Who Or What Is The Peace Child To Me?

How did Christianity change this culture?

The Sawi were a tribal people who had not been in contact with anyone outside of their microcosm. Their lives had not been altered in any way by the influences of the modern wold and they had been living as their ancestors had for hundreds of years. Their culture was one of mostly violence, distrust and also cannibalism with some superstition sprinkled on the top. At this stage all they probably cared about was either surviving or gaining pleasure, some of the primitive instincts. However they had not heard of the Word of God and they had no way of accepting Christ as their savior which meant that they were all doomed to eternity in the lake of fire.


Don Richardson and his wife Carol brought a doubled edged sword that was capable of penetrating through the thick armor of their barbaric society and finally land into their hearts. With the Word of God as his sole weapon, Don was able to convert these people who had never heard of God into strong spiritual Christians. With the help of Don, they were able to forfeit their old lifestyle and start a new one through Jesus Christ. 


The Sawi were a primitive group of people who valued treachery, feared demons and spirits, kept souvenirs of their dead adversaries and even indulged in the consuming of human flesh. This all changed when Don and Carol came into their lives. Yes, they did initially change slightly to gain favor of the foreigners but the compelling power and love of Jesus Christ brought them to a point where they left behind their old traditions and starting to practice new ones.


With the help of Christianity a whole society was able to be saved. Not only that but the Sawi went from being a cannibalistic headhunting society to a Christian society with the largest circular building made with un-milled poles in the world.

What Should We Do?

What does Jesus want us to do for the Sawi?

The Sawi were a primitive and tribal people who viewed cannibalism and betrayal as something good. What Jesus wants us to do is forget about their history and focus on their humanity. Who are we to judge someone for behaving in a particular manner, we must put aside our judgmental views and treat them as fellow humans while upholding our duties as a Christian. Jesus wants us to bring these people, who are in the dark, to the light by sharing with them the Gospel. We need to evangelize these people or else they will perish into the eternal fire that is hell. He wants us to do it because if we, Christians, do not then there is no one else who will be able to convey the fact that Jesus is our savior to them and if they don't even hear the Words then how will they be able to accept Jesus as their savior. The Sawi are fellow humans, our neighbors, and we must treat our neighbors in a manner we want to treated with. 

Also going back to the treating the Sawi like we treat ourselves, we must provide them with necessary aid such as food or medicine. These acts of kindness will melt frozen hearts that some may have and bring them into the light. Also while helping these people provides us with more believers, these people also get to live slightly easier with the help of the aid provided.

Jesus wants us to only share the Gospel with these people and if they want to accept him as Christ is their own decision. As long as we share the Gospel and make these people aware of the almighty God and his Son our duties are pretty much done. The next stage is to be a beacon of light for these people who when they look at us will start to believe that there is something different about us. We need to be role models for these people so that they can look upon us and behave like us instead of following their own barbaric traditions. 

Who Or What Is The Peace Child To Me?

How different is your modern culture form the Sawi Tenets ?

The Sawi culture and my own culture, at a first glance, seem to be completely different. The Sawi philosophy hold the tenet of treachery as one of the greatest acts a Sawi can accomplish and instead of punishment or any incarceration, the ones who pull off a spectacular treachery, by means of the 'fattening for friendship' method, actually get praised and worshiped. Another major tenet is that the Sawi must perform various acts of superstition. These rituals include smashing the skull of the victim in a place where no one else can hear or eating the brains of someone to gain their powers.

My modern culture doesn't have any of that. However, with a closer look, some similarities do rise. For one my culture does contain some irrational rituals performed solely for the sake of performing it. Take a birthday for example, we make a cake, add candles onto it and then we blow them out. Another example would be Christmas, we take a jolly fat guy, dress him up in Red and then make him give us presents. These 'rituals' are not done out of fear or any other cause except for actually doing it since we have been doing it for as long as we can remember. Maybe the Sawi perform their rituals the same way.  Also treachery has another term for it in my culture, its called survival of the fittest, in this modern world we are no better than the Sawi as we try to climb the ladder of success while throwing people off it. 

