Saturday, July 11, 2020, Luke, Stefani, and Scott rode out to meet Dennis at the junction of National Highway 4 and highway 48 peeling off to Srey Ambul. We met up at the Tela station and got something to drink and then went down 48 toward Koh Kong for about an hour and stopped for lunch.
Moving on from there we headed to Thmor Bang and spent some time avoiding rain in an abandoned building with what looked like bags of fertilizer that were over-ripe, but we endured the smell to keep dry.
After the rain let up, the battery was dead on my motorcycle, but we were able to push start it pretty easily and made it to Thmor Bang. I got a new battery there and the bike started up but now my light didn’t work. We got something to eat there in Thmor Bang as we didn’t want to show up right at dinner in the village.
We rolled into Jamka Jake right as it was getting dark and raining. Tokna greeted us warmly and said that he had been waiting for us since 3 pm to visit with some of the older people in the village. The young people are usually busy during the day but the older people would have time to visit. He says that normally they meet every evening when the young people that work have time to meet. He is teaching the youth how to play the guitar, drums and sing together. They have prayer and praise times and lessons each night from the Bible.
Tokna has written about 30 original songs that he asked for help and training in learning how to record and make videos. Back in February 2020, Ben Rainey, Chris Cox, Kurt Helmer and Brian Garland went over to Koh Kong and set up a recording studio in the church and taught a group of young folks how to record and mix tracts and how to coordinate that with video to make a music video to share on FB and YouTube. They spent a lot of time working on 1 song and through that process they trained these nationals how to do it on their own.
Tokna is originally from Banteay Meanchay. His family came to faith during Pol Pot. Originally, his father did not like the Christian faith because he said it was a foreigner faith. He didn’t like Christians. But he came to believe and stopped drinking. His whole life changed and he started sharing with other people and sharing about spiritual things at home. He lived out his faith and did work in ministry there in the village in Banteay Meanchey. His favorite shirt was his evangelism shirt with a cross on it and he wore it all the time. Tokna wanted to do ministry with his father. It was not easy. Tokna was tempted a lot. It’s not clear what the temptation was, but I think it was drinking? He had a photography business and several other jobs to support his family and do ministry in their village.
One time, Tokna was out in the village and someone gave him something to drink that was poisoned or something. His arms and legs swelled, he heard strange noises. He thought he was dying. His father came and sat with him in the hospital and gave him encouraging words, words that gave him hope. He was in the hospital for 3 months. His father would say that “If I die and my child lives, that would be fine.” After three months in the hospital, Tokna had recovered from the poison but was very weak.
Soon after this time his father died and Tokna was very angry at God. (His father was killed by someone?). He did not want to serve God anymore. I think he’s 17-18 years old at this time. At home things are hard. His mother marries again and he feels like he needs to get away. Nobody knows where he is or where he is going. He goes to Siem Reap and there is a Bible school there that will give housing and food for working there doing Bible teaching. This school in Siem Reap closes after about 6 months. The school tells him about another Bible school down in Kampong Som and they say he should go. He went down there and studied for 3.5 years. He met his wife, Sokhea, and got married. This was not easy as he had no one to help him with paying for a wedding, but he had some things he had grown and could sell so her family agreed because they saw that he loved and wanted to serve God.
After finishing Bible school, Tokna and Sokhea were looking for a place to go to do ministry. A teacher at the Bible school suggested Thmor Bang. He went there and did not feel like that was the place to go (his promised land). He was encouraged to go back, but instead of stopping in Thmor Bang, he went about 20 km further to Jamka Jake and it was literally at the end of the road. The road did not go any farther. But when he stopped there he saw that it was rich with fruit and resources of the jungle. There were durian trees that are very tall and over 100 years old. Many types of fruit and vegetables can be grown there. He felt this is where God wanted him to live and work, God’s promised land for him.
Tokna moved there with his wife and rented a small spot of $30/month and started teaching English. He was like a jungle man during those days with very long hair and a long beard. The students would bring things for them to eat and they could get things from the forest to support themselves. He said they could get various things from the forest and sell them to earn about $25/day. They were also supported some by the Kampong Som Bible school. Things were going slow and no one was interested in learning about the Bible for 2 years.
