Og-okhod Bible Storytelling Festival

At the end of June, a team from Australia joined us at YWAM Mountain Province for the Og-okhod Bible Storytelling Festival which was held from July 6 to July 15.

The Og-okhod Bible Storytelling Festival was facilitated by three teams working together: the Core OneStory Project team from Mountain Province, the Australian Og-okhod Short-term Mission Team, and the Northern Philippines Mother Tongue Translators Association (NPMTTA). The team was divided into two groups. One group was dedicated to each of the target communities, Sadanga and Sacasacan.

At the beginning of the festival, the team was expecting the people to be tired from their work during the day to bring in the rice harvest. But they were excited to see how the people not only stayed awake but engaged in the stories throughout the festival. In fact, the nightly attendance grew from about 20 the first night to 50-60 adults and about 120 children in both Sadanga and Sacasacan by the end of the festival.
During the ten days in the villages there were many activities. Each afternoon the teams would visit people; building relationships, praying for them, telling the stories, and inviting them to come to the evening program where the stories would be retold. In the evening program, the stories were dramatized with songs. At the same time, people from each community were trained to tell the story and practiced so that they could share the story at the evening program. After the evening program, all who attended processed the meaning and implications of the stories in small groups and worked to memorize the stories. At the end of the festival, those who memorized 5 stories were awarded a t-shirt and a Bible for their hard work.

The Australian team supported the local team members by, among other things, serving meals, cleaning, and serving coffee and pandesal (a type of roll) each night. This allowed the local team members to share the stories in the tribal dialects. Many of the team became ill during their time in Sacasacan and Sadanga. But they worked through their illness to share the stories.

The Sacasacan group had to hike to and from Sadanga each day. That meant a 45 minute hike each night in the dark, and usually in the rain. One team member, Jason, made the trip several times a day as he brought the pandesal from a bakery in Sadanga to the team in Sacasacan then returned for the evening activities in Sadanga. Of course, he then had to return with the team later each night.

At the conclusion of the festival, a celebration was hosted. A fantastic meal of pork and chicken was served with all of the people of the community. The people from both villages remarked about how good it was to have believers from so many denominations and backgrounds coming together to share the Word of God. They are eager for the next festival so they can enjoy the stories and fellowship once again.