For the Balangao people in the mountains of the Philippines, the spirits were in control of every aspect of life. Their lives were centered around satisfying the spirits’ demands, even if it meant great personal sacrifice. Yet still, their children and wives died in childbirth, they became sick, and their crops failed. The Balangaos were in bondage to the god of this world, whose desire is to kill and destroy.
God had given Joanne Shetler the desire to translate His Word for an unreached people. After arriving among the Balangaos and learning their language, she began to see the reality of spiritual warfare.
As she poured her life into teaching the Balangaos the Gospel and translating the Scripture so they could read it for themselves, God began to work. One by one, some of the villagers understood the way of salvation and trusted Jesus to save them.
“When I was very young,” eighty-year-old Forsan told Joanne, “the spirits put this bracelet on my arm and said if I ever took it off, they’d kill me.” Because of this, Forsan became a medium to speak with the spirits and learn their demands. But when Forsan saw the freedom her fellow medium, Chalingaay, experienced after trusting the God of the Book Joanne was translating, she decided to test God. She took off her bracelet.
“Come quick, please! Forsan is dying!” Forsan’s husband led Joanne to their hut. “I tried to trust God, and now the spirits are killing me!” Forsan cried as Joanne entered.
Joanne prayed for God’s power, and once again explained from His Word how God protects His children. Old Forsan then understood, and one more soul was delivered from oppression and shielded by the blood of Christ that day.
God did show Himself stronger than the spirits in Balangao. The power that brought victory came through the Word of God, translated into the anguage of the Balangaos’ hearts. But how many more villages does the
enemy control, unhindered and unchallenged? We hold in our hands “the power of God unto salvation” (Romans 1:16), and it is our responsibility to take God’s Word to those who live in darkness.