The rain beat down on the corrugated tin roof so loudly that the small group of Yanowamo believers sat close to hear. We were deep in the Venezuelan Amazon, having a church leaders meeting. several of these men had walked more than two miles through the jungle in the rain.

All of us were sitting in the open, under a big tin roof. as I taught the wind and rain with an occasional clap of thunder were giving me competition. we spoke even louder!

My first lesson that morning was on partiality; that God is not partial and as Christians we had better not be partial. I continued by placing the focus on the church meetings using as an example, the story in the book of James where the church rejected a man who was poor and dirty but embraced the man who was rich and clean. The Bible teaches clearly that we should not reject the poor from our meetings. everyone was listening closely. Several Indians were standing by two small fires to keep warm.

After a short break I was just starting into the second lesson on persecution when Simun, a new tribes missionary who was translating for me, said, "There seems to be someone important coming." Neither of us could see anyone coming so I continued. in a few minutes several men left the meeting and walked tword a small shed a short distance away. It seems that everyone knew that Philip was huddled and almost hidden in that little shed. he was sitting there wet, cold and shivering. He was listening but couldn't hear a thing.

Philip was a person that the community and even the christians rejected. To his village he was of no value. He was dirty, thin, rather ugly, almost deaf and could not speak well. He wasn't even classified as being a man.

He had come about as close to the meeting as he felt he could.

He wanted to be included ... but he was Philip, the worthless one.

You see Philip had no wife, no garden and he couldn't hunt. Why would anyone want Philip? So they all avoided him, even the Christians.

Now here was Philip. Trying to hear what was being said.

We were actually watching the lesson I taught earlier being learned and played out by the Christians there in Parima, as several of the believers walked over to the little shed and invited Philip, cold and wet, to join the meeting. He left the shed, came and stood by a pole for a few minutes and then came in under the tin roof and warmed himself by the fire as we continued with the teaching.

It was our last day with the leaders of the Yanowamo church at Parima and they had planned a potluck in our honor. (An Indian type pot-luck)

We were happy to see that Philip was included in the distribution of the food even though he brought nothing.

It's a thrill to teach these simple people living in the Amazon mountains of Venezuela who humbly believe the teaching of their Bible.