Jim Elliot, Missionary to Ecuador

“God, I pray thee, light these idle sticks of my life and may
I burn for Thee. Consume my life, my God, for it is Thine. I
seek not a long life, but a full one, like you, Lord Jesus”
this quote was from a journal entry Jim Elliot wrote in
college. Jim Elliot was born in Portland, Oregon on
October 8 1927. He was the third child of four. He had two
older brothers, Herbert and Robert, and he had a younger
sister named Jane. His father, Fred, was an evangelist.
His father couldn‟t finish school because he had to work.
His mother, Clara, finished her studies and opened a
chiropractic practice in their home to support the family. At
home missionaries from all over the world would come
and stay with them. He liked to hear their stories of far
away lands and peoples. He had a happy childhood. As a
boy he enjoyed sledding on the mountainside for
excitement. His parents encouraged them to grow fruits
and vegetables. They also taught their children to get
along with animals. They encouraged their children to
have hobbies as well. Jim liked to collect stamps, read,
and make models. Although Jim‟s father was an
evangelist he wasn‟t strict or overbearing with his children.
He would read the bible to them every day and pray for
them. When Jim was 6 he told his mother that he was
saved after a meeting. He spoke of his relationship with
God very naturally to his family and friends.

At the age of 14 he switched high schools and attended

Benson Polytechnic High School. He decided to take
architectural drawing as his main subject. He had an
artistic flair and enjoyed different shapes and colors. At
school he was very active in extra circular activities. He
wrote editorials for the school newspaper. He participated
in the School Theater by taking many lead roles in
dramatic productions. His drama teacher was so
impressed by his acting ability that she subjected he
should go into the theater for his career. He also belonged
to the public speaking club.
In high school he would carry a small bible with his other
schoolbooks. At lunch he always said grace before eating
in the school cafeteria. He began to preach at this time.
When the war broke out he thought about it carefully and
decided that he would be a conscience objector. It was not
an easy decision because patriotism was very high in the
country at that time. When the school dance came around
he decided not to buy a ticket to it reasoning ” I am in the
world, but not of it.” Although he made some unpopular
decisions he was nonetheless elected vice president of his
senior class. In order to make money Jim and his brother
Bert would work odd jobs after school. Sometimes instead
of going home from school he and his friends would take
supplies and go camping in the Oregon countryside. His
father didn‟t mind him camping with his friends, but just
insisted that he didn‟t miss church on Sunday. Jim loved
the outdoors. He took long hikes, canoeing, and often
went camping with his friends. In 1945 Jim graduated from
high school and decided to attend Wheaton College in
Illinois. He would live about 2000 miles from home and
money would be tight. He had to support himself through
odd jobs, his friends help and scholarship money. When
he wanted to visit home for the holidays it wasn‟t easy
getting home. He couldn‟t fly because flying was a luxury
and way too expensive. Sometimes he didn‟t even have
enough money to take the train home so he would have to
hitch hike. In 1948 he started keeping a journal of his daily
thoughts and meditations. One of his most famous quotes
is “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain
what he cannot lose” At college he dedicated himself to
his Christian commitments. He majored in Greek because
he thought this would be helpful on the mission field when
he would have to translate the bible into another language.
Although his parents wanted him to stay in America and
preach he decided to go overseas because he felt that
was the greatest need. In order to keep his body strong for
the demands of the mission field he joined the wrestling
team at school. In the summer of 1947 he and a friend
hitchhiked down to Mexico, to stay with his friends parents
who were missionaries there. He spent six weeks there,
and begun to study Spanish. He wrote a letter to his
parents saying in it “Mexico has stolen my heart” and
“Missionaries are very human folks, simply a bunch of
nobodies trying to exalt somebody.” Pg 29 He liked
college but sometimes he thought he was wasting time
there when he could be out on the mission field. But
despite this feeling he did his best at college. He had a
routine of studying prayer life, bible study, physical
exercise that left very little leisure time. It was at this time
that he met his future wife, Elizabeth. They liked each
other but they decided not to get serious or think of
marriage until God gave them the sign to marry. For now
Jim and Elizabeth decided that they would put God‟s
priorities first before they‟re own relationship. It would be
another 5 years before they would get married on the
mission field in Ecuador. Jim enjoyed going home for the
holidays and participating in all the festivities. But
Christmas 1948 he wrote his parents and told them that he
wouldn‟t be coming home for Christmas because he would
attend the Student Missionary Convention at Illinois
University. It was here that he felt called to be a
missionary to South American jungles to work with the
tribal community there. He wrote Elizabeth saying ” I am
quite at ease about saying that tribal work in the South
American jungle is the general direction of my missionary
purpose.” Pg41 Toward the end of his college career he
wrote in his journal that he had felt a “renaissance” He
said he created a false barrier between the more spiritual
students like those part of the Foreign missions group and
the less spiritual like those who were more interested in
sports. This allowed him to take part in more activities then
he usually would have. For instance he dressed in a
Victorian costume and sang funny songs at the wrestling
banquet. He went on outings and other activities with
many students. He mentioned this in his journal saying
“The Lord has freed me from many things-good
consecrated attitudes, priggish little laws whereby I used
to govern my conduct…I experience new fellowship, new
freedom, new enjoyment,” he also acknowledged “I love to
be with a gang. Fellowship with the gang is enticing fun.”
pg 42 In the spring of 1949 Jim graduated with honors
from Wheaton College. His parents drove out to see his
graduation. His older brother Herbert had already gone out
into the mission field with his wife in the high Andes
Mountains of Peru. Jim didn‟t have a practical, long-term
plan for his life at this point except that he wanted to serve
overseas as a missionary in South America. He wrote in
his journal “I feel that three month‟s building would prepare
me more for the mission field than another three months in
the books.” pg. 45 He was going to help his brother Robert
build a house for him and his wife. At home from college
he had a lot of free time which was totally different then
the busy days he spent at college. He couldn‟t work on his
brother‟s house because of local zoning issues that came
up. He didn‟t have a way to actualize his vision of being a
missionary in South America yet. At home he filled his
time with reading biographies of other missionaries,
secular books, bible study. He especially liked to read
Amy Carmical‟s biography. He empathized with her. He
did odd jobs, and he was a substitute teacher at a
Christian school. In January of „50 he was accepted at
Camp Wycliffe for the summer to study Linguistics, in
order to help break down native language into written
symbols. The course lasted 10 weeks. There he met a
man who worked with the Quichuas of Ecuador, and he
told him about the Auca Indians who lived there also. He
told him there was an abandoned mission station there
and was available for use. Jim was fascinated and prayed
earnestly for 10 days to see if this was God‟s mission for
him. He wrote in his journal ” I dare not stay home while
Quichuas perish.” Jim prepared to make arrangement to
go to Ecuador. In 1951 he traveled through the East Coast
talking to fellowships of his church about the unreached
tribes on South America. He applied for a visa, and he
sought another co-worker‟s to go with him. time he met 10
days with Dr. Tidmarsh whose family was serving the
Quichia Indians. The Quichia Indians are the largest
population group. He confirmed his mission to Ecuador
through this meeting. In October of ‟52 he met with
Elizabeth and she would be going to Ecuador for mission

