Orang Asli Mission

I spent a few days with the Revd Lizune, who is pastor of Shalom Anglican Church in Gopeng.  Shalom Church has a special ministry amongst the Orang Asli, and as well as Shalom Church in Gopeng, they have churches in twelve Orang Asli villages situated in the jungle.  In addition Shalom Church has a mission amongst villages over four hours from Gopeng, up unmade jungle roads, and he also at the request of the Anglican Church in Batu Gajah started a new Malay service on a Sunday evening.

Shalom Church in Gopeng - meeting in a converted shop unit

With such a large area to cover, Lizune is assisted by Orang Asli lay pastors, who live in the villages, and look after several churches each.  As the only ordained priest, Revd Lizune visits a different village each week to conduct communion services. 

Typical Orang Asli village

This ministry amongst the Orang Asli was started by Bishop Moon Hing when he was priest at St Peter's Church in Ipoh, and St Peter's continues to provide financial support for this ministry.

Pastor Lizune talking to a villager

In addition to Sunday services, on Wednesday evening's they hold prayer and worship services in the various villages, and on Friday's the cell groups meet.

Cell group meeting

The only way to access many of these villages is with use of a 4x4, as the roads widening up through the jungle are narrow and at times steep.  Although the preferred mode of transport for the Orang Asli themselves is by moped.  It's common to see three or even four people on the back of a moped, and the wearing of helmets is very much optional, especially for children!  

Preferred mode of transport for the whole family!

Some of these villages are very remote, one village we visited had no direct road access, and so the only way to reach it was by walking twenty minutes through the jungle along a small track.  

The only way to access some villages is by foot

In many of the villages churches have been constructed (I gather with money from Korea), and where no church exists, the members meet in one of the houses.  The majority of the Orang Asli prefer to live in their traditional bamboo houses.  The government are building new houses for the Orang Asli, but I'm told many of them prefer their traditional style houses because they are cooler.  

This house is used as the church meeting place.  The couple who live here want to give this house to the church, and construct a new home in the village.  The man seated on my right is aged 90 or 100.  He couldn't remember is actual year of birth, but was 20 or 30 when the Japanese invade Malaysia in 1942.

As well as visiting a number of Orang Asli villages, I also have the opportunity to attend a prayer and praise service in one of the villages.  It started with a worship song, followed by a short talk based on a Bible reading, before moving into a time of extended worship, where people started praying in the spirit.  The sense of God's presence in that church was incredibly strong, as everyone lifted their voices together in prayer and praise.  The people were also divided into groups and given topics to pray for, and they also offered pray for healing for those who needed it.  The sense of deep love and devotion to God was obvious to see.

I also got the opportunity to attend a cell group meeting in one of the villages.  Again there was a time of worship, followed by prayer and then sharing.  At the end of the meeting there was the obligatory meal!

Orang Asli village church

The impression I got from my brief visit to Shalom Church and the Orang Asli is that the church has a very strong and vibrant presence, and although not all the Orang Asli are Christian's, many clearly are.  It was a great honour and privilege of being able to experience their worship and sense the power and presence of God at work in these jungle villages.  It was also encouraging to see Orang Asli villagers being equipped and trained for ministry, and taken on leadership roles within the church.   

Worship at St Peter's Ipoh

St Peter's is unmistakably charismatic evangelical in it's worship, and provides quite a contrast from the more traditional Anglican worship that I experienced at St Barnabas in Klang.  

There are four different congregations that meet at St Peter's, based around various languages, English, Cantonese, Mandarin (which meet on Saturday) and Malay. Altogether the combined attendance at these four services averages around 400 plus, with the English and Malay services attracting the largest congregations - closely followed by the Cantonese service.  The worship is very modern, and very contemporary.  The English service begins at 9am, and starts with between 30 to 40 minutes of band led worship.  One of the worship leaders is an extremely talented 19 year old called Joshua Loo, whose passion and zeal for God is amazing to behold.

After a time of worship, they move into a time of intercession. This however is not the the quiet style of prayer that you'd find in most Anglican churches, but very passionate, praise and worship, usually leading into a time of praying in the spirit (in tongues), and with everyone praying allowed together.  More worship often follows, before the congregation say together the collect and then a simple declaration of faith before the Bible readings are read.  This is then followed by the sermon which generally lasts around 45 minutes, and often is followed by a time for more ministry.

If it is a communion service, communion is celebrated before the talk.

In addition to the congregations that worship at St Peter's, St Peter's has planted various churches around Ipoh and beyond.  These include Shalom Church (in Gopeng), Shekinah Church, Agape Church, Hallelujah Church and Charis Church. Attendance at these churches along with St Peter's is between 550 to 670 people per week.  

What is most striking about the churches I've visited in Malaysia, is how many of them have planted new churches.  Whereas church planting amongst the Anglican Churches in the UK, seems to be still fairly rare, and only undertaken by the very large Anglican churches, in Malaysia church planting seems a very natural thing to do.  In addition the church plants soon seem to be planting churches of their own.  For example originally St Peter's was a church plant of St John's Ipoh, but has now planted many churches of its own (and in size has outgrown its mother church).