Charis Around the World

Tidbits from Ebony
by Elizabeth Carmichael

Visits with My Guard

Various expressions I thought I might see on my guard’s face
when I had a certain conversation with him recently about .... personal matters.

This is near one of the village areas where I’ve been traveling almost on a daily basis.  There is an area with some huge houses, but right in front of them some of the nomadic people’s have pitched their tents.  I just think the stark juxtaposition of lifestyles is so interesting.  Probably the residents of both areas (house and tents) are pushpin speakers.

Dear Charis Family,


Before you read on, could you please stop and pray for a situation in this country.  This is a tense week in the big city due to some political meetings going on, that do not make some groups of people very happy.  Also, there have been recent, very unhelpful reports, coming through various mediums to the local population which really put humanitarian aide work in a bad light as well as local Family Members.

We are asking that these things will blow over.  And, also that anything intended for evil would, instead, be used for the good purposes of the Father.  Some influential people have the opportunity to respond and set precedents right now.  Please pray for these people-of-influence as well as for those influenced by their decisions.  Please also lift up my guard as he relates to this situation.

Before we ever heard it from other sources, we heard it from him because another Brother walked to our house in the night in order to tell his friend what was going on.  He came to use boldly, but with tears, to tell us about it.  As we lifted the situation up together (my roommate, the guard and I), he expressed that he would “give his head” (meaning, let someone cut it off...) for people like us, his sisters, to remain here and do the work we do.  Yet, we reminded him that we don’t want his head for our lives, we want him to live and be able to proclaim to his people as he so desires.  Your prayers are effective and powerful over these situations.  Thank-you for remembering the Pushpin people (and all the other ethnic groups of this land)!

“I need to talk to you about something.  But, don’t become angry.  And don’t be embarrassed.  I am just going to tell you something like a doctor would tell you, OK?”

I wasn’t even sure if I SHOULD be having this conversation with my guard as we walked out of his house and he and his children walked me to my car.  The women stayed behind the door and behind the curtain that “protects” them from the outside world.  For the sake of his wife, I kept the conversation going.

“Of course,” he said. “You can ask me anything.”

I took a deep breath and watched the ground as I walked.

“Ok. Well, what I want to say is.....your wife is pretty sick.  So, you should try...... Please, could you...... I just don’t want you to.......um......together with your wife........just don’t.......for a while.....just don’t sit in the same place.”

“OK?”

“Of course, Elizabethjan (Dear Elizabeth)! I understand this.  I am glad you said this to me.  Don’t worry.”

If you didn’t catch the implication--I needed to ask him to please refrain from marital relations with his wife due to a specific illness she is facing.  Often in this culture, women don’t understand the implications or how to communicate this to their husbands. I followed the advice and example of some lovely midwives in Glory Land and went ahead and spoke to the husband about it, hopefully with appropriate “shame.”

Rest assured, this “brave” chica went home and buried her face in her pillow in embarrassment while she described the conversation to her roommate.  It is just SO unusual and borderline inappropriate in this culture (some reading this who know the Pushpin culture might think it IS inappropriate...oh well).

I just couldn’t resist telling you this crazy story because it is such a depiction of who my guard is as a person, father and husband and it also is a small glimpse into some of the more uncomfortable moments of navigating Pushpin culture as well as women’s health care. The two do NOT always go hand in hand--hence all the severe problems in this country related to women’s health and childbirth.

I have been meeting regularly now with the women in my guard’s family. We’ve spent time both at my house and at their house.  This is a family of Pushpins from the South.  Since they have lived up here in the capital, they have had to move three times due to dangerous people seeking to harm their family and their father because of his beliefs. Right now they live in one of the poorest conditions I have ever actually visited and been inside.  It breaks my heart for them and their nine children. The only way for me to also spend time with the guard’s wife and not just his children is to visit their home.  She doesn’t have permission to go anywhere else unless it is an emergency.

I am having some trouble forming in to words the many thoughts and joys I have in relating to this family right now, so I would like to just list a few requests and explanations here.  Thank you for adding “The Flower Family” to your prayer list. :-)

• Please pray for Mr. Flower’s wife. We thought for a couple of months that she was expecting another child, but it turns out that some of her symptoms are due to a very serious infection. They are considering having to do surgery, but thankfully they are at least able to get proper treatment for the infection. Even though they are not from Glory Land specifically, the board for this humanitarian fund agreed to release funds to help the family in their health care needs for this woman.  In many ways, this opportunity also helped protect her culturally and socially.  She needs healing and she needs to come to know Jesus Christ.  Please lift her up.

• Even though Mr. Flower is a strong Brother and has been following Jesus for a long time, he is still very misinformed on one important point that keeps coming up.  He believes that all the women associated with him are automatically members of the Family just because he, as the male leader of the house, is a Brother.  I have been very grieved at this twist of Truth among them. Please ask for wisdom as to how to respond, please ask for Truths of the Word to shine out and show this man the need for his family to know the Lord for themselves.

• Please pray for me as I seek to discern how much time to spend with this family and what to spend our time talking about.  So far, we have storied through some of the Old Testament and also talked about many other practical points of following the 'Way'.  Mr. Flower is very capable of clearly explaining the good news to his family, but he doesn’t know how to explain much more to them.  Also, he is very literate, but the rest of his family is very illiterate and he really struggles with knowing how to teach them and help them understand concepts and truths.  It is like they live in two different worlds.  Finally, I think he is just a man who struggles to get his two teenage daughters and wife to listen to him.  I wonder if anyone else has ever felt that way!

Thanks for your intercession for this family!

Love in Him,
Elizabeth Carmichael