The villagers sat in small groups, awaiting the chief to
arrive. Their faces seemed so distant from where we sat, to the point it made
us feel nearly unwelcome in this place.
There was, indeed, a great divide between us. More than
language or culture, something else. Something that lurked, not entirely dark,
yet not entirely light, either. They stared at us, peering with dark, curious
eyes. All of them had the same brown eyes, forever watching, forever glaring.
We could not meet their gaze, at least, I couldn’t. I looked
away. I prayed it wasn’t a sign of weakness.
There stood our ambassador, our champion, if you will. We
called him “War Eagle.” He was, indeed, our only hope.
The silence hurt our ears it screamed so loudly of
awkwardness. Would we be received? Would we be extricated? Starved? Shunned? Or
worse?
Finally the man everyone was waiting for arrived. The chief
entered, without barely a word. He walked past the place where the woman sat,
surrounded by their children. They all looked up at him, in reverence or fear,
I could not tell which. Truly the questions ran through my mind. “How many of
these villagers owe their life to this man? How many of these children has he
fathered? Would we be able to stand before any of them if this were to go
badly?”
I drove the doubt from my head, knowing my questions were
ridiculous. I had nothing to fear. I looked up at War Eagle, who stood there,
quietly defiant.
The Chief finally sat down, in a poor plastic excuse for the
throne he probably should have deserved. The men sat at his feet, all looking
at us outsiders, waiting for the words to be spoken.
I felt like we had waited for all eternity for this moment.
Surely, isn’t this so? Hadn’t we been brought here by almighty God Himself? For
just this purpose? We had to be sure we were doing the right thing, that we
were speaking the correct words. Surely the villagers saw this coming?
Regardless of how magnificent their Chief may have been, don’t all reigns come
to an end of what they once were?
I held my breath as War Eagle stepped forward. The time was
now, and there was nothing we could do to stop the turn of time. This was our
moment, and all of our trust was in the one we had chosen to complete this
task.
Finally he spoke then, seemingly unaware of the amount of
courage it was taking for us to even sit and observe this moment, let alone
stand before the Villagers, the Chief, and all of creation as it witnessed
history.
“I want to challenge the Village Chief!” War Eagle said, in
a voice louder and clearer I realized I had expected. “I want to challenge him
to stand up, and take spiritual leadership of this village! The Bible says that
it is our duty to be leaders for our families!”
We all waited as the translator delivered the message.
Anticipation is always the toughest part of any brief moment in time, like that
split second before the roller coaster hits its apex, and you begin to fall.
Blessedly, there was no revolt. There was no rebuke or
rebuttal to War Eagle’s challenge. Instead, to our amazement, the Village Chief
sat there, silently, as if he completely agreed with everything that had been
said.
Kyle looked over at us, and shrugged, as if to say, “I guess
they took that well.” He then turned to the rest of the congregation and said, “Now,
on to the sermon.”
