Easy Chair Series

Interview Larry Bailey

Professor: Dr. R.J. Rushdoony

Subject: Conversations, Panels and Sermons

Lesson: 36-91

Genre:

Track:

Dictation Name: EC338

Year: 1986

This is R. J. Rushdoony, Easy Chair number 338, May the third, 1995.

This evening Douglas Murray, Andrew Sandlin, Mark Rushdoony and I have the great pleasure of having with us Larry Bailey, a very unusual man. Larry lives not too many miles from her in Thornton, California, down in the valley and he is a very remarkable Christian. He is the kind of person we need to see more of from coast to coast. He makes things happen for Christ.

I am going to start off by asking you, Larry, to tell us a little bit about yourself, the kind of work you are in, your business and how you got into the educational and missionary activity that you are so deeply involved in.

[Bailey] Actually I guess you would be a fellow of Chalcedon. I was hosting Sam Blumenfeld, boy, in the mid 80s at Washington State University driving him around and I don’t know if any of you know. Sam can ask some very probing questions at times. And he asked me what I was going to do with my life. And it really took me by surprise and I had Christian and very much involved with my church in Pullman, Washington and married, happily married, a couple of children. And he... at that time he... I had mentioned missions in Africa and he said, “Well, have you ever considered all the people groups that are in the United States that are ... that are here?”

And so that one thing led to another and a bunch of circumstances happened as only God can set them up where I ended up at a Cambodian pastor’s conference in Seattle, Washington. Cambodian pastors from all over, really, the world gathered and I got very keenly interested in the Cambodian people and at that time I was employed at Washington State University, again, very involved with my church in Pullman and got ... got to know my missions pastor very well and found out through a mutual acquaintance of work at San Jose Christian College, a man named Don Byers who was a former missionary to Thailand for about... from the... when Thailand was born about 1950, before I was born, 1950, early 1950s till the mid 60s he was a missionary in the ... near the {?} province of Thailand, that area...

And he was doing this work with San Jose Christian College where they would... they were actually taking newly ... new immigrants from... I guess the refugees is the word from Cambodia who had become Christians in the refugee camps in Thailand and giving them theological training, giving sound... sound grounding in the Scriptures and the faith because they come from a totally non Christian Buddhist culture and it is entirely different than most of us can imagine.

And so we came down there to vacation, got to know him, he got to know us and our church elders in Pullman, they... they basically they... we just kind of left it in the Lord’s hands to see what the Lord would do and ... and he opened some more doors for employment down here so I could work and I... I worked in the environmental and safety area for a northern California sugar company. But he, Don Byers, he said, “Hey, I think there is a really good combination here,” because I... I had taught Bible school type classes before, theological education before in Pullman. And one thing led to another. Two years later we ended up with the elders say, “We... we feel this is the Lord.” And opening the doors. And so they hated... {?} pastor said he hated to let me go, but he really thought this was... he was releasing me for this and ... and now we have been here for three years and it is, I have to say, some of the most fulfilling work I have ever done in my life. Not always easy, but very fulfilling. We... we work with a group in Modesto that is called the Cambodian at Modesto Cambodian Christian Fellowship and what we... what we have done is we have... I think one of the main things that we have done is we have a catechism program. I don’t know if any of the list... listeners are familiar with a lot of mission work in third world countries to unreached people. The thrust is get them saved and let them drop. I hate to say that. And very little foundational teaching, very little.

If you ask, went to many third world countries you asked them who Abraham was or David or anything about the Old Testament or even who Paul was, they wouldn’t know. Just elementary basic things. And so we have tried... we are in the process of through Cambodians and ourselves translating catechism.

It is... we... we don’t start out with the cross. We start out with Genesis. In the beginning God... Take them all the way through the Old Testament and then, of course, then they good news and then the doctrines of the Christian faith. And I think we are about 32 lesson course that has been tried and trued in Chinese, Ugandan, Spanish and several other languages. So we know it is very ... how do I say it? Biblical, not just totally slanted toward American culture and we have been seeing some amazing things happen in people’s lives. So...

[Rushdoony] How about your teaching ministry?

[Bailey] I... I also teach at San Jose Christian College. We have an extension in the valley and it is kind of unique I think in the United States. Since California is kind of a ... it seems to be a magnet for a lot of immigrant peoples right, wrong or indifferent, you know, they are here, you know. And what are we... what is the Church going to do to respond to some of these peoples? And our particular target is the Cambodians. And there are a lot of them in the central valley of California and, again, for whatever reason they haven’t fit in to the main stream American churches and it works better to... to minister in their language, in their own ... their own cultural approach. And that is how come San Jose Christian College has been so successful, I guess, if that is the word in reaching these men who want theological training. And it is... it is... they are very grateful to have it and things that we would have assumed we learned in Sunday school they know nothing about. No one ever told them. And so they are very grateful and I... I teach anything I have taught world geography, science. In most of their cultures only the wealthy and the intelligentsia or even get science at all. So basic concepts that we would get in a reasonable education they have no idea of the concepts of ... of science at all. And... anyway and then I have taught Reformation history, reformed to present and we ... we translated The Great Christian Revolution I think that was the name of it. It was a book that I think Mark Rushdoony, John Lofton, yourself and Otto Scott put together. And we translated Otto Scott’s portion into Cambodian.

