“It’s Time to Protest!”

It was the fall of 1963, toward the end of our football season, when our coach called a meeting of all the players from JV and Varsity together as we dressed for an afternoon practice. We all wondered what it was all about since we never had combined meetings like this in the past. “Boys,” he began, “Next fall we will be joined by the students of Douglass High School. These boys are no different than you. They put their pants on one leg at a time, just like us. There will be no problems.”

          That was the meeting. These are probably not the exact words, but the thoughts are what we heard that afternoon over fifty years ago. Douglass High School was an all-black school, and we would be integrating the following year. Unlike many schools at the time integration went smoothly and without any serious issues. As I remember it went so smoothly that it went virtually unnoticed by the students. I know there were probably some issues, but as far as the football team was concerned, “there were no problems.”

          Prejudice as always been and will always be an issue in every society. It may not be black and white, but it will exist, dividing people by race, sex, nationality, and even viewpoints. The events of the past few years have taken me back to what I would see in the news of the ‘50’s and ‘60’s. I thought we were past most of that and making progress until it raised its ugly head again. At first, I thought it was like taking one step back but then realized prejudice has always been there in some form or another and like an injury that lingers, occasionally, expressing itself in pain.

          Protests of inequality and discrimination are taking all forms from riots to kneeling during the National Anthem. Some are peaceful, and some are violent. Some done by well-meaning people who truly want to make a difference while others attract the few who just want to show they are mad and stir things up.

          So where does the “Church” step in? We protest! However, we protest by kneeling, not when we hear the National Anthem, but by kneeling in the presence of God to give us the strength to be drawn together for the good of all men. We protest! Not by attacking each other in riots, but by embracing each other with the love of Christ and caring for one another no matter the color of skin or language we speak. We protest! Not by turning over cars, burning buildings, and looting, but by helping those who are less fortunate. We protest! Not by calling people names, but by holding hands, working together for the betterment of all men and women. We protest! Not by dividing, but by adding to the Kingdom through sharing Jesus in his ways with a lost world.

          It seems that most of the national news is always building on the negative. I’ve gotten to where I have become frustrated with always hearing the bad. However, there is one news piece I stop and listen to every time I hear it come on. I don’t know what network it’s on, but the segment is usually only a couple of minutes, and they entitle it “America Strong.”

It is always something positive. That’s exactly what we as Christians should always be portraying. In a world that is lost and hurt. In a world, full of chaos and depression there is always something positive to lean on, Jesus Christ.

          I encourage us all to be positive. Protest the world by doing what is good and right in the eyes of Jesus. Don’t let the world change us, work on changing the world. We can’t change it all at once, but each of us in our daily interaction with people can work at changing it one person at a time.

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Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds,

Hebrews 10:23-24

“A Place Called Hopevale”

Martyr

/märder/

1. Noun: a person who is killed because of their religious or other beliefs.

"saints, martyrs, and witnesses to the faith."

          Nestled in the midst of the Philippine Archipelago is the island of Panay. As you travel through the region of Capiz near Tapaz, you come to the mountains of Barrio Katipunan. It is in those mountains you find the site that at one time for twenty months was called “Hopevale.” You won’t find it on any maps since it was never an incorporated town and was settled by less than twenty people.

          In April of 1942, the Philippine Islands were invaded by Japan forcing McArthur to withdraw his troops to fight elsewhere. As a result, this left scores of military guerillas to try and defend the islands. In addition to the guerillas were families from the United States who were working with the Gold mines. Then there were the missionaries; men, women, and children who had left their homes in the United States to serve the Lord in the jungles of islands far away from home. After McArthur withdrew from the islands, the families moved inward to try and find safety from the enemies. Within the mountains and jungles of Panay on Saturday, April 18, 1942, the small group of 12 missionaries along with a few miners set up camp. They named the little community, Hopevale. Setting up homes were a nurse named Jennie Adams, James and Charma Covell, whose daughter would indirectly make an impact for the Lord after the war, Dorothy Dowell, Signe Erickson, Dr. Frederick Meyer and his wife Ruth, Dr. Frances Rose and his wife Gertrude, Earle and Louise Rounds and their son, Douglass.

