Mission Link

Whithersoever I go, I always make an effort to worship with my Brothers & Sisters in Christ … even IF their church building looks very different from my home church. Here is a Nordic/Transsylvanian Building, blending Finno-Ugric Architectures into what they refer to as “The Boat-Church” (Looks like GONDOR to me! Some locals tease it’s a Dog’s Face). ëInside, above Crucifix on the altar, a Pillar [or Tree-of-Life] rises very high and is surmounted by a sculpture of The Risen Christ! This fit well with the Ecumenical, Polyglot, Multinational, Cross-Cultural Gathering for c. 500 Christian Foreign Missionaries!

Dr. David Upp’s current ministries in Global Missions

include a missionary conference in East Europe, Teaching Seminary Classes in Bukidnon, The

Philippines, and his fourth consecutive term beginning in Lahore, Pakistan.

2 Dr. David Upp’s MISSION LINK for September 2017

UMC Bishop Rodolfo Juan, Davao Area: Leader of My New

Affiliated Conference

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One of my Crucial Guidelines is Always Serve as Part of a Ministry TEAM! Above you can see a few of our Bishop Han Theological Seminary Faculty, Staff & Students who drove to Malaybalay on September Fifth, to meet with our new Bishop Rudolfo Juan as he again traveled through Bukidnon Province (last time, it was with Relief Supplies from Refugees of the Battle for Marawi, about 60 miles away, where Muslim Separatists/Terrorists known as Maute are still fighting Army troops for control over that City). The Recipients this time are members of several different Tribes, mostly Manobos from Talaandig, & Umajamnon, who lost their ancestral domain lands as settlers streamed down from Luzon and the Visayas Islands. MAnobo Cultures were ORAL, so they couldn’t read the new rules giving lands [like the Homestead Act in the USA] to anyone who’d fill out the Paperwork & Claims! Since here (as throughout the Tropics) the farming was done by slash-&-burn / Swidden method, new arrivals took “empty” lands not THEN being farmed, but part of swaths of land farmed for centuries… Every 6-or-7 years! By the time the Manobo found out their land had been grabbed

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and legally deeded to Outsiders, it was too late to act as whole Tribes and keep their lands. Later the Ancestral Domain legislation was passed, sparked by Matigsalud Manobo, but smaller and still un-recognized Tribes are struggling to reclaim their primeval territories. The Talaandig [Manobo] live to the Northwest of our Campus & the Umajamnon Manobo are off to the East and across the Border into Agusan del Sur Province (my Long-Time Readers have met them in various articles about my missions during 2015 and 2016).

It’s wonderful to see the United Methodist Church reaching out to those in particularly difficult circumstances. Bishop Juan [yes, his family name is spelled just like the Juan Neighborhood of Incheon which is home to our Korean Methodist sponsoring congregation] has a huge area to supervise: All of Mindanao, All of the Visayas Islands, and the SE part of Luzon! He’s bishop of FIVE UM Annual Conferences! That includes NW Mindanao Conference, with its Bukidnon District where I serve. As provided for in The Discipline, I will apply to be accepted as an Affiliate Member of this conference (keeping my Full Membership in Great Plains Annual Conference) and participating actively HERE!

Members of Displaced Tribes camp out near the Provincial Capitol, seeking their Lands. Bishop Juan hands out Relief,

Donated by UM Members!

3 Dr. David Upp’s MISSION LINK for September 2017

Are the Native Peoples of The Philippines... MALAYS?

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I was surprised to learn Filipinos have been taught that they are "Malay"! The Malay Peninsula (on the East Shore of the Indian Ocean) is a LONG way from the Philippine Islands. At Rice, I learned the name of their Language Family as "Malayo-Polynesian" -- but I never thought about that very deeply before. Since that Language Family spread to Madagascar & to Easter Island [Chile] before the Age of European Exploration, a better name might be: RapaNui-Malagasy. Finally, I realized that the name we use was determined BY European Exploration! The Portuguese traveled down the coast of West Africa, back North along its East Coast, along the monsoon winds to India, and finally on East to Malaya/Spice Islands. There they met their first natives of this Language Family. The English and French sailed West to the Pacific, around Cape Horn/Straits of Magellan, and first encountered the Austronesian Islanders in Tahiti (now French Polynesia). So "Malayo-Polynesian" traces back to the two places where Europeans first met such folks, rather than drawn from their Largest Populations or the Earliest Centers. So, where DID these distinctive peoples originate? Now, we can answer that easily. All Nine branches of this Family have only been spoken by Natives of one Island: FORMOSA / Taiwan! Filipinos have been taught that their ancestors migrated to these islands from the Malay Peninsula (yes, that's used to encourage acceptance of ISLAM by Filipinos, after all, MOST Malays are Muslims). DID those ancestors island-hop their way across Indonesia's 7000 islands, eventually reaching the Philippines (following the same "Natural Route" Islam later travelled)?? OK, it's time to look at a MAP. Find Taiwan. [No, the Chinese people are from China, they're relatively Recent Immigrants to Taiwan, though they totally dominate that nation today.] Now find Luzon. These Islands are Near Neighbors! How did the Filipinos get from Taiwan to Luzon? They didn't walk. Neither did these peoples walk to Easter Island, nor to Madagascar, nor any of their 30,000 Native Islands. They sailed!

