Alphabet Challenge: B
★★★★★
“I wanted to tell them that Jesus’ death had freed them from meaninglessness, from death, and from the powers of evil.
‘How do evil, death, and deception find power over the Motilone people?’ I asked.
‘Through the ears,’ Bobby answered, because language is so important to the Motilones. It is the essence of life. If evil language comes through the ears, it means death.”
Bruchko by Bruce Olson
Each year, my church starts the year with 21 days dedicated towards fasting and worshipping as they introduce a focus for the year. This year, our church is pursuing faith through reading testimonies written by missionaries, and the first book the staff chose was Bruchko, which worked perfectly as the next book for my alphabet challenge!! I am enjoying that this challenge is stretching me to get creative in how I find my reading list for the year.
Bruchko is written by career missionary, Bruce Olson, who moved to South America when he was a young adult, compelled by God to specifically serve the native tribes there. Despite facing criticism and lack of support from his family, mission boards, and even fellow believers living locally in Colombia, Olson persevered past their rejection and followed God’s leading for his life. He lived among the Motilone tribe, who had been previously greatly feared for their violence by both land developers and other tribes, as their lifelong friend and advocate. Olson faced multiple near-death experiences as he worked to befriend them and learn their language for communication with them. Time and time again, God showed up for him and the Motilone people in powerful and undeniable ways.
I was impressed with Olson’s humility as he entered new cultures and different ways of living. He felt convicted that becoming a Christian does not mean changing another people group’s way of life or annihilating their culture. He witnessed how other missionaries had moved into the nearby tribes and created division among the new Christians and their fellow tribe members by teaching them that Christianity required them to dress in certain clothes, sing certain worship songs, and build worship centers that looked like the ones the missionaries were accustomed to. Instead, Olson felt strongly that Jesus would encounter the Motilones in a way that made sense in their context and would leave them with their heritage and own expressions of Christianity. In his words,
“O Jesus, these people need You. Show Yourself to them. Take me out of the way and speak to them in their own language, so that they see You for who You are. O Jesus, become a Motilone.”
If you read this book and find that you enjoyed it as much as I did, then I recommend also checking out Peace Child by Don Richardson.
Content Warnings
Murder, some graphic descriptions of disease and injuries, violence, death of a child