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Today's Christian, March/April 2000
Baptism and Communion in the jungle? Sometimes it's hard to find …
The Rite Stuff
by Shel Arensen
We were walking carefully through the bamboo forest, trying to avoid the nettles with their fiery sting. Eventually, we arrived at a glade where small rivulets trickled through deep mounds of grass toward a small pond. There we would hold the first baptism for the Dorobo people. Then it hit me—I'd forgotten the Communion juice!
My wife Kym and I, missionaries with Africa Inland Mission International, started working with the Dorobo tribe in 1992. The Dorobo are hunter-gatherers in the highland forests of Kenya who, because their villages are difficult to access, had never heard the gospel.
We did a year's survey, then started our first Dorobo church on an old volcano called Oldoinyo Opurru, the mountain of smoke. Loma Eglin and Betty Allcock, missionaries from South Africa, joined our team.
Often looked down upon by surrounding tribes such as the Maasai, the Dorobo had always felt the gospel was for others but not for them. But thanks to strong prayer support, the Dorobo began to respond rapidly in 1996.
Tea from mother earth
We had first visited the Dorobo village of Oloolbung'aiko in March 1997. To my surprise, five people prayed to receive Christ on our first visit. They began meeting in a clearing in the bamboo forest.
It gets cold at 9,000 feet above sea level, even on the equator. So they built a bamboo building, which we helped them roof. Now, a year later in April 1998, we were going to have our first baptism.
But, after the baptism, how could I give Communion with no juice? Usually I could buy some Coca-Cola at a duka, or shop. But the closest duka to Oloolbung'aiko was several hours away. I discussed the problem with our Dorobo leaders, Snakok and Kashu. They decided that Kashu's wife could quickly make some tea. She ran home to prepare it, while we went to the pond.
The shallow pond had thick weeds with lily-pad-like leaves. I tried to push the weeds aside to clear a section of water, but they resisted. I ended up just dunking the Dorobo believers under the weeds. They emerged adorned with leaves on their heads, but baptized and beaming.
The tea arrived. Poured into plastic Communion glasses, the tea looked and smelled like the muddy water from which it had been brewed. We broke bread and then drank the tea. My wife later confessed that the tea's smell had put her off, and asking the Lord's forgiveness, she had dumped hers quietly when no one was watching. I drank mine with no ill effects.
Mission-field ingenuity
Communion "wine" has taken on many makeshift manifestations on the mission field. I've used Fanta orange soda, powdered Gatorade (mixed with water, of course), or Ribena, a black currant health drink popular in Kenya.
The Communion that became legendary in my family's missionary history involved my mother. Preparing Communion for a Kenya missions conference, she couldn't find her usual packet of grape Kool-aid (which my younger brother Brian and I had probably mixed after a hike). She grabbed the next-best thing—a box of red Jell-O—and mixed it with water.
What she hadn't anticipated was a long-winded speaker that evening. By the time he finished, it was nearing midnight, and the weather was cold.
When Communion was served, and everyone tipped their cups back reverently, nothing came out. The Jell-O had gelled!
At another baptism I was conducting in a stream near Sakutiek, we had dug a hole in the river because the water was barely a foot deep. The hole had filled with miry mud by the time I stepped in. Each candidate slid in beside me—up to their waist in mud.
I bent them over just enough to get their heads under water. With each candidate, I sank a little deeper. Fortunately, I only baptized eight people that day. At the end, I had to claw my way out of the sucking grasp of the mud.
A magical moment
But the most memorable Communion took place in May 1999 after a baptism in the Enosopukia forest. Following a baptism in another mudhole, we hiked back to the school where we held church. Two neighboring congregations had joined us, making the crowd too big to fit in the building. We set up the Communion table outside.
I had bought a new brand of black currant juice called Stamina, half the cost of Ribena. I broke the bread and poured the glasses full of the purple juice.
As I explained the meaning of the elements, I noticed that the juice's color had changed from purple to blue. During my Communion prayer, I peeked again. The glasses now contained clear liquid!
I'm still not sure what happened. Most likely the manufacturer used a cheap kind of food coloring and the hot sun bleached it. Nevertheless, we drank the colorless juice, thanking God for the blood of Jesus which cleans the stain of our rebellion.
Embarrassed at first, I soon realized it had been a vivid example of what Christ's blood does for believers. When God sees us through the cleansing covering of Jesus' blood, our sins are invisible to him.
Even with all my human gaffes, the Dorobos still have understood and trusted in God. That's the most amazing story of all.
A Christian Reader original article.
Copyright © 2000 by the author or Christianity Today International/Today's Christian magazine (formerly Christian Reader).
Click here for reprint information.
March/April 2000, Vol. 38, No. 2, Page 63
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