Monday, June 22, 2009
+ Enlarge this imagePastor Inia Rokovosa, left, with CMF missionary couple Metuisela Cinavou and wife Susu.
FOR the love of God, a young missionary couple ate deep-fried spiders and fried frogs so that their work in spreading the Gospel of Jesus reached the hearts of the people of Cambodia.
Reaching out to a population of about 15 million in an area where Christian worship is restricted has been a challenge for Pastor Metui Cinavou and his wife Susu for the past four years.
The couple are missionaries of the Christian Mission Fellowship and are based in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh, where they hold underground church services.
Describing the change in culture and food, Mrs Cinavou said it was a part of life they had to accept in order to get God's message across to the Cambodians.
"We have to accept their way of living and eat what they eat and live like them so that we can have an understanding.
"We also eat their normal menu of mile-a-minute soup and banana stalk soup that we have fallen in love with."
One of the most challenging elements of their missionary work is the restriction of Christian worship.
Mr Cinavou said that on two occasions a church service they organised inside their camp with a group of Cambodian converts was stopped by police officers.
"They heard us singing songs of praise and came to ask us to go underground to worship. Since then, we have our church services underground because Cambodia is a Buddhist nation," Mr Cinavou said.
But the couple has not been disheartened by the limited freedom and continue to spread the Gospel. The poverty in the city is worse than in Fiji.
"People live near rubbish dumps and that is where we go to as part of our missionary work," Mrs Cinavou said. "One family we visited had a single mother with three children aged between one and three years old.
"At times she leaves them alone at home to look for food in the rubbish dump.
"Poverty in Fiji is nothing compared to what we saw in Cambodia.
"People here are blessed to at least survive with what little they have," she said.
The couple have been in Fiji from last month and will return to Cambodia next week to continue their work of faith.
1 comment:
we should make them eat prahok and dog meat and durian too.this is how we promote khmer food just like them trying to promote chritian. how about that?????!!!!! and let them find food among the garbage dumb also. how about that?????!!!!! hay this is what some khmer do,right?????!!!!etc,etc...........
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