WHY ARE UNREACHED PEOPLE GROUPS SO HARD TO REACH? by Patrick R. Anderson

Essays by Pat

The focus of CBF's missionary work among "unreached people groups" has left me with a nagging question: Why are unreached peoples unreached? What has happened to make them so immune from the Gospel, so hostile to its messengers, so separated from God's love? Recent trips and readings have helped me gain some understanding. The history is bleak, especially in Indonesia.

Hundreds of years ago Islam came to Indonesia through the trade process on merchant ships. The representatives of Islam treated the Indonesians as equals and as trading partners. Since the early trading partners were predominantly Islamic, Arabs and Turks coming by way of India, the village merchants were susceptible to the faith and lifestyle.

In the 15th century Islam was growing fast in Indonesia, even while it also spread from Turkey to Hungary, Egypt, and Mesopotamia. Spain and Portugal helped slow the invasion in Europe, and for their reward the Pope gave the kings "the world beyond Europe," as though it were his to give. The two seafaring powers eagerly sought to conquer worlds across the oceans and sailed to Indonesia with priest-missionaries on board to convert any heathens they encountered.

The Portuguese brought and arrogant attitude and superior firepower to the region, and trade was not to be peaceful for hundreds of years after their arrival. They met animosity from the Indonesian, Arab, Indian and Chinese traders due to the fact that these foreigners in their ships from faraway lands did not hesitate to use violence to get what they wanted.

The fact that the newcomers also called themselves Christians, the traditional enemies of the Muslims, brought about sure conflict for both economic and religious reasons. Christianity was identified as the religion of the warlike colonizers from distant and strange lands, whereas Islam was the religion of the majority of the Indonesian people.

In 1511 the Portuguese began a perpetual state of sporadic warfare with island kingdoms throughout the region. The history of the next 350 years is characterized by atrocities, pogroms and devastation. The Portuguese came more to spoil, loot, and amass personal fortunes than to conduct trade. They certainly were not messengers from Jesus.

The Dutch ships arrived in 1596 after a 13-month voyage around the tip of Africa. They were ready to fight after a protracted war with Spain and were very well equipped. They defeated the Portuguese finally in 1605, although the Portuguese continued to be a factor in the region. After the Dutch defeated Spain and dislodged them from the islands in 1677, the Portuguese and Spanish Catholic missionary enterprises came to a halt. The Dutch East India Company ordered the people who had been converted by the Catholics to be inducted into the Dutch Reformed Church.

Missionaries of the Calvinist Dutch Reformed Church accompanied the invaders, and often walked behind the marching Dutch soldiers in their effort to expand Dutch domination of the region. Sometimes they went before the armies, first trying to convert the population and then the army would come in and conquer. In either case, the locals came to view the Reformed Christian missionaries as accomplices of colonial power. There is no record of the church condemning the cruel and inhuman practices of the Dutch East Indies Company or the Dutch government, and few examples of greater cruelty and inhumanity are found in history.

The Dutch colonizers brought an arrogant kind of confidence in the righteousness of their actions. They had the firm belief that they were the chosen people of God, a belief based in a strict Calvinist theology.

Hostilities with the local Indonesians erupted quickly. The Dutch insisted on monopolies of trade, control of the seas, and when the Indonesians violated those ideas canons would roar and cities would be destroyed. The various island kingdoms were constantly caught between the Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, and later the English invaders. If they traded with one, the others would punish them terribly.

The first wave of ships met devastating losses, but the much-valued spices were worth any price to the Dutch invaders. Only 89 of the 248 men who left Holland survived, but the value of the cargo was staggering. The next flotilla of ships brought a great many more soldiers and more armament. The spice trade in pepper, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and a host of other valuable commodities made many Dutch traders extremely wealthy.

The Dutch saw the Indonesians as unbelievers, and as such were enemies of both God and the Dutch who were chosen by God. Calvinist missionaries were employees of the Company, and any person converting from Christianity to Islam suffered death. They were fully comforted by the belief that God was on their side and that the Dutch East Indies Company was his instrument. The spirit of Dutch expansion in Indonesia was a spirit of ruthlessness and violence. In one celebrated battle in 1621, no fewer than 15,000 Indonesians were killed. The Dutch took 40 chiefs who had surrendered to a ship, had them decapitated by Japanese mercenaries and then quartered their bodies. The Company sent warships to destroy ports and villages, and slaughtered any people violating the monopoly by selling spices to other traders. Whole islands were devastated and impoverished. For instance, in anger over the sale of spices to competitors, the Dutch burned all the nutmeg trees on the Moluccan Islands, leaving not a single tree nor any source of income for the entire population. The Moluccans are an economically deprived backwater in Indonesia even today.

Many islands were drowned in blood. Entire cultures, peoples, communities and sources of income destroyed. The stories of atrocities are many.

The Indonesians, for their part, being new converts to Islam, and full of the messianic spirit, gave no quarter. They dished out as much violence and cruelty as they received at the hands of the Calvinists. The Dutch Calvinists believed they were right, and the Indonesian Muslims had an equally strong belief they were serving the only true god, Allah, and fighting the infidels was part of the calling. Many of the Indonesian people groups refused to bow to Dutch power, and took their boats to the sea to roam around the archipelago to upset trading and sink or capture Dutch ships. The Dutch called them "sea pirates," but for the Indonesians this was their form of warfare against the invaders.

During the 18th and 19th centuries the Dutch moved inland from the ports in an attempt to monopolize every aspect of the economic life of Indonesia. Coffee and tea plantations were planted, and villages were given quotas for rice and other foods to be delivered to the Dutch without payment. The Dutch learned to appreciate the skill of Chinese businessmen as middlemen. They organized special voyages to the coastal towns and villages of China to recruit businessmen, and sometimes they kidnapped them and brought them to Indonesia under duress.

When some Chinese rebelled in 1740 the Dutch killed more than 10,000 in just three days, leaving the bodies throughout the city of Batavia.

The Dutch created a perfect situation for the ruthless exploitation of the entire Indonesian people by Company representatives. They lived in luxury and were waited on by slaves and servants. The Dutch women lived as nobles. They lived apart from the Indonesian people, not caring for the common people at all and only giving lip service to their relationships with the sultans and kings. The few preachers of the Calvinist Dutch Reformed Church likewise lived apart from the people, and local tales of missionary/plantation ruler sexual rape and promiscuity with the villagers are still heard today. Christianity became identified with sex and greed.

Now, 60 years after the end of Dutch domination in the region, the legacy of Christianity as expressed by Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch "Christians" has inoculated large segments of the population against the message of Christ. I can understand how most of the hundreds of people groups residing in the archipelago are "unreached people groups," untouched by the Gospel, and often hostile to it. They are unreached and hostile for some very good reasons. Many of those reasons can be laid at the feet of so-called Christians.