realized as having the glory of God.  That’s what we are doing here.  In some small ways in a world that seems often dark and perplexing we come to reflect that glory.  Our  presence, one of so many, is a sign of His Kingdom in Indonesia.  Our work in some way is making that holy city, joining together with others to become the wife of the Lamb.  Basking in His Glory we will reflect in colors and light an unimaginable magnificence that enables us to cry:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory!”

2011 December « Brian & Heather Marx

2012 January « Brian & Heather Marx

Young men singing in Biak language

Soon I think I’ll make the 25 kilometer trek to a neighboring town so that I can attend an English language service. After all, I need to worship in my heart language, too!

The music is “Aku Papua” by Edo Kondologit.  I’ve heard hundreds of Papuans join together to sing this song together.