Ecuador is a beautiful land. The high Andes Mountains cut

through the county. Also the mighty Amazon river flows
through the mountains. There are thick tropical jungles,
and green grassy plains. It is hot as it borders the equator.
In January of „53 he recieved money from 5 different
sources in 24 hours. This money was enough to cover his
trip to Ecuador. The money came from people he met
months earlier. This was God‟s provision for him. On
February 4, 1953 he and a coworker, Pete Fleming, set
sail for Ecuador on the Santa Juana. They shared a cabin
together. Finally after a long two years of waiting and
preparing Jim‟s vision of serving the unreached tribes of
South America was being realized. He was full of
excitement and praise to God for his faithfulness. On the
ship they practiced their Spanish with the other
passengers. They were amazed at all the new sights they
saw. They stopped off in Mexico, and San Salvador where
they rented a car and went to look at the new sights. They
were also invited on a fishing trip with the captain. It took
about 17 days to reach Ecuador. From the dock they flew
to Quito. There they met Mrs. Tidmarsh and her son Rob.
At that point he realized that he had a language problem,
and quickly started studying Spanish. After 5 months he
gave his first message in Spanish. Although it wasn‟t
perfect he grew in confidence. They stayed in their homes
a few days. From there they went to stay with the Shorts,
another missionary couple, in San Domingo. San Domingo
was more primitive then the city of Quito. The only way to
get there was a long and hard trip in a pickup truck. There
Jim helped out in little ways like taking care of the kids,
washing dishes, or driving. In April 1952 Elizabeth came to
Quito, Ecuador to study language, tropical diseases, and
medical work. Jim so this as God‟s providence in his life.
They toured the city, went to a bullfight with friends, and
talked about their mission life together. In mid August they
had to separate again. Jim and his friend would move
deeper into the jungle. They took a crowded bus up a
steep mountain to Shell Mara. This was an abandoned oil-
prospecting town. There were just a few remaining old,
abandoned buildings around. They met Dr. Tidmarsh at
the Aviation Fellowship base. From there they had to
reach Shandia, the outlaying station, where the Quichua
Indians were. There were no airstrips there so they were
dropped off as close as possible. From that point they had
to trek three hours through thick, lush rain forest to reach
the Shandia. When they arrived with Dr. Tidmarsh men
and women of the Quichua met them. They were
physically tired, but exhilarated on reaching them. Now a
new problem arose. They had to learn a new language of
the Quichua Indians. In his journal entry he asked God to
help him learn it quickly. Life was simple. They lived in a
bamboo house that was on stilts. They had a simple
curtain to divide the sleeping and living quarters. Each day
an Indian would sweep out the bugs and mud. They
couldn‟t study well because the Indians had an easy going
attitude and would always disturb them when they were
studying. The would sell them food, ask for directions on
clearing the airstrip, or ask for pay at any time they felt like
it. Jim tried to teach them volleyball, but team sports were
foreign to them. Jim participated in their sports and they
liked him for it. Their diet consisted of a lot of fruit,
occasional meat when the Indians went hunting.
Sometimes they would eat fish if the Indians went fishing
by the riverbank. Occasionally they even ate roasted ants.
Sometimes they went on healing missions. Usually this
consisted in helping in childbirth. It wasn‟t unusual for new
born‟s to die in such conditions. Often death was looming
near through childbirth, snake bites, tropical disease. Life
was fragile among them. There were few comforts for
them. Jim and his associates longed to share the hope of
the gospel with them. The work of building the clinic and
widening the airstrip was slow. He wrote in his journal ” O
God, Life is slow, for all the action is shows” pg.73 In
January of 1953 he was engaged to Elizabeth in Quito.
Quito is a large city in Equator. After his engagement he
returned to Shandia. The rainy season was the worst it
had been in 30 years according to the Indians. The rain
was so intense that the river swelled and destroyed
Shandia. A full year‟s work had been washed away. The
three buildings they had repaired, the two new ones they
had constructed, and part of the airstrip was gone. They
sought a new place to build but decided to rebuild
Shandia, and some small out post stations to effectively
reach the Indians.

