{"id":82,"date":"2009-10-01T08:47:17","date_gmt":"2009-10-01T15:47:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/?p=82"},"modified":"2009-11-06T15:29:51","modified_gmt":"2009-11-06T22:29:51","slug":"dining-with-heroes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/2009\/10\/01\/dining-with-heroes\/","title":{"rendered":"Dining with Heroes"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Our
Our dinner guest: Fergusons, Burnhams, Rasmussens<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tuesday night we were privileged to dine with some of our heroes, men and women who have served the Lord for most of their adult lives and who now at retirement age, rather than sitting back and letting the younger generation do \u201cthe Work of the Gospel,\u201d continue to serve tirelessly as the Lord enables them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Paul and Oreta Burnham<\/strong> arrived in the Philippines in May 1970.\u00a0 Because of their 39 years of faithful ministry, there is a thriving church in the Ibaloi tribe today.\u00a0 Burnhams raised their five children in the tribe and later four of those children and their spouses returned to the mission field to continue their parents’ legacy.\u00a0 Martin, their oldest son, gave his life for his Lord after he and Gracia were \u00a0taken by insurgents\u00a0in 2001.\u00a0 During that year long ordeal, Paul and Oreta parented Martin\u2019s three children back in the US, providing physical and emotional support to the family.\u00a0 Although officially retired from New Tribes Mission, Paul and Oreta continue to make trips to the Philippines to assist in the translation of the Bible into the Ibaloi language and to reconnect with the believers\u00a0 When they are in the US, they provide encouragement and a place to stay when any of their 23 grandchildren needs them.\u00a0 We have been friends with the Burnham family since our own years in the Philippines and were delighted when we heard that they were coming to visit.\u00a0 They wanted to see the three families in McNeal whom they knew from the Philippines and what better way to accomplish that than to get together for a Filipino dinner?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jim and Edna Ferguson<\/strong> are retired from NTMA and live here in McNeal.\u00a0 Before becoming a missionary, Jim was a crop duster pilot to support his family.\u00a0 After joining New Tribes Mission, he and Forest Estelle, another\u00a0pilot, were challenged to start a flight program to provide air support for missionaries serving in tribal locations around the world.\u00a0 They purchased their first airplane in 1969 and based it out of Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 From July 1972 to April 1976, Jim served as the pilot forthe flight program on the island of Luzon in the Philippines.\u00a0\u00a0 He and Edna served Paul and Oreta by providing aviation service into and out of the Ibaloi tribe.\u00a0 Upon returning to the U.S., Fergusons continued to serve in leadership roles with Tribal Air\/Communication (which later became known as NTM Aviation) in Grant, Nebraska and then McNeal, Arizona until their retirement in April 2002.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Monty and Kathie Rasmussen<\/strong> were challenged by Lee German to go to the island of Palawan in the Philippines to serve our tribal missionaries there.\u00a0 They first arrived on the field in November 1970 with their four children and served on both Palawan and Luzon until they were relocated to McNeal in 1986.\u00a0 Martin Burnham flew in and out of the tribe for years in Monty\u2019s plane and claims that it was Monty\u2019s example that challenged him to become a missionary pilot.\u00a0 We met Monty and Kathie in May of 1982 when we first arrived in the Philippines.\u00a0 They have been dear friends and close associates ever since and we praise the Lord every day for their example in our lives.\u00a0 Although they are at retirement age, Monty continues to work part time in our engine shop and Kathie and I co- teach the student ladies class every Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n

\u00a0As we sat around the dinner table and listened to these six reminisce about the early days, laughter sporadically erupted from the group, and we caught a glimpse of what it will be like in glory when we sit at the marriage supper of the lamb and feast with all those who have come before us in the faith.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As I thought of our time together the words of Steve Green\u2019s song \u201cFind Us Faithful\u201d kept running through my mind:<\/p>\n

We’re pilgrims on a journey of a narrow road, and those who’ve gone before us line the way,
\nCheering on the faithful, encouraging the weary,\u00a0 their lives a stirring testament of God’s sustaining grace.<\/em><\/p>\n

Surrounded by so great a crowd of witnesses,\u00a0 let us run the race not only for the prize
\nBut as those who’ve gone before us, let us leave to those to those behind us,
\nThe heritage of faithfulness passed on through Godly lives.<\/em><\/p>\n

Chorus:
\nOh may all who come behind us find us faithful.\u00a0 May the fire of our devotion light their way.\u00a0
\nMay the footprints that we leave, lead them to believe, and the lives we lead inspire them to obey.
\nOh may all who come behind us find us faithful.<\/em><\/p>\n

After all our hopes and dreams have come and gone, and our children sift through all we’ve left behind,
\nMay the clues that they discover, and the memories they uncover,<\/em><\/p>\n

Become the light that leads them to the road we each must find.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0May God find us all faithful!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tuesday night we were privileged to dine with some of our heroes, men and women who have served the Lord for most of their adult lives and who now at retirement age, rather than sitting back and letting the younger generation do \u201cthe Work of the Gospel,\u201d continue to serve tirelessly as the Lord enables them. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-82","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-ministry","7":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/phil-koop\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}