One day, Tokna was riding his bike down the road and a guy who had been drinking grabbed his bike and said that he wanted to give him some land to start a school. He was very excited but not sure this guy really knew what he was saying so he went back the next day and this man said that he really wanted to donate the land for a school in the village.
Tokna was very resourceful and harvested wood to build the house/school/church out of the wood he could mill from the jungle. He had some help and also continued to use what was donated and contributed to build the facility. He had some solar donated so he is using that and they also have access to power from a generator in the village. One time his Khmer friend was coming by to give about $350 for his ministry. This friend was just casually commenting about how big the building was and used the word “ah-kia” to signify a large structure, bigger than a house. This comment hit Tokna the wrong way and he was angry at his friend for suggesting he was building an inappropriate facility. He did not want to take the money and wanted his friend to leave. Then he realized that he needed to humble himself and not be so prideful. The character of the structure will not be judged by the size but by what is being done and taught there. He was thankful for this lesson God provided.
Tokna continued teaching in the village, but only his family would come to worship. One day some people in the village brought a woman that was possessed by an evil spirit and they asked for help. Tokna and Sokhea were not sure what to do. They thought that they should pray, but they were not sure what kind of prayer or what were the correct words to use. They felt powerless and unsure about how they should proceed, so they just asked God to help. After a time, the woman’s body rose up off the bed, levitating, and several people saw this event. They were not sure what was happening so they kept praying. The woman returned to the bed and the demon had left her body. People in the village now realized the power of prayer and God was praised for having the power to force the spirit out of this woman. People started to believe in God and had an interest to study the Bible, sing and pray. Now they have nightly gatherings where they study music, sing, pray, study the Bible and share together. They also go out and have meetings in four other locations near their village. Each of those locations has 2-4 families that are believers.
After our service on Sunday, Tokna asked us to stay in Jamka Jake and to visit with some of the families in the village. The first family that we visited had over 200 durian trees. They are able to grow many other fruits and vegetables but their best cash crops are the durian and bananas. Little squirrels like chipmunks eat the durian and they try to shoot them with slingshots. We learned how to tell when durian is ripe with sounds and textures. We learned how to cut a durian to eat. I ate some but Luke carried his weight eating his share as he had durian for 3 straight meals with no ill effects. We prayed for their health and their witness in this village.
We next went to visit Ta Keen and Yea Ruung In Jamka Jake. Ta plays the tro (Cambodian fiddle) for worship. We prayed for Ta’s health. He was told that he had a liver problem at the hospital in Koh Kong. He can’t eat seafood. His energy is not what it was and doesn’t have the same strength. He makes a tea out of plants from the forest and he says that helps.
We prayed for the family to know what to do in making a living as the government says they can clear land but wildlife association says they cannot. They are able to sell bananas but the rest comes from what the jungle provides. They can hunt with a muzzle loading gun but it is not legal so we didn’t ask too many questions about that. They also have a son that was thought to be possessed by an evil spirit. He just stopped making sense about 4 years ago. They sent him to MMC and they could find no medical basis for his lack in ability to cope with life. He stopped talking 3 years ago and now they don’t know what to do to help him. We prayed for all these things together. We walked down to the river and saw their water buffalo, some leeches and beautiful deep green scenery along the way. On the way back is started raining so we hung out and visited during the storm.
Tokna admitted that previously he did not really see the benefits of people traveling around the country to pray (as Prayer Circles Cambodia does). He was skeptical of those people, but now he says he realizes the spiritual battle that is ongoing and how important it is to keep praying. It is important to go and visit and pray specifically and encourage the people living in the village. He encouraged us in our task of praying throughout the country.
Tokna takes field trips around the country himself to visit people in Mondulkiri and Ratanakiri and many other places. He said he took 4 people one time on one of these trips. It is not uncommon for the people that they visit to return the favor and come to visit them. He said the group from Ratanakiri showed up with 2 van loads of people, about 30 folks! He said he really enjoys those times of fellowship as they pray, praise, study and worship together to realize you are not alone in your faith.