An Indian named Atanasio, who had 15 children, asked

them to come to his village in Puyupungu and build a
school. Jim saw this mission as one that he and Elizabeth
could do together. At this moment he asked Elizabeth to
marry him. They had a simple civil ceremony in the Quito
Registry office. It took 10 min. They honeymooned in
Panama and Costa Rica. After restocking they went back
to the jungles and arrived at the village in Puyupungu
together by canoe with their supplies stacked high.
Atanssio, and other men from the village came out to meet
them on the river in their canoes.
There new home consisted of a thatched hut, which they
had to move out of because it became infested with
roaches. They moved into a tent. For the first month Jim
came down with a mysterious fever and couldn‟t due
anything. After recovering they made a nine-hour hike
through the jungle to catch a plane to spend Christmas
with his other co-workers. The rain didn‟t seem to let up
through December to April. On April 1 Jim noted this down
in his journal “Pause late on a rainy afternoon. Gratefully
settled in our home for a week now…God has been
faithful, though Satan has fought us to discouragement
through long weeks of rain” pg94 Jim‟s work consisted of
building, teaching, instructing young Indians to take over a
church, translation of the bible, and healing missions of
mercy. This was using his limited medical knowledge to
help the Indians. Yet preparations were in the works to
make contact with the savage Auca Indians, even though
they had recently heard that the Indians had killed a
mother and her two children. Arajuno, was a small town
set up by Shell Oil to produce oil. IT had been abandoned,
and now was overgrown by the jungle. Yet it would be a
perfect base to reach the Auca Indians since it set next to
the Auca territory. Shell had left when the Auca‟s killed
some of its personnel. Jim went to build a house from the
left over material there. In September 1955, the
missionaries spotted the first houses of the Auca Indians
while flying over their territory. In order to establish friendly
contact with them they began to drop gifts down to them
from the plane. One time they dropped a machete to them
and they saw an Auca Indian come out and pick it up and
wave it around his head. Eventually the Indians lost their
fear of the plane and started to come out and wait for the
gift to drop. From that point they started to fly the plane
lower and shout out phrases to the Auca Indians: “We like
you, We are your friends”

In order to communicate with them Jim learned a few

phrases from an Auca woman Indian who had run away
from the tribe many years ago during a tribal feud.
On January 3, 1955 there were 5 missionary families
working together to bring the word of God to the
unreached Auca Indians. On this day Jim and the 4 other
men began to load their small plane with supplies that they
would need at Palm Beach. Palm Beach was a strip of
beach along the river where they would set up their base
station to meet the Auca Indians face to face. They were
all aware of the danger and took some practical steps to
protect themselves. They loaded handguns with them, and
they planned two escape routes just in case things got out
of hand. Following breakfast they prayed together, sung a
hymn and took off. The landing strip was narrow and
dangerous to land on, but Nate, the pilot, pulled it off
perfectly. In all he made 5 trips in and out to bring in all the
missionaries and supplies. Palm Beach was like paradise
except for all the millions of insects. On the beach they
built a tree house for shelter and to hold their supplies.
They made a make shift stove, and received food from the
base station flown in by Nate on daily trips. Nate flew over
the Auca houses and motioned for them to come down to
the river. A few days latter, Auca Indians, a male and two
females stepped out of the jungle across the river. They
didn‟t wear anything except a string around their waists,
wrists, and legs. The missionaries smiled and exchanged
gifts with them. They gave them food and repeated Auca
phrases saying “we are your friends. We like you” The
next time they took “George” a male Auca Indian they
nicknamed on an airplane ride. They flew over his village,
and he waved to his friends calling out and laughing. They
continued to have more contact. But they wanted to make
contact with the older Auca Indian elders. They tried to
show them that they wanted to build an airstrip in their
village with a model plane, and sticks to represent trees.
About a week after they first made camp they flew over
the Auca village and noticed that only a few women and
children were there. They felt that it would be the day they
would meet the leaders of the village and be invited back
with them. They radioed back to their wives in the base
station of Anjuro asking for pray and told them they would
again contact them at 4:30 that afternoon. That call never
came. A search party from the US army in panama found
5 bodies of the missionaries. Apparently they were
ambushed. The Acua Indians speared them to death.
They buried them together on the beach shore in a
common grave. This made worldwide news at the time.
Their death was not in vain. God would use it to open the
door to the Auca Indians through their wives. All of the
widows continued the mission that they had been called to
and in which Jim and his co-workers had given their lives.

References

All quotes taken from Jim Elliot‟s journal were found in

the following book.

Kathleen White, Jim Elliot, Men of Faith Series. Bethany

House Publishers 1990.

Nate Saint, Ed McCully, Jim Elliot,

Peter Fleming, and Roger Youderian (8 Jan 1956)

In the dense rain-forests of Ecuador, on the Pacific side of

the Andes Mountains, lives a tribe of Indians who call
themselves the Huaorani (“people” in their language,
Huao), but whose neighbors have called them the Aucas
(“savages” in Quechua). For many generations they have
been completely isolated from the outside world, disposed
to kill any stranger on sight, and feared even by their
head-hunting neighbors, the Jivaro tribe.