          The people survived with the help of Filipinos who lived in and around the small town of Katipunan. Dr. Rose built a small “cathedral” on the outskirts of Hopevale among the overhanging trees he gorged a semi-circular bench seat with a towering tree at the end. He called it Cathedral Glen. It is where, in the midst of war and the fear of capture, at any moment they would take time to worship. The missionaries were Northern Baptists who were conservative in their thinking, not believing in dancing or drinking. When the miners among them would celebrate good news about the war with a little dancing and drinking of homemade fermented wine, the missionaries said nothing. These things didn’t seem to matter considering the circumstances they all found themselves. Prayer and caring for each other was what mattered, not the issues they had been taught to follow.

          Eventually, all the miners left moving to other areas except for Mark and Fern Clardy and their two sons, Johnny and Terry and a miner, Mr. King. Those who remained struggled, plagued with concerns, if captured would they be treated as civilians and sent to camps or as guerillas and executed? It was a constant fear that though ever present was pushed aside in favor of their faith in the Lord.

          On Sunday, December 19, 1943, Captain Watanabe and his troops entered the camp and rounded up the missionaries and remaining miners. That evening Captain Watanabe came to the missionaries and told them they would face executed the next day. Though no one knows exactly how the rest of the story took place, other reports say that James Covell tried to convince the Japanese otherwise. However, it was eventually turned down. The missionaries last act was to sing a hymn and pray. We don’t know what hymn they sang, but we do know that they put themselves in God’s hands as each one was taken into a nearby hut and decapitated.     

          To this day the group is known by locals as “the Hopevale Martyrs.” Their faith and courage in the Lord made an impact on those who knew them as well as some of those who had been a part of their capture. Years later one of the Japanese soldiers was on a train with a Baptist minister who was with the Japanese Baptist Union. He asked the minister if he had known a missionary named James Covell. The minister acknowledged he had and that James Covell had been one of his teachers. The man then proceeded to tell the story of what took place in the jungle. He told how appalled some of the soldiers were of what Captain Watanabe had done. He also shares how touched he was by the faith and courage of the missionaries as they prepared to die, so touched in fact that he later became a Christian.

          Sometimes, I wonder in our modern world if we have forgotten what it truly means to be followers of Christ. Have we got caught up in issues and how we do things? Do some of the things we fret over really matter in the long run when it comes to being a true follower? Does God really have great concerns over some of the things we spend so much time debating? Over the years I have seen so many churches spend hours arguing about buildings and programs. I’ve seen churches split over trivial matters. Have we forgotten what it’s all about?

          The little group in Hopevale figured dancing for joy wasn’t that big of a deal considering the circumstances that surrounded them. Drinking fermented wine was not an issue when your very life was in danger. The important thing to them was to keep their faith and trust in God in the middle of a catastrophic world. Issues like these didn’t seem to matter in the scheme of being faithful in their trust of God.

          The focus of the church is to be reaching out to bring others to Christ. The focus of the church is to share the Gospel with the world. The focus of the church is to care for each other. We need to stop occasionally and ask ourselves if the things that bother us are things over which we should be concerned. Maybe ask ourselves, do I think God cares about the  things that tend to wear me down?

          Someday we should each take time to go to the Cathedral in the Glen. We should walk out of the walls of the building, go to the woods or hills away from the hustle and bustle of the town and city and ask God to give us the eyes in our heart to see the world and church the way he wants it to be. Let’s get back to what is really important, sharing Jesus with a lost world.

Note: Facts about Hopevale and story on the train are based on the story presented in The Edge of Terror by Scott Walker, Thomas Dunne Books Publisher.

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For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.’ But blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear. For truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.

Matthew 13:15-17