Esther and Sunday

If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? (1 John 4:20 KJV)

Esther (not her real name) and Sunday (not his real name) are blood sister and brother, same father and same mother and both are vegetable farmers in Kundasang. Both have their families with them and had been in Sabah for for 20 years or so. Esther had been married 3 times, the two previous husbands had been divorced but she had children from them. The first husband was a Toraja, as she herself is, and being so, they married in Church. She left for Sabah to find work leaving the first husband in the kampong back in Sulawasi, Indonesia. She was in Tawau for sometime and meet up with a Bugis man, who was a Muslim, and she got married to him, embracing Islam as a convenience to get a passport and possibly a myKad. However, that marriage did not last and she left him too and meet up with present husband Aha aka Yo (not his real name)and they got married presumably in a Church. They had four children, the eldest a girl who had just turned eighteen. Based on the info provided by the President of a locally registered Toraja Church, Gereja Filadelfia  she came to a Christian Revival Meeting and was touched by the Holy Spirit.She was at the time living with another man, not her husband, and was away from him and and working for a vegetable vendor at Pekan Kundasang. After the encounter, she came back to live with her husband, Yohannes in the vegetable farm. They started a house Church in their Kongsi, without the Landowners fore knowledge, with the help of a Church worker from Indonesia under the spiritual covering of Filadelfia  Church and a work permit of a locally registered Toraja oil palm plantation venture.  Mike (not his real name), the young bible college graduate from Indonesia, effectively became the 'pastor' of this small congregation of less than 10 people meeting weekly in this small kongsi in the Kebun. Most of the Toraja in Kundasang are Christians and majority of them are vegetable farmers. They numbered around 300 families and are scattered around, from Kg.Kinasaraban to Kg.Mesilau after the Golf Club.

What is the point of this story? This story reminds us of Jesus meeting with the woman of Samaria that was recorded in Gospel of St. John, Cap 4:7 when He asked her for a cup of water. It is an interesting story, read about it and mediate on it. God may bring to you in remembrance someone you personally know in your life; be patient and slow to pass judgment and pray for them. Shalom.