In 1955, four missionaries from the United States who

were working with the Quechas, Jivaros, and other Indians
of the interior of Ecuador became persuaded that they
were being called to preach the Gospel to the Huaorani as
well.
Nate Saint was 32 years old (born 1923), and devoted to
flying. He had taken flying lessons in high school and
served in the Air Force in WWII. After the war, he enrolled
in Wheaton College to prepare for foreign mission work,
dropped out to join the Missionary Aviation Fellowship,
established a base at Shell Mera (an abandoned oil
exploration camp in Ecuador) in September 1948, and
flew short hops to keep missionaries supplied with
medicines, mail, etc. Once his plane crashed, but a few
weeks later he returned to work in a cast from his neck to
his thighs. He was married to Marjorie (maiden name??).

The other threee, Ed McCully, Jim Elliot, and Peter

Fleming, all Plymouth Brethren, came to Ecuador in 1952
to work for CMML (Christian Missions in Many Lands). Ed
McCully was ?? years old (born 19??). He had been a
football and track star at Wheaton College, and president
of senior class. After Wheaton, he enrolled at Marquette to
study law, but dropped out to go to Ecuador. He and his
wife Marilou (maiden name?) worked with the Quechuas
at Arajuno, a base near the Huaorani. Half a dozen
Quechuas had been killed at the base by Huaorani in the
past year. Jim Elliot was 28 years old (born 1927), an
honors graduate of Wheaton College, where he had been
a debater, public speaker, and champion wrestler. In
Ecuador, he married Elisabeth Howard. They did
paramedic work, tending broken arms, malaria, snakebite.
The taught sanitation, wrote books in Quechua, and taught
literacy. Peter Fleming was 27 years old (born 1928), from
the University of Washington, an honor student, a linguist,
married to Olive (maiden name?). They ran a literacy
program among the Quechuas.

Nate and Ed found a Huaorani settlement from the air in

late September, 1955. Nate made four more flights on
Thursday, 29 September, and found a settlement only 15
minutes from their station. They told Jim and Pete, and the
four planned their strategy. They would keep the project
secret from everyone but their wives, to avoid being joined
by adventurers and the press, with the chance that
someone not dedicated to the mission would start
shooting at the first sign of real or imagined danger, and
destroy the project. They had one language resource, a
Huaorani girl, Dayuma, who had fled from her tribe years
earlier after her family was killed in a dispute, who was
now living with Nate‟s sister Rachel, and who spoke both
Huao and Quechua. From her they learned enough of the
language to get started. They would fly over the village
every Thursday and drop gifts as a means of making
contact and establishing a friendly relation. Eventually they
would try for closer contact. Nate had discovered that, if
he lowered a bucket on a line from the plane, and flew in
tight circles, the bucket remained almost stationary, and
could be used to lower objects to the ground. He had
devised a mechanism to release the bucket when it
touched down.

On Thursday 6 October, one week after locating the

village, they dropped an aluminum kettle into an
apparently deserted village. On the next flight, several
Huaorani were waiting, and they dropped a machete. On
the third flight, they dropped another machete to a
considerably larger crowd. Beginning with the fourth flight,
they used a loudspeaker system to call out friendly
messages in Huao. Soon the Huaorani were responding
with gifts of their own tied to the line: a woven headband,
carved wooden combs, two live parrots, cooked fish,
parcels of peanuts, a piece of smoked monkey tail…. They
cleared a space near their village, and built platforms to
make the exchanges easier.

After three months of air-to-ground contact, during which

they made far more progress than they had hoped, the
missionaries decided that it was time for ground contact—
that they could not keep their activities secret much
longer, and that delay risked a hostile encounter between
the Huaorani and some third party. They decided that the
expedition needed a fifth man, and so brought in Roger
Youderian (married to Barbara ???), from rural Montana, a
former paratrooper who had fought in the Battle of the
Bulge (major German offensive in Belgium in the last
stages of WWII), and had been in General Eisenhower‟s
honor guard. Roger had been working with the Jivaros,
and was thoroughly at home in the jungle, accustomed to
living like the Jivaros, and blessed with acute survival
instincts. They located a beach that would serve as a
landing strip, about four miles from the village, and
decided to go in on Tuesday 3 January 1956. After some
discussion, they decided to carry guns, having heard that
the Huaorani never attacked anyone who was carrying a
gun, and having resolved that they would, as a last resort,
fire the guns into the air to ward off an attack, but would
shoot no-one, even to save their own lives.
On Tuesday they flew in and made camp, and then flew
over the village to invite the Huaorani to visit them. The
first visitors showed up on Friday, a man, a woman, and a
teen-aged girl. They stayed for several hours in apparent
friendliness, and then left abruptly. On Saturday, no one
showed, and when the plane flew over the village, the
Huaorani seemed frightened at first, but lost their fright
when presents were dropped. On Sunday afternoon, 8
January 1956, at about 3pm, all five missionaries were
speared to death at their camp. A search party the next
day found no signs of a struggle, and the lookout who was
to be stationed in a tree-house overlooking the camp at
ground level had come down, so it appeared that the
meeting had originally seemed friendly, and that the attack
had been a surprise. Ed McCully‟s body was seen and
identified, but was swept away by the river and not
recovered. The other four, at the request of their wives,
were buried at the site of the camp where they had died.

The effort to reach the Huaorani was not abandoned but

rather intensified. Within three weeks, Johnny Keenan,
another pilot of the Ecuador Mission, was continuing the
flights over the Auca village. More than twenty fliers from
the United States promptly applied to take Nate‟s place.
More than 1000 college students volunteered for foreign
missions in deirect response to the story of the Five
Martyrs. In Ecuador, at the mission stations, attendance
by Indians at schools and church services reached record
levels, and the number of conversions skyrocketed. A
Jivaro undertook to go at once to another Jivaro tribe that
had been at war with his own tribe for years, bearing the
Christian message, and his visit brought peace between
the two tribes. Truly, as Tertullian said 1800 year ago, the
blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church. In less than
three years, Rachel Saint (sister of Nate Saint) and
Elisabeth Elliot (widow of Jim Elliot) had not only renewed
contact but had established permanent residence in a
Huarani settlement, where they practised basic medicine
and began the process of developing a written form of the
language.

