Hello friends! Welcome back to Dancing Through the Seasons, a series of powerful testimonies given by ladies with dancing hearts. Last week, we had Joyce and Cheow Lan sharing touching stories. Today, we shall learn from Joyce and Ashley, a missionary in Brazil.

First, we shall have a lifeline to healing. It is found in Isaiah 61: 1, “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners”.

We are living in a world inundated with broadband, wireless, MSN, Skype, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, you name it. Joyce said, “If I were a moviemaker, I would make a horror movie entitled IT Has Taken Over the World! And by “IT”, I mean Information Technology.” IT has taken over the world progressively and steadily without our knowing of its rapidity. With IT comes speed! Everything becomes instantly available with a click or a snap of the fingers. Therefore, we do not have time to breath properly as we plough through tons of information on the World Wide Web. Days zip by and time really seems to fly.

Christians in this IT world have also lost touch with their souls, let alone their spirits. We cannot hear the still small voice of God in the cacophony of our smartphones as we stand crammed in noisy Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) trains. All of us are like the proverbial frog, boiled alive without knowing the danger of imminent death. Joyce was no different - until the day she experienced a total IT blackout.

Her computer crashed, and she had to send it in for repair. While she stayed at home wondering whether she would live lonely days without her IT companion, Joyce decided to take a long walk at the Botanical Gardens. She just wanted to escape the IT withdrawal pain and to recapture the joy of being close to mother nature.

She took the MRT to her destination. In the train, on the five-seater before her were two young men. On one side of them was an elderly couple, on the other, a really old woman. In front of the two youngsters, on the floor, were their bulging laptop bags and backpacks but nothing on the floor in front of the elderly persons. Shortly after, the two youngsters started multi-tasking on their laptop, Blackberry, their iPod and mobile phones. The seniors just looked on, a little puzzled at all the frenzy of their younger ‘pilgrims’. Then Joyce realised living in this world has become something like that. There is always tension between the old and the new, tradition and innovation, rush and rest.

In her journey towards her own healing, Joyce discovered that she must find a balance. Life must be manageable and healing of the soul comes from the Lover of her soul. She must take time to seek Him in order to receiving a healing touch from Him.

The spiritual director of a contemplative, soul-care retreat wisely advised the participants:

Our modern lives in a modern city grow too complex and overcrowded. Our professional status and our social obligations put claims upon us. We are weary and breathless and we know and regret that our life is slipping away, with our having tasted so little of the peace and joy available to us.

The times for the ‘deeps’ of the silences of the heart seem so few. In guilty regret, we must postpone till next week that deeper life of unshaken composure in the Holy Presence where we sincerely know our true home. But this week is much too full.

Mother Teresa once said that we need to find God and He cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. The more we receive in silent prayer, the more we can give in our active life.

In a moment of divine inspiration, Joyce understood that she has to tutor her soul to let the Spirit take control of her sorrow and grief. She said, “I have to teach my soul to remember who God is, to rejoice in His good plans for my life and to be rejuvenated in the tranquillity of His presence.”

During her walk that morning at the Botanical Gardens, God guided Joyce to see her pains as an integral part of her growth into Christ-likeness. John 12: 24 says, “Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”

Joyce started on her journey into contemplative retreats and being a gregarious person, she did not go on retreats alone. She invited other women to join her in what she termed ‘Heart SPA’. She learnt together with her fellow pilgrims the second dance step for the healing of their weary souls – to take time out from the world of noise and wait in silence at His feet.

It is not a difficult dance step - to sit in attentive silence at His feet. But it has to be a deliberate personal choice. To choose between the chronic demands of a noisy world or to hearken to the voice who calls her His beloved? Joyce chooses to live her life as God desires. She wants to listen to His instructions. So she chooses to dance with Jesus.

Ashley’s Dance

“But I pray to you, O Lord, in the time of your favour; in your great love, O God, answer me with your sure salvation.” (Psalm 69: 13)

Ashley is a missionary in Brazil together with her husband Paul. Growing up in urban Singapore, Ashley never sees water as a scarce resource. And water is everywhere in the Amazon Basin where houses are built on stilts or on floating tree foundations. However, there is not enough clean water to drink there! Only 1 per cent of earth’s water is drinkable in its natural state. Of all the fresh water on earth, 5 per cent is in Amazon Basin!

