May 5 – A Miracle Among Cannibals
This took place in the heart of Africa in the year 1922. Reverend H. B. Garlock and his wife, of Toms River, New Jersey, volunteered for a dangerous assignment to the Pahns who were cannibals.The Garlocks arrived in Liberia and set up camp with a group of African Christians whose tribal boundary touched that of the Pahns. Almost immediately Mrs. Garlock came down with malaria. Some men went to get her medicine, but one was captured. The African told the two missionaries that unless the man could be rescued, he would be eaten.Garlock went to their dwellings and saw that one of the huts had sentries posted before it. He managed to get into the prisoner’s hut, but they discovered him. He sat down on the skull of an elephant that stood beside the door. All the while he was praying. The crowd kept its distance, still yelling and milling, but not coming close.
A full moon rose. Finally, a witch doctor harangued Garlock for an hour, and then quite abruptly he stopped. He came, for the first time, directly up to Garlock and peered into his face. The witch doctor thrust his neck forward, then drew it back amid the cheers of the onlookers. Then, with great ostentation, he laid the wand on the ground at Garlock’s feet. He stepped back, waiting.
Silence fell over the tribe. Garlock gathered that it was now time for him to speak in his own defense. He prayed and then picked up the wand. Instantly the natives fell silent. And while they waited, Garlock prayed.‘Lord, show me what to do. Send your Spirit to help me’.
Suddenly Garlock began to shake violently. This frightened him as he did not want the others to see that he was afraid. But with the trembling came a sense of the nearness of the Holy Spirit. Words of Jesus came to him: ‘Take no thought what ye shall speak, neither do ye premeditate; but whatsoever shall be given to you in that hour, that speak ye; for it is not ye that speak but the Holy Ghost” (Mark 13:11).Garlock felt a strange boldness. He took a deep breath and began to speak. From his lips came a flow of words which he did not understand.
Garlock saw the natives lean forward, enthralled. He saw that the words – whatever they were – had a stirring effect on those who listened. He knew beyond a doubt that he was speaking to the Pahns in their own language.For twenty minutes Garlock talked to the Pahns. Then, as suddenly as the speech-power came, it vanished, and Garlock knew that he had come to the end of his discourse. He sat down.
There was a moment of waiting while the chief and the witch doctor put their heads together. Then, straightening, the witch doctor gave an order and a white rooster was brought forward. With a snap, the witch doctor wrung the rooster’s neck. He sprinkled some of the blood on the foreheads of Garlock and the prisoner. Later Garlock interpreted this as meaning that the rooster had taken his place: blood had to be shed, but something ha had said while speaking in the Spirit had convinced these people that he and the prisoner should go free.
A few minutes later, Garlock and the captured man were walking through the jungle back toward the mission station. The chief had even supplied two of his own men to guide them the first part of the journey. In time, the Pahns gave up their cannibal life and turned to God.
A Miracle Among Cannibals: From: John L. Sherrill, They speak with other tongues, published by Fleming H. Revell Company, printed in USA, Seventh printing, December 1968, pages 97-100
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