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The Austronesians were the BEST Navigators in the Whole World! It was a short and an easy voyage. There are even "Stepping Stones" (the Batanes Archipelago North of Luzon, spans most of that distance toward the South from Formosa). Now look at the Map again and ASK yourself IF this route is more or less believable than the story that those people WALKED across all of those countries in-between [China, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and Thailand... none of whose intervening Peoples are "Malayo-Polynesians", except for Chams of Cambodia/Vietnam] & then SAILED from the Malay Peninsula to Luzon. Compare the two distances. Then, realize they couldn't have even started that trek... unless they could already SAIL from Taiwan to China! Easy as pie to re-construct now. No, Filipinos aren't Malays! The flow of Migration went in the Other Direction, down Through the Philippine Islands to the others: Malays are former Filipinos! So are the Indonesians! And the Melanesians! and the Malagasy! Their ancestors all used to live in the Islands which are now known as The Philippines! –David Upp Hat-tip to Dr. Kambati Uriam of Kiribati & to Pacific Historical Association publications.

4 Dr. David Upp’s MISSION LINK for September 2017

SEPTEMBER Trivia Question: Which Bible Verse is protrayed below by the type of indivdual

drawing we see in the memorization methods now

widely known as “ORALITY”?

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My two Missiology Classes continue well, as students study Indigenous Peoples of this nation. Ultimately, the key to maximuize evangeli-zation is multiplication of New Believers through the native networks of family & friends & neighbors: New self-multiplying churches!

Worst Cornfields ever? One ear per stalk, weeds/vines taller still, ground cannot be seen for nettles & weeds! Maize is not native to The Philippines and that shows!

For the first time, I was able to sing along with our Christian Praise–Worship Songs IN Arabic! The key is a form of Texted-English with numbers or Capitals in place of sounds English doesn’t have: alif, ‘ayn, ghayn, kha, etc. Now I can recognize the Semitic roots of most words & Sing them!

August Trivia Question: How many of our thirteen United Methodist Semina-ries in the USA are located in rural areas [since we’re a Rural Denomination]? I ask since BHTS is the only Rural Methodist Seminary in The Philippines [two are up in Metropolitan-Manila and Cabunatuan City].

Answer: Only 1-of-13 in USA is Rural: Methodist Theological School in Ohio, just outside of Delaware, Ohio (population 35,000). We train almost ALL our clergy to live/serve in the huge cities, not town/country where Most of US Worship!

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September Trivia Question:

See the RED BOX on this page í and the white card beneath it.

“Orality” is a set of techniques which have developed following the great Lausanne Conference on World Evangelization, where the challenge of Oral Cultures was brought into the Spotlight. No longer do missionaries have to wait until a Gospel/NT has been translated to teach Bible Stories to the emerging Believers! Now folks who have never held a pen or pencil are given pen & paper and asked to make a little sketch which will remind THEM of a point in a story from the Bible. No one else has to recognize it… only the Storyteller. Such a series of visual notes [outline] helps her /him to share every point in the whole story with a new Listener!

Now, in addition to many major languages, Bible Training for new leaders is also available in a format for Oral Cultures and Communities. The use of paper & pen also prepares the leaders for the possibility of Literacy, but that is no longer a limit today.

This frees up illiterate evangelists to present in depth, multi-year Bible Studies. In some parts of the world… Memorization of revered writings is very common, but this dimension has been addressed poorly in most literate cultures (we think we can always go back & read the text again… so we don’t bother to learn it by heart, even though rote learning is superb for making Scripture handy for informal/spontaneous sharing of our Faith, answering questions posed by Searchers, & strengthening our Prayer Life by including God’s own Words and phrases. Try this out with one of Your favorite Bible Stories! See if you can tell the whole nar-rative without any re-reading?!