Although water is non-salty in the Amazon, it is not drinkable. Ashley has not seen a village river-dweller over 55 years old. People living closer to cities tend to live longer.

Paul and Ashley have planted 200 video Bible schools across Brazil teaching the Word of God, running free retreats on their 35-acre ranch for pastors and missionaries. They are building a training centre for would-be missionaries. Paul wishes to go to the Amazon at least once a year. He desires to drill a well in one village at a time. The vision is simple but great. The mission is even greater because it is hard and expensive to execute the arduous work. Thank God for they both believe that the Great Commission is for every disciple.

A visit to another village is like going back in time a hundred years. They have to travel over 24 hours by boat from a major city and 6 hours from the nearest small town. No electricity, no phones, no running water and no proper toilets. Drinking, cooking, bathing and laundry are done in the same river water! But amusingly enough, every village has at least a football field.

Villagers sleep in hammocks under the open skies and when it rains, they live in wooden or thatched huts built from materials taken from the Amazon jungle. Children run around with bloated stomachs from malnutrition and diseases or worms from the water. They have many small wounds on their bodies, horribly infected. And pet dogs look half-starved as well. In time to come, Ashley and Paul hope to bring a medical team along on their well-drilling expeditions.

When villagers see them with equipment to drill a well for them, they are anxious to help carry equipment from their small boat and bring it to the drilling site. All of them are very excited to have clean fresh water. The set up normally takes a full day for five men, not including the 20 ‘jungle-strong’ men and children who help bring necessary equipment to the proper location. Then, it takes three days of drilling and another day to set up the workings of the well with the pump and sanitary area around it. The villagers are extremely grateful. Once they complete the first well, the village chief acknowledged God’s hand in it by saying “we know God loves us because He wants us to have clean water.”

Ashley never dreamed that she would be a part of this mission work. She says she has learnt to re-dance with God and it has been an incredible and amazing dance. Accumulating wealth was the aim of her working life but the richer she became, the emptier she was. Then she began a long hard search within herself and asked, “What would I really like to do to make my life count before it was over?” She surrendered after much struggle. As she looked back, Ashley said she should act earlier to the Master’s dance because “victories are sweeter than anything I could ever imagine.”

Now, she has a reason to live each day and beyond. Her consuming passion is to continue to make an impact on people’s lives in Brazil. People ask her what it takes to be a successful missionary and here are her points:-

1.   Cling on to God because struggles and successes have pitfalls of their own. Recognise that struggles are not there to make us bitter but to strengthen us for the next level of faith so that we might be better stewards for God. Success too is not a time to be complacent but to recognise that it is God’s encouragement and favour for the tasks ahead.

2.   Put faith in God’s provision because missionaries have no idea where their money comes from. Missionary life is a step by step ‘dance’ lesson with a patient God.

3.   Be willing to adapt by immersing yourself in the language and culture of the people. Culture is to a people what water is to a fish. It is the ‘enter’ key to the mind-set of a people group. Try your best not to say, “In my country, we do it this way.” Every culture has their own quirks but the faster you adapt, the faster you learn to survive by doing things differently.

4.   Manage personal stress, whether single or married, you will face loneliness. You will be homesick especially during festive seasons. But as you adapt to the people group to which you have been called, you will soon have a new family from that culture.

5.   Be assured that whatever problem you have at home will be magnified many times over in the mission field. So, the ability to handle your finances, marriage relationship and children is of utmost importance. If you cannot handle these issues at home, they will destroy you in the mission field.

6.   Never forget the vision that you had. The vision will push you beyond your limits, strength, imagination and ability. It will sustain you when things get tough and the vision will not allow you to rest on your success in good times. The vision is the guiding star. It is living in the world with purpose. That is the true dance to the rhythm of God’s heartbeat for a lost world. And that makes life worthwhile.

How wonderful it is to dance with our great God! Let’s expect, with greater faith, as we bring you glorious testimonies next week again. You will be surprised by God. Get ready your dancing shoes!