Why did the Huaorani suddenly turn hostile? Much later,

one of the Huaorani who had helped to kill the five martyrs
explained that the tribe, who had had almost no contact
with outsiders that did not involve killing or attempted
killing on one side or another, wondered why the whites
wanted to make contact with them; and while they wanted
to believe that their visitors were friendly, they feared a
trap. After the killings, they realized their mistake. When
they were attacked, one of the missionaries fired two shots
as warnings, and one shot grazed a Huaorani who was
hiding in the brush, unknown to the missionaries. It was
therefore clear that the visitors had weapons, were
capable of killing, and had chosen not to do so. Thus, the
Huaorani realized that the visitors were indeed their
friends, willing to die for them if necessary. When in
subsequent months they heard the message that the Son
of God had come down from heaven to reconcile men with
God, and to die in order to bring about that reconciliation,
they recognized that the message of the missionaries was
the basis of what they had seen enacted in the lives of the
missionaries. They believed the Gospel preached because
they had seen the Gospel lived.
by James Kiefer
Missionary works to help the tribe that killed his father
Steve Saint was not quite 5 when his father and four other
Christian missionaries were speared to death by
Ecuadorian Indians. Forty-seven years after the attack that
shocked America, Saint said he has never forgiven his
father‟s killers — not because of bitterness, but because
he doesn‟t feel it‟s necessary.

“The only reason to forgive somebody is that you‟ve been

wronged by them,” Saint said. “The Waodoni (Indians),
yes, they killed my dad. But it was because they didn‟t
know how not to.”

The story of the Jan. 8, 1956 slayings of Nate Saint, Jim

Elliot, Peter Fleming, Ed McCully, and Roger Youderian
has been told many times, most notably in the best-selling
book, “Through Gates of Splendor,” by Elliot‟s widow,
Elisabeth.

A documentary of the same name is due for release this

spring and a major Hollywood production is now being
filmed, said Saint, who now lives in Orlando.

Today, Saint, 52, is working to help his father‟s killers by

bridging the educational and technological gulfs that
separate them from modern society.

“My biggest responsibility is to be a cheerleader for them,

to convince them that they are capable of helping their
tribe physically and spiritually,” Saint said.

The Waodoni, formerly known as the Aucas, which means

“naked savages,” are very slow in adapting to modern
society, he said.

“Their culture is so radically different than the outside

because for the last 10 generations it has been based on
survival,” Saint said. “And to be good at killing anybody
who might come to kill you, you need to be good at being
secretive and keeping your whereabouts hidden.”

The Waodoni, who move their villages throughout the

Ecuadorian Amazon, are one of the most egalitarian
societies ever studied, Saint said. They have no chief, no
elders and no property. Their only social structure is the
extended family.

For centuries, the tribe lived in constant fear of murderous

attacks from their enemy tribes upriver, who would sneak
up on their villages in the dark of night, crouch under the
stilted houses, and spear their sleeping victims through
the bamboo floors.

“The reality of their lives was that they would either spear
others and live or be speared and die,” Saint said.

That is why he feels no anger toward the Waodoni for

killing his father and the other missionaries.
“My earliest recollections were memories of my dad,” Saint
said. “My dad was my hero. ... And I do remember when
Mom told me that my dad wasn‟t coming back, and my
initial shock at that.

“And later, when my mom told me that my dad had gone

to live with Jesus, I knew that that‟s what we all looked
forward to. We talked about it, sang songs about it.”

After the slayings, Saint said he and his mother stayed in

the same house for a year until another missionary family
arrived, then moved 150 miles away to a mission hospital.

Several years later, he returned to the Waodoni region

with his aunt, Rachel — his father‟s sister — and began
living with the primitive tribe in their Amazon village.

Mincaye, one of the Waodoni hunters who killed Nate

Saint and the other missionaries, “adopted” young Saint,
teaching him to hunt with a blowgun, climb trees, and use
spears.

“Up here we have this formal concept of adoption,” Saint

said. “But down there, they don‟t distinguish.” Relatives
often take in a young child from another tribal family, he
said.

Last year, Mincaye and Saint joined Christian music star

Steven Curtis Chapman on a tour, sharing their
experiences and giving an evangelistic message.
Saint said that over time, the missionaries‟ efforts to reach
the Waodoni began to have an impact.

“It‟s kind of like salt,” he said. “The Waodoni never used

salt. But when my Aunt Rachel brought in salt and they
tasted it on meat once, it‟s not hard to convert them to be
salt eaters. A few might not like it. Some might like it a little
bit. But salt is a pretty attractive thing.

“In a society where people lived in abject fear and virtually

constant anger and hatred — and I would say that those
are three primary characteristics of the tribe‟s emotions —
they were glad to learn that they don‟t have to live like that
all the time.”

He remembers waking up one night as a child, lying on the

bamboo floor of his house, and hearing Waodonis yelling
loudly because they thought they heard upriver tribesmen
sneaking into their village.

He asked his Aunt Rachel what the Waodoni were yelling.

