Woodie's Battle with the Wooden Idol

       I've heard it said that Ghana is "mission lite" where they play Christian music in the shops, and all the businesses have Godly names". In Accra, that's true, it's a nice place to visit, but I wonder if the people who say these things have ever been to the Volta region. In places like Addidome, and New Bakpa, it is very dark and oppressive - where witches hold nightly rituals including the occasional human sacrifice, and the local witch doctor has a demonically possessed woman as his watchdog sitting on a bench at the entrance to his house, and there have been several attempts on the missionary's life over the years. (Does that sound "lite"?) That is the setting of this story.

baubau tree

       It is the story of the battle to remove a wooden Idol in Ghana and in its place erect an altar to the Lord God - The idol - a very large baubau tree that was the meeting place of a group of witches for 100's of years. I'll begin this story with the day my missionary friend, Sharon was walking by a vacant lot and heard God say that she was to buy the property and build a centre for seniors. Since the property was not for sale, she just filed that one away, until 10 years later she was walking by the same property and heard God again say that she was to buy that property and build a center for seniors. This time the whole thing made more sense as she was now ministering to and feeding a group of seniors daily in a rented facility a ways across the village. Again she checked into the availability of the land and found that it was now for sale, so she put a conditional offer on the property - the "witch tree" had to be removed. Now baubau trees are not considered useful by most people, but there are some who think they have supernatural powers. This stems from the fact that during the wars of the 19th and early 20th centuries men who took refuge behind these trees were not harmed by bullets, bombs, or grenades because the trees are huge and the trunks are loose bands of cellulose with large quantities of water between, - it's a bit like the stepped armor on tanks and can absorb much damage and concussion without much harm to the tree and none to the men behind it. In the minds of the soldiers they were magic trees, and in that part of the world such beliefs soon lead to worship of whatever possesses that kind of power - hence the witches gathering around that particular tree. The owner hired a couple of guys to cut it down, but they had barely begun work when the police arrived and arrested one of the men (the other ran away) and locked him up. While he was in jail, he died, and the district counsel met and declared the tree a "heritage tree", so the owner's hands were tied. He tried to poison the tree thinking it would wither and die in a few days, but much to his astonishment that action was met by new green growth on the tree a thing unheard of during the dry season, so it became clear that this was to be a battleground between spiritual forces for mastery over the region, and perhaps the country. This was war, and both sides marshaled their forces! Sharon told many people both friends in Ghana and in North America about the impending battle and a period of fasting and prayer ensued. The mission was simple - remove the wooden idol and in its place erect an altar to God. Some fasted a few days, some for 40, prayers went up before God day and night, and many had visions of the tree lying on the ground split by a lightning bolt, but in the end it was not quite so dramatic. The day that Sharon was to leave to come back to Canada on her annual fundraising trip, there was a tremendous crash, the ground shook, and the power went out. No earthquake, no lightning, no wind - the tree simply fell over - pulling the roots out of the ground, and took out the power lines when it fell across the road so that the district had to foot the bill for much of its removal. There was another similar tree in another part of the village that also fell over, so there was a great uproar among the witches - they wanted revenge, and knew the missionary was responsible, but she was gone - safely on her way to the other side of the world for a couple of months. Meanwhile on this side of the globe a small band had been busily raising funds to build the pavilion, and were preparing to go in May to put the roof on the seniors pavilion. As time went on it became clear that we would be removing the tree, not putting on a roof - it seemed that a catalyst was needed to get the project off the ground (pun intended), so 4 brave souls headed for Ghana 2 to teach in the bible school, and 2 to remove the tree. 

