Eating Ants and Planting Trees: Culture in South Asia
By Sara Ebert* 5/5/03
Joshua scooped up another ant and popped it into his mouth. "Mm-mm," he grinned. "You gotta try these."
Bobla, his chubby friend, blanched. "So people eat ants in America?" he worried. (His mom has applied for American visas.)
"Yeah, of course," Josh encouraged. "You'll love 'em!"
Bobla reached out a shaky hand, and Josh burst out laughing.
Cultures are so different. Events are so unpredictable. Who can guess what's right? Bobla* couldn't. We surely can't. Our days cross so many cultures: Muslim, Hindu, or Christian; tribal Tripura, Marma, or Mru; missionaries, foreigners, and MKs, a strange mixture of us all. Who can rely on common sense? Only God can make life work. We trust Him in the incomprehensible events of our days.
Life for our sons, Joshua* and Mark*, is a rousing blend of cultures, whether they're helping workmen pull down old pine trees or joining Muslim friends at sunset during Ramadan for special snacks. On the weekends, they participate with crowds of exuberant boys in action-packed rice-clod battles. When we play the guessing game, "Animal, Vegetable, Mineral," Mark claims his favorite vegetable is sugarcane.
Simply traveling makes for adventure: Howard* zips me off to meetings sidesaddle, on the back of his motorcycle, my long sari flapping in the breeze. On-road driving here feels like off-road moto-crossing. We splash through a puddle; my knees bump cows. Psalm 121:8 is vividly affirmed: "The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in."
Applying God's Love in Culture
Jesus declared that God's goal for us in life—wherever that may be—is "to love your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, and to love your neighbor as yourself." How do we apply this in a culture so unlike the one in which we grew up?
We seek to demonstrate God's love in culturally meaningful ways. In this warm, generous society, home-visits honor those to whom we go. We visit neighbors who have endured calamity: a home washed away last rainy season, a mud house attacked by an angry elephant, a family sorrowing without hope for their dead mother. I hold tea and Bible studies for the tribal ladies. They graciously pray that my language skills will improve, and refrain from smirking when I act out the cleansing of the temple and accidentally get the whip tangled around my neck.
One day we visited a Mru village. It was like stepping into a Native American village of the 1600s. I loved clapping along with their tom-toms in church, climbing notched log stairs to visit families in stilt-bamboo homes, dropping banana peels through the hole in the floor to hear pigs eagerly snorting their thanks, bathing with the women and babies in the mountain stream, counting black piglets, and warming myself by the early morning fire. God is working among the Mru, slowly but surely. Not long ago, all Mru believed God had sent His message to them on a banana leaf; unfortunately, a cow ate it. For generations, these people have sacrificed a cow in response, feeling they would never know God's word to them. Now the church is packed with intent listeners. Other villages beg for Jesus film showings.
Planting Trees in Love
Another way to show love is to care for the country's environment. The rainforest here has been devastated, leaving strip-mined fields. The government is urging people to plant trees. My husband, Howard, co-sponsored a South Asia-style Arbor Day and organized the donation of 4000 saplings to schools, villages, and churches. When we attended a tree-dedication program, crowds of children marched in waving branches—cut from standing trees. Howard rose and spoke emotively on the value of trees; our pastor friend followed him with encouraging words, "Do you need money? Plant a tree! When it's big, you can chop it down and sell the wood!" The crowds grinned; we sighed.
Cultures are diverse. Events seem random. Yet, our faithful Lord is working in and through this time and place. Long ago, on Mars Hill, the apostle Paul preached that God made every nation of men and determined the times set for them and the exact places where they should live, so that "they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us..." (Acts 17:27). We crave knowing God more through every event and every cross-cultural challenge in our days: watching His design in our visits, learning to trust His laws even more than we rely on our own customs, seeing His purpose fulfilled as He draws people from every tribe, language, and nation to Himself. Our days are planned by Him to show us, and the people with whom we work, how infinitely sufficient His grace is.
For more articles on cultures and missions, see Online Features, and look for the Summer 2003 issue of Message Magazine Online, coming online in June.
* Names have been changed.
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