“She told me, „They‟re saying, “If you want to spear us,
come and spear us. But we won‟t spear you back. We‟re
following God‟s trail. We‟re living in peace.” ‟ ”

“And I said, „Well, Aunt Rachel, do you agree?‟ I was

thinking that wasn‟t such a good plan.”

When the missionaries first arrived, there were about 200

Waodoni, Saint said. Today there are around 2,000. “Once
the killings stopped, there has been a huge population
explosion,” he said.

He estimates that about 20 percent of the Waodoni are

now Christians, or “God followers,” as they call
themselves.

Saint moved to the United States in 1994 and founded an

organization called I-TEC, which stands for Indigenous
Peoples — Technology and Education Center. The
organization takes ready-made tools and “reinvents” them
to fit the needs of the churches that minister to primitive
societies.

“One of the biggest barriers preventing indigenous

churches from growing to maturity is their continuing
dependence on the welfare of outsiders,” Saint said.

By DAVID YONKE, Toledo Blade

Posted by Admin at 5:25 AM
SATURDAY, JANUARY 21, 2006
Elisabeth Elliot Interview
The Heart of a True Missionary

An Interview with Elisabeth Elliot by Russell G. Shubin

Elisabeth Elliot talks about cross-bearing Christianity, the

immaterial wealth of her mission heritage, and what has
given her strength in the face of adversity.
In a great number of North American evangelical homes
today, Elisabeth Elliot is a household word. Her radio
program, “Gateway to Joy,” is broadcast on some 250
English-speaking stations and some 250 more in
translation. She speaks of “soldierly qualities” and the
need for a cross-bearing Christianity. She reiterates the
need for wives to be submissive to husbands. She
challenges outright the dating practices of our youth.
Simply put, she advocates a Christianity that is a striking
contrast to much of what fills the “bestseller” section in
Christian bookstores today.

But Elisabeth Elliot may be best-known as the surviving

wife of Jim Elliot, the 28 year-old missionary speared to
death in 1956 with four of his co-laborers-Nate Saint, Pete
Fleming, Roger Youderian, and Edward McCully. Along
with their wives and children, these five men were in the
early efforts of reaching the Auca tribe (now known as the
Huaorani) in the dense jungles of northern Ecuador. They
were nervous but optimistic as they landed their small
Piper aircraft on a shallow part of the Curaray River.

Elisabeth Elliot‟s riveting account of this story and the

follow-up to it-Through Gates of Splendor and The Savage
My Kinsman-quickly became standard missionary fare and
remain so today, over 40 years later. The event itself-
known as the Palm Beach incident for the shallow beach
where the plane landed-continues to have a riveting
impact on successive generations of young people.
Countless youth have been called to service in the fields
of the harvest as a result. All have been called to live lives
of increasing sanctification.

A prolific writer of over 20 books who has moved well

beyond the pale of specifically mission-focused material,
Elliot‟s writing efforts over the last 20 years have covered
a range of topics-including God‟s plan for the Christian
family, suffering, loneliness and a re-evaluation of
Christian dating. While some find her a bit harsh and
dogmatic, she has articulated a spiritual passion in the
face of all of life‟s hardships that has given many a more
upright spiritual posture.

Elliot‟s immediate response to the Palm Beach incident

placed her, along with co-laborer Rachel Saint (Sister of
the slain Nate Saint) in the memory of evangelicals as
modern-day saints. Shortly after the incident, she returned
to the tribe to continue the church planting work among
the Huaorani. They made it clear that they did not want to
prosecute the murderers. Today, the numerous Huaorani
followers of Wnagogi (“creator God”) may well be her most
profound legacy. The sweet though costly irony was
illustrated most poignantly as Stephen Saint, son to
martyred Nate Saint was baptized by a Huaorani pastor-
one of the spear-wielding Indians who took part in the
slaying of his father years earlier. The living testimony of
Elisabeth Elliot and Rachel Saint‟s work amongst the
Huaorani is a superb example of the vital and strategic
role of women in the frontier mission task.

In addressing her preparedness for the initial tragedy Elliot

attributes her strength in adversity to her upbringing-one
that had missions at its very core.

“I grew up in a very strong, missionary-minded home. We

had dozens, perhaps hundreds of missionaries visiting in
our home. I have my mother‟s guest book that has 42
countries represented in it. Therefore, I had read
missionary books, we had looked at thousands of
missionary slides, heard many missionary stories and we
knew that there would be hardships.

“Of course, I didn‟t know what the nature of mine might be

and I didn‟t expect it to be quite so soon.” She notes that
in each of the major blows to her faith that first year in
Ecuador, it was a return to the cross of Christ that
provided the deepest counsel. But she recognizes that
there are precious few who have a similar background and
its component part-preparedness for adversity-with which
she was so blessed. “So, when I have the opportunity to
speak to prospective missionaries, I do want to emphasize
an encounter with the cross. I think it takes a deep,
spiritual encounter with the cross before we‟re really
qualified to call ourselves missionaries.”

While hesitant to generalize too broadly, Elliot sees in the

younger generation an aversion not so much to the grand
cause of martyrdom but to the mundane discipline of
yielding to Christ‟s lordship in the small things. Her words
to prospective cross-cultural workers: “I would take them
first to the foot of the cross and just ask them if they
understand what the cross was all about and what it
means in our daily life. If Jesus told us that we must take
up our cross daily and follow Him, in what tiny little ways
might we experience this?

“These students do know that five missionaries were killed

in 1956 and that was a very dramatic event that is still in
the minds of many. I am amazed at how many decades
have gone by and it seems as though more people are
acquainted with that story now than when it happened.

