My Wayumi Experience

 In August 2022 I was invited by Ethnos360 Caribbean to participate in the Wayumi retreat. It promised to give participants an experience in cross-cultural missions, in the middle of Pennsylvania. “Wayumi” is a word in the language of the Yanomamo people (a tribe in Venezuela) which means leaving home for a period of time, for a specific purpose. The objective is that, at the end of the Wayumi experience, participants would come away with an appreciation of what is involved in serving as a missionary in a different culture, and be challenged to consider whether this is part of God’s plan for their lives. I was attending as part of a contingent from Trinidad and Tobago, since it is the desire of Ethnos 360 Caribbean to set up a similar program locally, which will be targeted towards participants from the Caribbean.

Safely at Wayumi after 8 hours of
flying and 3 hours of driving

On the first night we were given an overview of Ethnos 360 – a missions organization that exists to reach people groups who have never before heard about Jesus. The session then focused on what God was doing in the world. We recognized that since the beginning of history, God’s plan was to fill the earth with people from every nation, tribe and language who love Him. Since then, God has been reaching out to all ethnic people to make them a part of what He is doing, by the power of the Holy Spirit.

From every nation, tribe and tongue...

The following morning, we examined barriers to reaching unreached people groups, and what were the necessary steps for a missionary who was taking the gospel to people from another culture. ‘Culture’ describes why a people group thinks, does and feels the way they do. It is therefore crucial for a missionary to understand the culture of the people group they will be ministering to, which includes their language, belief, views of life, work, economy, food, manners, and even sleep! Understanding the culture of the people group would help them to understand how to accurately communicate spiritual truths.

There is an option to experience the culture of some
people groups by sleeping on hammocks in cabins 
in the woods

After this session, we were given the opportunity to enter ‘The Village’. This was a room set up to simulate what a missionary would experience when they enter the village of an unreached people group for the first time. There were huts set up with hammocks, campfires and basic utensils used in village life. We were able to sit with a ‘villager’ who only spoke to us using their native language, while we tried to elicit from them words for basic items such as pot, fire, hand, eye, etc.

Participants eliciting language from a
representative of the Tanomamu people group

We recognized how difficult it is to get an accurate idea of how someone's life is like if you only visit them for a short period of time. The experience helped us to understand how to pray for missionaries who have to learn someone else’s language and culture. There is spiritual darkness in these tribal villages when they don't know the truth about God. They don't understand the need to seek God, and the role of missionaries is to shine the light which would dispel this darkness.

An additional bonus to the sessions was the
gorgeous landscape we lived in during the retreat

We heard stories of the experiences of missionaries who had to learn a new language in the process of ministering to an unreached people group. They had to understand how to use the words from the new language to accurately translate God’s Word. They started at the very beginning and laid foundations to share the gospel, after which the church was born. New believers were then taught to be followers of Jesus, by feeding them on the Word of God.

Steps in establishing a church among a previously
unreached people group

One of the missionary stories which stood out to me was about a tribe that had no concept of music in their culture. When they started reading about how the early believers worshipped by singing, they wanted to learn how to do it, but none of the missionaries were musically gifted. The villagers were given translations of songs which they 'sang' by talking, but with greater emphasis on the intonation. They prayed for God to help them to sing the same words at the same time. When they were tired of ‘singing’ these songs, they started singing the portions of God's Word which were already translated. Eventually, they wrote their own songs! The principle was to allow indigenous people groups to develop how they live out biblical practises such as worship, baptism and even communion in their culture and not influence them into doing it the way we do in our context.

Sunrise making the mountains look like
they are on fire

The last session for that day highlighted the need for persons other than missionaries to be a part to taking the gospel to unreached people groups. Reaching the unreached requires many members doing different roles: language, maintenance, literacy, medical, teaching, translation, linguistics, culture, accountants, administration, construction. We were challenged to answer the following questions: What am I skilled at? What gifts has God given me to accomplish His purposes? How am I contributing to what God wants me to do?

Churches would send their youth groups
to get a taste of overseas missions - enjoyed
fellowshipping with them during free time

Throughout the course of the retreat, we were inspired by hearing how indigenous peoples responded when being taught the truth of the gospel for the first time. One people group built a shelter that the entire village could fit under so that when the missionaries started teaching the Bible, if the rain fell, they wouldn't have to stop teaching. They had never built something so big before, and they had to bring in leaves that only grew at the top of the mountain to make the roof. After hearing the live teaching in the morning, they would listen to the recorded message twice before going to bed. They even asked the missionaries to teach every day, with no breaks in between!

One of the missionaries who shared his
stories of experiences on the field

The Wayumi retreat was a sobering reminder of the need for more resources to be allocated to ensuring that all people groups have the opportunity to hear the truth of the gospel. There are programs which are targeted towards high school students, university students and church leaders. The objective is to challenge followers to Jesus to let their temporary lives in this earth count for eternity, by being faithful in doing the work God has designed for us to do.

There is still much work to be done...