The day after delivering the spiritual message at the special New Year’s program held at the Kewa evangelical church, I was in the sitting house waiting for Laurie to finish checking blood pressures. Carl, a village leader who has given me trouble in the past, was there. Having missed hearing my message the previous day, he was taking the opportunity to organize a reconciliation meeting for the following Friday and asked if I would speak for it. According to him, the reconciliation meeting should have happened on New Year’s Day after the church service, but someone had dropped the ball, so he was taking it upon himself to spearhead the effort. According to him and others in the village, it was time for various groups to come together and apologize. There was the government school that seemed to be acting a little too independently of the village lately. There was a locally organized cattle project run by a small group of evangelical church men that allegedly was hoarding its profits and not sharing with the village. Another group, organized by the local Member of Parliament to work on development projects in various villages including Kewa, was being criticized for not coordinating their work with the village leaders. Of course, church and community leaders would be present at this gathering.

The day of the meeting came, and I arrived at the meeting house at the appointed time, but I found only a handful of men milling about, cooking their breakfast in the open, thatched-roof pavilion. I could hear the distant exclamations of the town crier as he made his way through the village calling the men to the meeting. “White man is here! You come quickly to the meeting house!”

An hour later, enough men had arrived that we could begin. I told the story of Jacob and Esau, the two brothers who were enemies but later, by the providence of God, came together and reconciled their differences. After finishing the story, to get the men to think through their motives for this meeting, I asked, “Is uniting always a good thing?” I was trying to learn what was driving these men to put aside their differences, confess their faults and give each other handshakes and hugs. Were the leaders’ motives pure, or were they purely political? I told them of the two dominant political parties that were bitter enemies in Jesus’ day—the Pharisees and Sadducees. Though they had different agendas, they united to get rid of Jesus. I asked, “Was their union a good thing or not?” Everyone agreed that unity was not good in that instance. I wanted them to understand that unity is good except when it is for an evil cause. God should have our first allegiance. If there is a cause that violates God’s word or moves our attention away from His kingdom, we should not join with it. After my little presentation, the designated chairman got up and led out in the proceedings. One by one, a representative of each group was invited to take the floor and speak on behalf of their group to apologize. Afterwards, the offenders and offended clasped hands and embraced each other.

As the meeting adjourned, a new sound was heard coming from over the hill—women chanting and singing. They came marching down the hill past the meeting house. Then they dispersed to their homes to get food they had prepared while some of the men brought out huge pots of cooked rice and spread tarps on the lawn for a feast. The women came back with long torpedo-shaped bundles of sago in various flavors: sago with fish, with coconut, with cooked greens, with prawns, with pork and even sago with grubs. Yum, Yum! (Sago with cooked greens and coconut was fine for me.) The mood was happy but thoughtful. Sitting on the ground stuffing myself with sago and rice, I overheard men discussing the story of Jacob and Esau. It was comforting to know that at least some had been listening.

An interesting thing is happening in the national government of Papua New Guinea. As I write, just two months before elections, several thousand young people from the University of Papua New Guinea are protesting certain moves by the new prime minister and his government. Today, the prime minister met 10,000 protesters in a stadium and received their signed petition.

The controversy started last year when the prime minister of 35 years needed open-heart surgery out of the country. While he was away, parliament ousted him and voted in a new prime minister. When the old prime minister returned, he found he no longer had a job. He took the matter to the Supreme Court, which upheld his challenge. On the same day, however, the new prime minister called a parliament session and got himself sworn in. So the old prime minister claims headship based on the Supreme Court decision, and the new prime minister claims his based on parliamentary procedure. Suddenly the country found itself in a precarious political position. Not only did it have two prime ministers, there were also two cabinets, two deputy generals, even two police chiefs and two police forces, and neither side wanted to back down. I dare say if this had happened in any other country, violence and civil unrest would have exploded. But not here. I have heard it said that what keeps this country from falling apart at times like this is the same thing that keeps it from developing into an industrialized nation; namely, their tribal mentality. They call it the “wantok system.”

Wantok (literally “one talk” or “one language”) is a Tok Pisin word for family, extended family, clan or tribe. Wantoks are so closely tied together that everyone’s first loyalty is to his wantok. Loyalty to country is secondary. In some parts of PNG, tribal fighting keeps the people preoccupied with local problems. In the capital city of Port Moresby, things continue on as normal as the protestors make their way home. We are blessed to be working in an area that is relatively peaceful. But thank you for your prayers because they are needed.

The PNG national government might do well to follow Carl’s example and organize a day of reconciliation. However, I don’t expect this world to get any better before Jesus comes. I just pray that the winds of strife will be held back a little longer so the work can be finished before times get too rough.

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