He plans these trips on regular intervals to visit people in distant locations. One village deep in the jungle had folks that were very superstitious. There is a specific spot in the jungle that if you don’t burn incense or give some type of offering you will get sick or something bad will happen to you. As believers, they did not adhere to these guidelines and the local villagers were shocked that nothing bad came upon the visitors from Jamka Jake. For 2 years Tokna and his group visited the people in this village but did not specifically share the gospel with them. They would pray and sing together, but then at night the jungle village folks would distance themselves from the Jamka Jake group so as not to be affected by the utter destruction they felt sure was coming. But no destruction or sickness harmed the outsiders. The spirits that they feared so much had no power over these outsiders! The next year this group from the jungle village came to visit Tokna in Jamka Jake. They saw the Bibles and song books and asked questions about these things and their beliefs. So that is when they shared the gospel and some of the people from this jungle village now believe in God and their faith is strong.
Tokna and the group in Jamka Jake love music. I mentioned earlier that he had written some songs. He also has taken Psalms and put those verses to music to praise God. He teaches and encourages all the youth that want to learn, to play an instrument and contribute to worship with their talents. Tokna recently bought a used bass guitar to add to the acoustic guitars, tro (Cambodian fiddle), drums and jambe.
The group was very excited to learn from Luke about music theory, scales and cord progressions. When those trainings were in progress there were typically 6-12 folks sitting around soaking up the information. After the service on Sunday, Luke put on a guitar maintenance and repair lesson. The group was very excited for that as no one had ever told them about the techniques and methods to keep their instruments in good working order. It’s hard for them to get on YouTube as there is only 2G service on Metfone in Jamka Jake and that is only if you are standing in the right location. Service is better in Thmor Bang about 20 minutes away.
A couple of stories Tokna told of spiritual encounters:
Tokna went to Bonlie Village and Smeun had been coming to the meetings in that village but had not yet believed. On her way home one night she felt heavy pressure in the back of her neck and it was unbearable. She asked that the local shaman relieve her of this persecution. As he prayed over her, the pressure became worse. He dripped candle wax on the back of her neck to cause the spirit to leave. She was told to take off her protective charm belt that was supposed to protect her from the spirits. It was soaked in gas and was attempted to be burned, but it wouldn’t light. She called off the meeting and went out and asked God to help her. God did help her and the spirit left. The family wanted her to have the local shaman help her again, but she said she believed in God and did not need or want his help. People in the village thought they saw Smeun’s body without a head and they were scared. Smeun had heard the passage in the Bible where it says if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. She said that because she now believed that God had given her a new head!
There was a man that was a believer that died and the family did a Buddhist ceremony. When they went to burn the body the ritual ceremony of the Buddhists could not get it to burn. They called the Christians to come and help. The believers came and prayed over the body of their fellow believer before they tried to cremate it. Tokna opened his eyes and saw a blue flame encircling the body. He did not believe what he saw so he closed his eyes and opened them again. He saw the same thing. A third time he looked and saw the same flame. He prodded the other people praying there and they saw the flame as well. While they were praying the local shamans are cursing and harassing them . One by one the shamans slip away so that there are just a few left. One of the shamans that is left then puts a knife on the back of Tokna’s neck and said that if the body did not burn he would die, but he is not afraid and keeps on praying. They ask that fire come and consume the body like it did for the altar of Elijah. And the fire came and burned the body. Then it started raining just in that small area where the service was being held around the body, but the fire burned to the finish and was not put out by the rain. This was a strong testimony in that village.
Tokna said that one of his biggest detractors are folks from the Kampong Som Bible school. He said that the leaders don’t believe in the demons and their activities in the world today.
God has given amazing gifts that he is using very effectively in Tokna’s life. He knows the word well and uses it in application to situations and conversations. He is very humble and teachable and willing to pass on lessons and encouragement to others. He wants others to succeed and grow in their faith. When a Katydid/Grasshopper flew into the room it was not a distraction, but became a lesson where he quoted out of Revelation and Exodus about locusts and how even the deep green color reminded him of new life. I felt very blessed to be able to spend time with him and hear his testimony and experiences.
They received a well in Feb 2020 from CBN. The wells were distributed throughout the village at a rate of 1 for every 15 families.
We left Monday morning and Dennis headed back to Kompot around by Ream National Park after splitting off from us when we hit Natl Hwy 4. We found the new road to PP from Kampong Som and rode on that as much as we could to get back to town.
It was very encouraging to see faith in action in Jamka Jake and the folks there are faithful to the spread of the gospel, know the Word, make disciples, create praise and worship. God is truly faithful, active and powerful in this village and I pray it spreads through the kingdom.