I clawed at the vegetation, trying desperately to get a handhold as the sharp grass cut into my hands. As I climbed unsteadily, even my one cleat-clad foot couldn’t get traction in the deep mud. (My other cleated shoe had long since fallen apart, and I had discarded it). The trail dropped off below me, and I tried not to look at where I would land if I began an uncontrolled slide. I had to stay on my feet to maximize traction. Though sitting down feels safer, it raises the risk of a dangerous slide and tumble. And so the trail went, hour after hour, punctuated by pain, terror and many prayers.

Why was I doing this? Why in the world would I subject myself to this gauntlet of muddy mayhem, looking like a water buffalo emerging from her wallow? Was I seeking adventure like an adrenaline junkie? No, I was just trying to get to Emrang.

Emrang is a village several ridges northeast of Kemantian. We have had a school in this village for a couple years now, and Bible studies for almost a year. Yet, I had never hiked to this village. People from Emrang had been coming to Kemantian for medical help for years, and I was fairly well acquainted with the village leaders. We had agreed to provide a teacher if they built the school and a teacher’s house. They were excited, but construction moved forward with agonizing slowness. We feared they would never finish without help, so, when Brian Glass agreed to return for a second year of student-missionary service, we asked him to supervise the building in Emrang and then start a school for kindergarten and first-grade students. He went in 2009, operating the school in a tiny hut he renovated, all the while working on the new school building, which took eight months to complete. During the building phase, he lived in a quonset-style hut he made for himself out of tarps over a mud floor. No amenities other than a propane stove.

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Classes in the new school building began in August 2010. Everyone was excited at first, but only 11 students enrolled. As the novelty wore off, several of them stopped coming. I reassured Brian that this was the pattern we had seen in the other schools we established—enthusiasm, then disenchantment, then a core group of students return with deeper commitment. So Brian hung in there.

Brian worked along with the villagers, establishing deep friendships and guiding conversations to God when he could. He also opened a small medical clinic. On Sabbaths, he would tell Bible stories, teach songs and pray. As people’s interest deepened, he started them on the Palawano Bible studies we wrote. Several village elders were attending these studies regularly.

As excited as we were with the progress Brian was making, we didn’t know how to continue the work after he left. It wasn’t possible for me to hike out to Emrang and back every week. We didn’t have any Adventist Palawanos who were prepared to teach school. What should we do?

The answer was not long in coming. During a visit to the States, I had lunch with Shama Eller and Allie Westermeyer, friends of my son Timothy. These young ladies were nursing students who wanted to do missions when they finished school and passed their board exams. They eagerly plied me with questions about our work in Palawan. Then they told me they wanted to come and continue Brian’s teaching and medical work in Emrang. Could we use them? Wow! Yes!

Shama and Allie arrived in November 2010 to serve as independent volunteers. After a couple months in Kemantian and crash courses in language, teaching skills and the medical skills they would need in Emrang, they prepared to hike over and join Brian for a few weeks before he returned to Kemantian. As the day of their departure approached, they asked me with tears in their eyes, “Are you sure we’re ready to go over there? There is still so much we don’t know. Can’t Brian stay with us longer over there?” I assured them that we were only a radio or cell-phone call away, and that jumping in was the quickest way to learn, given the fact that they would be serving only a year. So, with a teary farewell and my motherly hugs and prayers, off they went to Emrang.

As I struggled along the trail to their village, my admiration for Allie and Shama found new heights. Brian had carefully planned and built a hut for them, but it was still very rough, with no bathroom, and mud everywhere. Allie and Shama had to learn to cook new foods, bathe in new ways and teach in an unfamiliar language. But they were courageous and dedicated, and they endured. Soon they found a place in the hearts of the people who had so loved Brian.

In the two months before he returned to the States, Brian worked in Kemantian on an audio project. Every Friday, he made the trek to Emrang for the weekend so he could work on finishing the girls’ bathroom, get water piped near their house through bamboo, and help them settle into their work.

When Allie and Shama made trips back to Kemantian, they always showed up looking pretty. Somehow, they made mud-streaked skirts, sweat-soaked shirts and muddy cleats and socks look stylish! They were eager to hear what was taking place in Kemantian, eat different food and use a real, enclosed shower (although the water was still very cold). I never heard them complain about their difficult living conditions, the scorpions and poisonous centipedes, the hardships of the trail or their loneliness living far from their teammates.

Brian never complained either. He prayed over his people, and it was so hard for him to leave them in the hands of others. He would frequently ask me as the time of his departure approached, “What are you going to do to continue the work in Emrang?”

“Brian,” I would say, “God will provide. He loves those people even more than we do. He has a plan. Let’s keep praying and trusting.” And so, when these two wonderful young women came to minister in Emrang, we saw God’s hand in it.

But we still needed someone who could continue the Bible studies—studies that require more language skills than Shama or Allie could get in a year. As He always does, God provided. He impressed Maliling, a fairly new Palawano convert, to go over and help Brian in his last few months in Emrang. So every Friday, Maliling hiked to Emrang to help explain Bible concepts to the people, returning Sabbath afternoon. When Brian’s time was up, Maliling announced that he would continue going to Emrang to teach the Bible studies. “Those people need someone to keep teaching them,” he said. “They are just babies and need help. Maybe God can use me.” The attendance at their Sabbath-morning service seems to be steady.

Maliling is not a brilliant scholar or an eloquent preacher. In fact, he doesn’t even read very quickly or smoothly. But he enjoys studying and teaching others what he knows, and he is willing to leave his family every week, brave the difficulties of the trail and take the word of God to his people.

Oh how I wish there were more Brians, Shamas, Allies and Malilings in this world—people who will not be deterred by difficulties and privations. The world is crying for more witnesses like them who are willing to leave their familiar and comfortable surroundings and, without murmuring, go to the hundreds and thousands of Emrangs around the world where millions are dying without the word of God and someone to teach them.

Thank you Maliling. Thank you Brian. Thank you Allie and Shama. Thank you for giving of yourselves to be instruments in God’s hands—to be His heart.

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