This a picture of the tree as it looked after we cleaned up the junk that was lying around it - as you can see the road is still partially blocked. All of the wood that had been cut up was still piled around it along the road, and it took the first 2 days to clean up the mess before we could get near the tree to start cutting it. We took a small chainsaw along with us that was donated for trimming at the mission compound. It was suitable for cutting anything up to about 30"  in diameter, but it definitely was too small for this behemoth. When we had finished cutting and removing everything we could with the saw we had brought, we prayed and asked God to send is a bigger saw. Within about 15 minutes a guy showed up and said that he had been wanting to have that tree

removed for a long time, so if he could help us, just say the word. We

asked if he knew anyone who owned a large chainsaw, and he said that he did and would go and get him. While he was gone we went to vist our Israeli friends on the road crew to see if they had a saw - they did not but sent us to the local carpenter's shop to talk to his partner, a man who owned a chainsaw and made his living cutting trees. When we got to the shop - a structure of poles with a thatched roof, no hydro, and no tool in the place that had been made after about 1900 Thomas (the saw operator) was not there but the carpenter whipped out his flip top cell phone and called him. It turned out that Thomas was about 20 miles out in the bush, but said he would meet us at the tree in an hour or so. Having accomplished what we set out to do, we headed back to the tree, and the other guy was waiting for us with his friend and a big Stilh saw. We figured we had hit the jackpot, but this saw would not start, so I had a look at it and concluded that I needed a flywheel puller to fix it (it was an electrical problem - no spark). I told them it was no good to me like that, so get it fixed and come back. They replied that they knew a mechanic who could fix it, but he was 8 miles away, and they did not have a vehicle, so we took them there in the van and they gotm the saw fixed. At that point they wanted us to rent their saw for the entire job, but I only wanted it for 2 days, starting tomorrow, since they didn't have money to pay for the ride to the mechanic's shop. They didn't like this much, but they needed money to pay the mechanic, so we agreed on $40 Ghana CD (about $35 Canadian) for the rental. About that time Thomas showed up and more negotiations ensued.  



Thomas with his saw - Wisdom looking on



We agreed that he would work for food, $40CD now and a gift that we would send over with Jill in August. By now it was about 2:30 pm and it began to pour rain.The torrent lasted for about 45 minutes, then the sun came out again and it  began to dry up almost immediately, except that the road was a mess for the next 2 days. We decided to cut a bit just to try out the saw, and since that went well, we started in on the limbs. At about

5:30 Thomas reached down to move a piece of wood that  had almost cut through and was stung by a scorpion on his hand. He immediately began to feel pain up his arm, and Wisdom did some sort of first aid on him. It did not help, and he started walking down the road heading for home. At that point Kerry said "Hey pastor Fred stop him, we need to pray for him" so the 3 of us gathered around Thomas laid hands on him and prayed. We had learned to pray things like "God we have a problem here" then define the problem and ask for a solution to the problem (kind of like astronauts talking to mission control), so I just followed that format then listened for a response. I immediately received "draw out the pain" so I took authority and by faith pulled the pain out of his body the way it went in. To his astonishment he could feel the pain go out of his body, and when I was finished praying he had no trace of it left. We sent our tractor operator to take him home, since the van would not make it down his road after the rain. The following day, neither he nor our tractor driver had showed up for work, so we started working without them. We did not realize that it was a holiday for them until some revelers came by and asked us why we were working. By now everyone knew that Thomas had been stung by the scorpion, and the foreman from the road crew came by to ask how he was doing. He said he would probably be in excruciating pain for a couple of days, and may not make it back to work for the rest of the week. He was concerned that we were not checking on him to see how he was doing, but we explained that we didn't know where he lived nor did we have a cell phone, and our tractor operator hadn't come back. After he left we went back to work - that was the most temperamental saw I have ever seen. First it wouldn't run, then this bird dived at me and the chain fell off, then the saw wouldn't start again. We were having all manner of troubles, had no help and had gotten nothing done, so out of frustration we took the saw to the bible college interrupted the class and asked them to pray over the saw, and to intercede for the warfare that we were experiencing. When we finished, we headed back to the tree, and just as we arrived, Thomas rode up on his bicycle ready to start work. He said he was fine that he had no pain during the night and he was ready to work, but that we had to pray for him first before he would pick up the saw. So we laughed and prayed for him that day, and every day thereafter, then I gave him a pair of chainsaw operator's gloves and asked that he wear them to protect his hands from any other things.