“But the great question is the tiny, little things which are
not dramatic and not heroic, but those are the ways the
cross is going to be presented to us. I often ask a group,
„In what ways do you expect the cross to be presented to
you?‟

“Well, the chances are not very great that it is going to be

anything dramatic or heroic; it is probably going to be, as
John H. Newman put it, „the carrying on of small duties
which are distasteful to us.‟

“My impression is that they have not had the same kind of
earnestness and preparation for suffering. America loves
comfort and fun. And we need to face squarely the words
that „If we endure, we shall also reign with Him‟ (2 Tim.
2:12).

“I don‟t run across very many people who have the depth
of understanding that we were given. I am very deeply
aware of the privileges that I had. I want to do my best to
pass on to younger people those soldierly qualities and
necessities that we have to learn. Jesus spelled it out very
clearly that, if we were going to follow Him, there was
going to be suffering. It‟s not going to be different.”

While writing and speaking on a wide variety of subjects,

center stage on her agenda has been the sad state of the
North American family (e.g. Passion and Purity and The
Shaping of the Christian Family). For Elliot, the connection
of the deteriorating family structure with the impact on the
message we export through the mission enterprise is not a
difficult one to make. This is highlighted by recognizing
that the family structure of many “pagan” peoples we
attempt to reach is-shall we say?-much more Biblical.

“I did come from a strong missionary family. We ate, lived

and breathed missions. My parents had been missionaries
and five out of the six of us kids became missionaries.
This whole thing of divorce just becomes so endemic that
it can‟t help but have a tremendous impact on missions. If
we are sending that kind of message around the world it
undermines the Gospel itself.

“I want to do everything that I can to strengthen the

Christian family. I‟ve written a book on that subject and I‟m
often asked to do seminars on the Christian family. It takes
a strong father, a submissive wife and obedient children.
But there was never any question in our minds that our
parents were perfectly serious when they laid down the
rules of the house. What they said, they meant, and what
they said, they meant the first time. These were all factors
that gave us self-discipline.”
One of the fundamental flaws that Elliot recognized in
North America upon returning to the States was the
carefree practice of dating-which presented a striking
contrast to her early years with Jim Elliot. “It became very
obvious to me back in the 70‟s that this whole business of
courtship and dating-actually, it wasn‟t called courtship at
all, it was just called dating, and it was simply taken for
granted-became more and more dangerous as all the old
rules were discarded.

“So, I felt duty-bound to just tell my own story of how Jim

Elliot and I made up our minds long before we ever fell in
love, that we did not belong to ourselves, but to God
Himself; and this body in which I live is holy, it belongs to
God until God gives it to somebody else. So, Jim and I
were perfectly clear about that independent of each other
and then, when he came along and confessed to me that
he was in love with me, he followed that immediately with
saying, „I‟m not asking you to marry me. You go ahead
and go to Africa and I‟ll go to South America, and if God
wants to bring us together, God knows how to do it.‟

“I thought I was going to Africa, but in various ways, God

indicated that it was South America. And so, we waited 5
½ years for each other. That, of course, is another
tremendous lesson in sacrifice. Young people today, it is
my impression, are not prepared to sacrifice. They want
what they want and they want it now. They‟re going to get
what they want, any way they can get it. When you start at
the foot of the cross and lay yourself totally at God‟s
disposal, there are a whole lot of pitfalls that are avoided.”
Elliot‟s hard language of placing oneself “totally at God‟s
disposal” is a striking contrast to the rights language so
prevalent in both secular and Christian media today. But it
is the depth of her conviction on a number of matters that
has emboldened many in their own calling to Christian
work. She calls for unadorned, sacrificial living directed by
a simple tenet: “Keep going back to the Old Book.”

The Bible, she says, is simply “our authority. There is no

other way except the way of the cross. Jesus made it so
crystal clear. He simply said, „If you want to be my
disciple…,‟ and that stands just exactly the same way
today. He is saying that to each of us, „Do you want to be
my disciple?‟

“If the answer is „yes,‟ then there can be no question about

the willingness to fulfill the three conditions of discipleship
which is [first of all] to give up your right to yourself-and
that flies in the face of everything that the world is saying.
When the world is saying „be good to yourself, work on
yourself, do your own thing,‟ that is the absolute opposite
of giving up your right to yourself. You can‟t take up the
cross until you‟ve given up your right to yourself.

“The second condition is „take up your cross,‟ and that

certainly means suffering of one sort or another. And the
third thing, of course, is „to follow.‟ And that means a
determined obedience, from here to eternity.

“You don‟t tell God you will do two years of missionary

work, period, and consider that you have done your job.
Following means one step at a time, one day at a time, but
we have a Leader who will show us the way.”

Elliot is now living near Massachusetts Bay in

Massachusetts-by her own admission a long way from the
jungles of Ecuador. Her acquaintance with grief, however,
did not end upon her return to the States. After Jim Elliot,
she would lose a second husband (Addison Leitch) in a
tough battle with cancer in 1973. Today, she is married
again-to Lars Gren, who serves as a manager for Elliot‟s
personal ministry.

Elliot certainly doesn‟t hold herself up as one who

deserves any special awards of merit for having borne
heavy burdens. She insists her lot is no more difficult than
the numerous others who have lost husbands-including
the recent example of Gladys Staines who lost her
husband and two sons while serving in India.

