It was Holy Week in Guatemala, and we had just finished dubbing a
portion of the Jesus Film, intending to show the Mam people the death
and resurrection scene in their own language. Following a synchronistic
religion of Catholicism mixed with animism, most of the Mam Indians
knew that Jesus died, but they had never thought of him as resurrected
and alive.
We drove out to a village down a bumpy unpaved road, carrying a large video projector which was cutting edge for the late 1980s. It was the huge kind (imported from the U.S.) commonly used in bars. Unlike the tiny ones of today that fit in the palm of your hand, it was a large box with three lights that converged.
Five hundred Mam speakers were waiting to see the very first movie ever to be shown in their own dialect. People were everywhere. Anticipation was high. I plugged the video projector in just like always, but it wouldn't turn on. I had no owner's manual, no tools, and no idea what the problem was.
Several of the church leaders kept coming over to assure me they were praying for me and that they trusted God to help me solve the problem. Remembering that I did have a Swiss army knife in my pocket, I found a screwdriver and somehow figured out how to open the back of the projector and pull out the "mother board" where all the wires were. Right away I noticed that two wires had become unsoldered - probably from the bouncing drive to the village.
I thought to myself, "Great. No solder gun, no manual. Now what?" It could have been a very simple repair with the right equipment. Being the only American there, I was surprised to hear an almost audible voice speaking to me in English, saying, "Use your chewing gum." Okay, so presuming that was the voice of God, I took out my gum and put it on top of the wires, connecting them to the solder, and I slid the card back into the slot, closed the back of the projector, and plugged it in. It started right up!
Satan was defeated, and people's hearts were open to the truth of the gospel, and many came to the Lord that very night. There is one more part to this story. The name of that town was "La Victoria."
The victory.
(This story is obviously a throw-back from our early years on the field. Jim dictated this memory, and I typed it up almost verbatim. Jamie)
