My Friend the Pharisee

 He didn’t mean to send the message to me.  He accidentally included me on his New Years distribution list. But I’m glad he did.  It was an insight into where his heart is:

English Club- Fakhadi is a regular

“Bad News!” it said, “We are duped year after year!  Unfortunately, we see so many of them joining with the infidels celebrating the New Year.  They go out practically nude, in the middle of the night, to the parties, mixing illicitly with loud music.  They have no shame. They fornicate.  They are like beasts—worse than beasts.”  

“We have been made to believe that the week begins on Monday which is completely false.  We are being tricked.  The week begins on Saturday....How will you be blessed if you disobey the first day?…"

“Don’t accept the concept of a New Year’s resolution...If you haven’t changed today or tomorrow, how will you change next year?  What’s so special about the next year?  Do not be duped by Satan.  Don’t let a new year be the cause of your change.”

I wish you could know Fakhadi like I know him.  He’s tall for an islander and proud of his lighter skin and longer Arab-like features—a wide smile, long face, strong chin, large nose.   He is a young man in his mid-twenties.  Bright, polite and friendly, he is both ready to learn and ready to teach.  He is also fiercely proud, convinced in his faith and his own righteousness, eager to tell others the errors of their ways. And he is my friend.

I often don’t know what to do with him.  Sometimes I want to shake him for the ridiculous arguments that he makes.  Other times I wonder at his blindness.  I wish I could get him to read  the Word, but he refuses.  He will tell me it is corrupted and full of errors and will not listen to the logical arguments I make to refute these lies.  He tells me he doesn’t need to read anything else because his book contains all truth including all science, biology, astronomy, geology, etc,  based on a handful of obscure verses—an argument so baseless it stumps me every time.  

New Years Eve fun & games in our team

Fakhadi is the closest I’ve come to knowing a real live Pharisee.  Now, we all resemble Pharisees at times.  We all have a tendency to fool ourselves, to look to the letter of the law rather than the heart of the law, to think ourselves righteous and better than others, to act religiously superior.  We all do this to a certain extent, but Fakhadi embraces the role.  He really does think he is religiously superior to those around him—and flaunts it.  He holds to the letter of the law and is often blind to its sense.  He is so convinced of his rightness, he cannot see his own pride which is obvious to everyone around him.  Though I remember, we hardly ever see the log in our own eye, do we?

And yet we meet and talk.  He is a great language helper, so he helps me with my language study.  He likes to talk about religion, but he is also careful with me.  He does not wish to offend me, so he keeps his complete thoughts to himself (as I do with him) when we talk in person. Yet, over messages and email, we seem to have more freedom to speak our mind.  I see him as a young man trying to do what is right with the knowledge and strength that he has.  For now, he gets by, but I know one day, his own strength will fail him.  I wonder what he thinks of my life.  Is my witness a challenge to him?  I imagine I’m a bit of a mystery, but it’s hard to be sure.  He generally wants to meet with me.  He is genuinely disappointed when my schedule keeps me away or I cut our time short.  He values my friendship and I his.  Sometimes I think he likes me because he sees me as a challenge to be won over to his way of thinking.  (I probably like him, to some extent, for the same reason.) But our friendship is real.  I wish I could get him to read the accounts of the Pharisees, but so far he has refused.  Then again, I’m not sure it would do any good.  He might miss the forest for the trees.  But there’s still a chance.  There was a Paul and a Nicodemus among the Pharisees.  Maybe, one day, there will be a Fakhadi too.  

PRAYERS ANSWERED
Our teammates have a new steel door in place of the old flimsy one.  Hopefully we won’t have any more problems with break-ins.  Our colleagues were finally able to travel to Madagascar with their newborn after months and months of waiting!  Family and friends were waiting for them and now they can finally get a passport for their baby boy and renew their own passports.  It rained today, which helped cool off some of the sweltering heat!  Our boys continue to adjust well to local school. Thanks for praying!  


PRAYERS REQUESTED
Pray that Fakhadi would show a new openness and agree to read our book.  Pray for others like him who have never heard of another way of life.  There is going to be a women’s gathering on Wednesday- pray that our time of study together would be encouraging and uniting. We are getting ready to move to our new house mid-month, pray for our preparations.  We are getting ready to receive new team members in early February.  Pray that we find a good house for them.  The small island has been put on lockdown and cut off from the other islands. We hear of more positive cases and even some deaths every day.  Pray for the our friends and colleagues on the small island— life is hard for them right now and they anticipate lots of shortages of supplies before too long. We have heard of a few new cases here on our island too now.  Pray that the lockdown would be effective in containing the virus and that we would not see a new wave hit the islands.