Reflecting again on the Palm Beach incident, she recalled

how she knew it was very serious when Jim Elliot and
crew turned up missing. “And when we got the word that
they were all dead, what can you do except turn to Christ
and say, „Lord, you are in charge, I accept this.‟ The great
principle that Amy Carmichael taught was „in acceptance
lieth peace.‟ We cannot change what has happened, we
cannot be angry at God because then there is no other
refuge. I‟m always aghast when I hear anyone say that
he‟s mad at God, because where else can you turn?”
This interview first appeared in Mission Frontiers, August
1999.
Elisabeth Elliot is a speaker, radio host, former missionary
and prolific writer. She has written many books including
Passion and Purity, Through Gates of Splendor and A
Chance to Die: The Life and Legacy of Amy Carmichael.
Find out more about her ministry and radio program
“Gateway to Joy,” at www.gatewaytojoy.org.
Posted by Admin at 6:38 PM
FRIDAY, JANUARY 20, 2006
Triumph From Tragedy - David M. Howard Jr.
Triumph From Tragedy
Five missionaries‟ murders were not the end of the story.

BY DAVID M. HOWARD JR.

Friday, January 20, 2006 12:01 a.m. EST

On Jan. 8, 1956, five American missionaries were speared

and hacked to death by a group of Auca Indians in the
deepest jungles of Ecuador, making headlines around the
world. A movie commemorating the 50th anniversary of
the event—and the stranger-than-fiction tale that
followed—is being released today. “End of the Spear,”
based on a 2005 book by Steve Saint, the son of one of
the slain missionaries, will be shown in 1,200 theaters
across the country.

The five missionaries—Jim Elliot, Pete Fleming, Ed

McCully, Nate Saint and Roger Youderian—were young
men eager to bring the Gospel to this savage tribe (known
today as “Waorani”), who routinely killed any outsiders
they encountered. The five prepared to make contact with
the tribe for months, even learning Waorani phrases from
a tribe member who had escaped years earlier. Nate Saint
flew a small, single-engine plane in circles over the tribe‟s
territory every Saturday for 12 weeks, trailing a long line
behind the plane to which he attached gifts; the Indians
reciprocated, tying gifts of their own onto the line.

On Jan. 3, the group landed on a sandbar in the Curaray

River, where the men set up camp. On Jan. 6, three
Waorani came out of the jungle, and there was a friendly
exchange for several hours. But two days later, several
Waorani warriors burst out of the jungle and killed the five
with spears and machetes. Though the missionaries had
guns, they shot their weapons into the air rather than
defend themselves, an action they had decided upon
beforehand and one later confirmed by their attackers.

The news was excruciating for the five widows, but it was
not the end of the story. They all shared their husbands‟
vision, and three stayed in Ecuador after the deaths,
working with other tribes and waiting for the opportunity to
make another contact with the Waorani. Less than two
years after the massacre, in November 1957, two Waorani
women—who had opposed the killings—walked to a
settlement of Quechua Indians, in an attempt to escape
their own tribe and find the white men. There they
encountered Elisabeth Elliot, the widow of Jim Elliot.
Within a year, the Waorani women invited Elisabeth, her
daughter Valerie and Rachel Saint, sister of Nate Saint, to
come back to the tribe with them. The missionaries
accepted.

The women learned the Waorani language, eventually

translating portions of the New Testament for the tribe;
“God‟s carvings,” the Indians called them. The women
also taught the natives rudimentary medicine. Elisabeth
and Valerie lived with the tribe for four years, but Rachel
remained until her death in 1994.

The ministry of these women resulted in a remarkable

change. In this 250-person tribe, characterized by some
anthropologists as the most violent ever encountered (the
homicide rate even within the tribe was more than 60%),
the killings stopped. Today, there are about 2,000 Waorani
and a third of them are Christian.

Over the years, Steve Saint visited his Aunt Rachel many
times, and he was “adopted” by the Waorani as one of
their own. As a teenager, he was baptized in the river by
two of the men who had speared his father; he calls one
member of the tribe, Mincaye (who is still alive today), his
second father. After Rachel‟s death, the tribe asked Steve
to come live with them to continue her work. It was a
radical request, but Steve and his family soon headed to
Ecuador. They built a house hewn from trees in the jungle,
and helped the tribe procure medicine and taught them the
skills they needed to interact with outsiders.

My own interest in this story is deeply personal—Elisabeth

Elliot is my aunt (my father‟s sister), Valerie is my cousin
and Jim Elliot was my father‟s best friend. I often think
about the sacrifices the five missionaries and their families
made.

The explanation for the behavior of these men and women

is not easily apprehended in our time. All these principals
had a worldview that transcended the material world: In
college, Jim Elliot wrote in his journal that “he is no fool
who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot
lose.” The religious faith of these men also demanded
from them an almost unimaginable empathy. Nate Saint
explained in his diary: “Would that we could comprehend
the lot of these stone-age people who live in mortal fear of
ambush on the jungle trail . . . those to whom the bark of a
gun means sudden, mysterious death . . . those who think
all men in all the world are killers like themselves. If God
would grant us the vision, the word sacrifice would
disappear from our lips and thoughts.”

The Waorani today are thankful that Elisabeth and Rachel

came to them, in spite of everything. Mincaye says: “My
ancestors didn‟t know God‟s carvings. How could they
walk God‟s trail if they didn‟t see God‟s carvings?”

For years after the initial massacre, the Waorani marveled

at the fact that the victims did not use their guns to fend off
the attack. Why was this so? Because, as their diaries
show, the five men believed that they were ready to meet
their maker while the Waorani were not. Such tales of
selfless love are rare today, and worthy of celebration.
Why not Hollywood?
Mr. Howard is the dean of the Center for Biblical and
Theological Foundations at Bethel University in St. Paul,
Minn.