In conclusion the Sawi culture and my own are not very different. Yes, the Sawi are extremely violent and war thirsty but these wars are tiny grains of sand compared to the enormous beach which is the raging war ongoing in the Middle East. Cannibalism is also another unique aspect of the Sawi culture, being described as Head Hunters the Sawi did enjoy the flesh of another human. However there were also those who chose not to eat the flesh of another human, here in the modern culture the majority choose not to be cannibals but there are a few who do practice it. 

Who Or What Is The Peace Child To Me?

What concepts of the Sawi culture intrigued/ reviled/ saddened/ angered/ surprised you?

One of the main things that surprised me was how the Sawi took the concept of betrayal and idealized it. Their love it drove them to a point where they couldn't distinguish who the good guy was: Jesus or Judas. Their appraisal of betrayal took me aback a bit because even though the concept of betrayal was not new to me, the thrill or even the sheer amoung of enjoyment shown by the Sawi towards betraying, killing then eating someone was completely strange to me. The surprise here does not lie in the cannibalism, this is their custom and has become traditional after a betrayal, but the thought of actually spending so much time and effort into a relationship just to see it end so drastically was probably the thing that stood out the most.

Another concept that intrigued me was that of the Peace Child. The idea of the Peace Child seems very ingenius to me due to the fact that the Sawi people are a tribal people, yet they invented what is basically a treaty system. One thing that comes to mind when thinking about the Peace Child is a quote "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few". This quote traces back to the High Priest Caiaphas, from the Gospel of John, who said “You know nothing at all! You do not realize that it is better for you that one man die for the people than that the whole nation perish.” So in order to save a whole tribe the Sawi sacrificed an infant, the infant did not choose this life but in the end looking at it through a utilitarian point of view it was probably the best course of action.

What Should We Do?

What do traders and NGO's do for these cultures?

Traders probably only have one goal and that is to trade with people to make a profit. Now what could they possibly want from the Sawi? Well they did trade a single axe for a small child. The traders basically exploit the Sawi from what they have and in return give them things that they could never make for themselves, even in a thousand years. This exposure to new technology results in a huge leap in their tools consisting of stone age items to a more modern inventory. Even though the traders exploited them, they did bring forth tools that have helped the Sawi considerably.


The NGO's are similar to the traders except the NGO's have the goal of actually helping these people instead of just taking away what meagre items they might have. NGO's introduce medical aids, food, and clothing that these people might actually need. Also in the book we see that with the aid of the foreigners the Sawi actually stop head hunting in order to please them so they might trader some axes. This shows us that the NGO's are able to restore order but only because the Sawi want something from them. The relationship here is conditional unlike the ones with the missionaries.


The traders and NGO's bring forth new technology and medicine for these cultures that are necessary for life but they do not bring something that is necessary for eternal life. All they do is help the people live in this world but missionaries do this and also help them live eternally through Jesus Christ.

What Should We Do?

What do mission organization do for these people?

Mission organizations reach out to these people with aid and other necessaries to bring themselves to a position where they can be trusted and easily accepted by the people. When they reach this position the organizations start to spread the gospel and being converting these people, bringing them into Christianity.


This should be the case for every mission organization but I have seen some that only care for the support they are getting for doing something, even anything in the field. Sometimes they don't even do anything and forge evidence for the sake of getting money. I come from Nepal where there are a lot of Korean missionaries working, however only a handful actually have the welfare of the Nepalese in mind. There is one organization that claims that it is running a school for the poor children but in reality they gather up some homeless children, put them in a room and take pictures. They then send these pictures back claiming that they are indeed helping some people while they send the kids back with only a piece of bread or something less while they receive money that could actually help the kids.


However there are true missionaries who have love for people in their hearts. Don and Carol were true missionaries and were sent by their Church to preach to the Sawi and bring them to God's grace. What they did is what all mission organizations hope to do which is to shake the foundations of a society so hard that all their beliefs fall away as new foundations are set on which they can begin their lives anew. Missionaries and mission organizations have had and are having massive impacts on people wherever they go because they are able to do exactly that. Their method of establishing themselves as a benign force while helping them and winning their trust always lowers the native peoples' defenses. Then as the people lower their guard the missionaries strike with the double edged sword, the Word of God, and bring them into the light.


Without missionaries and mission organizations I would probably not be here right now writing this blog. Thanks to missionaries such as William Pettigrew and the missionaries from Darjeeling who brought Christianity to Manipur and Nepal, I am a Christian too.