 We started in cutting blocks off the top of the log, peeling it away a layer at a time, working from the bed of the farm wagon, or standing on top of the tree. It is worth noting at this point that we had no further problems with the chainsaw, it started first pull and aside from needing sharpening a couple of times, cut great the rest of the day. The next couple of days we worked steadily peeling away block after block, only stopping for food, water & sleep for the men, and gas, oil, & sharpening for the saw. Everything was going well and the job got steadily smaller. At that point we had used up the rental on that saw and it was time for Thomas to bring his saw to the site. That was when the difficulties began. His saw was much older, and was a breakdown looking for a place to happen. The chain was so worn that it was almost impossible to keep it on the bar, but somehow we managed to get through half the day before it broke. To add to the problem, there were pools of water on top of the tree from the rain a couple of days earlier, and when we cut into them there was water everywhere. In one spot we cut into the log and water poured out of it for 2 or 3 minutes. Thomas was drenched in some very warm and slimey water. At that point we had to have 2 men on the saw - one to run the saw, the other to pump the chain oiler. We soon ran out of oil, and had to scrounge the village for used motor oil for chain lube. (new 30 wt oil cost $4.75CD a quart - too much to use in the oiler - we went through a few gallons of it) We decided that we needed a new chain, and ordered one from Ho (about 3 hours away) It would come in by bus the next day, so we had a couple of hours to clear space around the tree. About 4pm there was anothe storm brewing, but this time with no tarps to cover the tree, and with the problems associated with cutting this wood wet,

I decided that we had a problem, and told God so. As the storm approached, I was praying, and moving blocks with a steel pry bar. I had a vision of Gandolf in the Lord of the rings standing on the stone bridge with his staff driving it into the stone and calling out "you shall not pass" and in an instant drove the bar into the tree and spread my arms saying to the storm to pass right and left but not on the tree or on the road. To my astonishment the rain came down in torrents about 50 feet to the right ( clear of the road), and about 50 feet to the left, but there was only a light sprinkle on the tree for about 30 seconds. You must understand that I had never seen anything like this level of answer to prayers before in my life. Nothing had prepared me for the things that I was experiencing, but I knew that I had a mission to  accomplish, and anything that kept me from it was not my problem, it was God's, so I simply asked him to deal with it. He obviously wanted us to get this job done, because everything we asked in connection with the tree, He did. It was that same evening that we got the news from one of the bible school students that a woman had been found on the other side of the village writhing on the ground and babbling about all of the crimes she had committed as one of the witches. She was arrested, and as we continued to peel away layer after layer of the tree, more witches were exposed. We were sheduled to go to the coast to minister to the orphans for the weekend, so we left the tree at about this stage 

Come Monday morning we were back on the job, and  with a little help from our friends on the Israeli road crew we were able to clean up all of the blocks laying around in about an hour to give us some room to work. It is very clear how massive this tree was seeing Thomas standing on top of it (orange coveralls), and that payloader is about 12 feet high. Once we got to the stage where the top layers were removed we started to cut part way through pieces of the tree about 6' x 6' x 4' thick, then the loader would break them off and carry them away. With this kind of help the rate of work accelerated rapidly. What we had estimated would take until Saturday was actually accomplished by days end on Wednesday. This is the last piece that we had him roll over so we could cut through the bark side. THis was also the day that the construction crew began to lay the foundation for the pavillion.

We finished the tree removal that day, but there was a surprise waiting for us the following day. That day the bible students were supposed to go to the hospital to minister and distribute fruit to the patients. In one of the wards was a bed with a sheet draped over a body. One of the students asked who had died, and was told the man's name, and that he had died earlier that morning. He appeared visibly shaken and when asked what was wrong, he said that the man was the leader of the witches. The war was over, and there was no question - God had won. Mission accomplished!