5 Dr. David Upp’s MISSION LINK for September 2017

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God's Doctor: A Texas Physician and the Miracles of God –by Dr. Bob Eckert “The Episcopal priest sat across from me at the dining table in our gracious home near the beaches of Galveston. His tale was spellbinding. Here were stories of a God who was not trapped in a 2,000-year-old book, but Who was alive today and doing amazing things. The priest’s name was Graham Pulkingham. I began thinking to myself, That’s Bible! That’s just like it says in the Bible! I began to say some things to God. At that time it was “God,” which is a distant and impersonal title for Him compared to “Lord” or “Jesus” or “Father.” I wasn’t yet able to call Him “Lord” and I wasn’t speaking to Jesus. Next, I prayed: God, I want that… what Graham has. I want that. How had I gotten to this point? I had met Graham while I was in medical school. Nancy and I had become Episcopalians and he was the Episcopal chaplain on the medical school campus. We were doing really well in life. I drove a new Plymouth Sports Fury every year; we had a nice, big, fancy home and this farm boy was now “Doctor Eckert” with all of society’s rank and privileges. We enjoyed a private club in Galveston and I had a partner-ship in a liquor store. I decided to contact Graham, who had become the rector at Church of the Redeemer Episcopal on the east side of Houston. I called and asked if he and Betty could come for dinner at our home in Alta Loma, just west of Galveston. It was the fall of 1964 and I was intent on showing him what a great life I had going. After supper when the kids were playing elsewhere, we four lingered around the table. “Graham,” I asked him, “what’s been going on since the last time we were together?” He started telling me about God

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leading him, speaking to him and working through him. Physical, mental and situational miracles were happening before his eyes. The story of Graham’s stunning personal transformation & that of Redeemer was just getting out. At first, the bishop had told Graham to just give Redeemer, then a dying parish, a decent burial. Graham reached out to the neighborhood, met up with the local gangs, even rode with them in their cars, but nothing changed in their lives. These neighborhood kids ended up wrecking the church. Meanwhile, Pentecostal types began inexplicably seeking Graham and telling him to be baptized in the Holy Spirit. Graham began finding verses popping out at him in the Bible about this. He went to New York to visit David Wilkerson, a Pentecostal minister, and saw the powerlessness of the traditional church. Then Wilkerson and a friend prayed over him. He felt a “swoosh,” as if he was cleaned out from head to toe, and began weeping. He knew there’d been a change. Graham began seeing changes in the Eastwood gang leaders when he talked to them about Jesus, and he began to see healing miracles at Redeemer. I listened patiently for a while. As I began to get the picture he was painting, it really disturbed me. What’s wrong with my friend, I thought. Does he have some mental disturbance? Is he delusional? I dismissed that as I had also dismissed the possibility of him being a rank liar. He talked for two hours. After the first hour, it began to dawn on me that his testimony was scriptural. They were things that had also happened in the Bible. Having been raised in the Baptist church, I knew all those Bible stories about miracles. But for me, those things were in the distant, non-functional, unreal past. Here was Graham, a respected and trusted friend, seated across the table, in living color, telling me of his having seen and participated in actual, biblical-type miracles. For

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the first time in my life, I was hearing that aspect of the Gospel from someone who could testify to its present reality & applicability. I made fun of him, saying, “Graham, you need to see a doctor, and you know which kind,” pointing to my head. I laid into him in that way but he kept talking. During the second hour of Graham’s story, I started having this interior conversation with the Lord. I saw a relationship between Graham and “God” and I wanted it. So I said those things to “God” and then I described it to Him, saying, I want that relationship that Graham has. I want you to be number one in my life. Immediately, I felt terrible. I almost felt like I had an upset and burning stomach. I felt sick! I knew I had just said something absolutely wrong. After I thought about it a bit, the Lord showed me that what I had said was indeed off base. He didn’t want to be my Number One. He wanted to be my whole life. He didn’t want to have any competition with any numbers two, three and so forth. So I followed that with, I don’t want You to be my number one; I want You to be my whole life. It didn’t take long after that, just a few seconds later, when I said (I was still talking silently to God): In fact, if it’s not going to cost all of my life, if it’s not going to cost ALL OF ME, I’m not going to start. Somehow, I saw the unsurpassed value of what the Lord was offering me. All of me had to go. My confidence at that point was that God could accomplish all of my “going.” It wasn’t like “I can do that; I can accomplish all of my going.” I knew the Lord could do it. The pressure was off of me and the transaction was made: All of You, God, for all of me.”

[Available from Westbow Books: www.westbowpress.com/Bookstore/BookSearchResults.aspx?Search=

god%27s%20doctor ]