The instructions were, “If you get frostbite, don’t touch it with your hands or it will turn black.” Well, Ken Dewar was able to put that piece of advice to good use when he experienced frostbite while riding for 80 miles on a skidoo in the tundra. He refrained from touching it with his hands and he was told that the best thing to do was to put snow on it.

Spending time in another culture can be filled with a whole lot of interesting and new experiences that you may have never imagined would happen to you. In 1 Corinthians 9:22-23, Paul talks about becoming all things to all people in order to save some. That is why our approach at Ethnos is to be learners of culture in order to understand culture and communicate clearly. The team that Ken took up to the Arctic in March did exactly that. They were faced with some pretty interesting offers and in order to understand, they embraced the opportunities for the love of the people. Melissa (pictured above), one of the missionary candidates that went on this trip wrote, “I never thought I would say this, but we just spent this past week in an Inuit village in the arctic. What an experience. I sat with ladies scraping and stretching seal skins, attended an Inuit funeral, took a 7 hour trip on skidoos out into the tundra in real feel -41 degree weather to check fishing nets (wearing real seal-skin gloves and kamiks), sat in a Inuit hunting cabin and ate fresh, raw Arctic char and tea with a wonderful Inuk and his grandkids and then watched the northern lights dance across a starlit sky. I couldn’t make all that up if I tried! What an adventure of a week. The adventure wasn’t what drew us there though. It is the people. Through those experiences we were able to get small glimpses into the culture, and see firsthand the brokenness, the hurting, the misunderstandings, and the spiritual darkness that is hiding behind a seemingly perfect harmonious culture. We are thankful for the opportunity we were given to go on this trip to see where we might fit into a team to reach the unreached.”

Please continue to pray for this ministry: for more labourers, for those who are already preparing to go and for the leadership team as they give direction to Indigenous Ministries.