And these men were just incredible. When they saw Cromwell not for a villain, but for a real godly hero.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] And I... I... I get a kind of kick out of emotional talking about it because they were... they were... they would pound on the table. They would say, “This is what we need for Cambodia. We need an Oliver Cromwell.”

And they... I really kind of gave... opened them up a whole hall of fame of Christian heroes for them that they had no idea had gone before them.

[Voice] What is... excuse me. What is the history of some of these... these Christian groups? You don’t think of Cambodia as being a ... a Christian country, obviously.

[Bailey] Yeah.

[Voice] Where has their introduction to Christianity come from?

[Bailey] Cambodia, ok, is a country of about eight to nine million people. They lost a couple of million along the way as most of you know. And they ... there was Catholic missionary influence at around the turn of this century, but the first missionaries were from Christian Missionary Alliance. As a matter of fact, the CMA, a group of them with some Cambodians is the ones that tar responsible for the Cambodian translation of the Scriptures which is, of course, as it is... because of their doctrinal influence has some inherent weaknesses, but it is still the Word of God and it... you know, it is very powerful and speaks to them. And up until about 1972 ish, early 70s, there were about... in a country of nine million, eight to nine million, there were 230 Christians and they had been there maybe 30 years, the Christian and Missionary Alliance. Almost as many missionaries as there were Christians. And so it really had... had not... nothing had happened and then a... or course, you all know about what happened in {?} and Pol Pot and the whole Vietnam era and all that stuff that happened there and the Cambodians say it was God, that God judged their nation for rejecting Christ for century after century, century. I mean, I didn’t say it. They said it about their own.

And through the persecution they had a revival of immense proportions. It is not always neat and clean as far as maybe some of the doctrine was a little sloppy and not as clear cut as we would like to see, but many people were introduced to Christ especially as they fled into the refugee camps in the mid 70s and then came to this country in 1980, 81, 82, 83. But very much a Buddhist culture.

If you look on their money even they have six headed snake god is on their money, very much like idolatrous, you know, Buddhism, of course, as a religion is very, very weak, almost a non concept of God. And so that is the problem when you are trying to communicate the Lord God of all creation. What word do you use? So you... you have to be creative and how you communicate.

[Rushdoony] Do you have any idea how many of the Cambodians in this country are Christian? They seem to be growing very rapidly.

[Bailey] I am guessing it is... it is probably... I guess there is probably, oh, a couple of hundred thousand in this country, maybe 30,000 in the valley something like that and... and the biggest congregation of them is actually in Long Beach. Probably 95,000 in the Long Beach area, Long Beach, California and we have contact with the ... many of the leaders there. And I am guessing it... it is... maybe one percent.

[Rushdoony] How many?

[Voice] One percent maybe, possibly. Again, you have to define what... what you include as Christian. And in... in Cambodia it probably less than a 10th of a percent right now, maybe a few thousand in a country of nine million that are... that we have ... that would be real... would consider themselves Christians.

[Voice] How are they looked upon by the rest of the ... by the non Christian population?

[Voice] Yes.

[Voice] Are they left alone?

[Bailey] In Cambodia or here?

[Voice] In Cambodia and here.

[Bailey] I have never been to Cambodia, but {?} have friends there that have lived there and get regular faxes. They... they think they are a bit quaint.

[Voice] Yeah.

[Bailey] There is an old fashioned word queer and that is the word that comes to me. I don’t ... I mean in the old fashioned sense of that word in Cambodia. They can’t understand why they want to follow the white man’s God. But we can talk about some things that the Lord has done that have changed their minds on that.

In the United States a lot of people that I run into see them as a drain on the welfare system and many, many of the non Christians and a few of the Christians, but becoming less and less, are... are on welfare and have not been able to integrate into our culture because they have very, very poor education. You probably know that during Pol Pot’s time, anyway, if you... if you are educated at all you were either shot or forced into hiding and... and so they basically decimated all of the educated class. And so you had people that had little or no education coming over to our country where you need just a basic education to survive in... in a... in any occupation. And so our country, I think... I think they are somewhat resented, but I think they are accepted now that they are here, but I think in Cambodia they are definitely not persecuted like in Islamic countries, but there is some respect growing because of... of the social work they are doing and... which is tremendous because there is no social welfare net there in Cambodia.

[Voice] Larry, you mentioned earlier some of the breakthroughs that you have had. Would you be willing to enumerate some of those, the successes that you have had?

[Bailey] Sure.

[Voice] Dealing with these?

[Bailey] For instance, we were... I was teaching on James one time. I think it is James five. What is it? It says, “If anyone is sick among you? Let him... let him call the elders and pray over him. You know, and the ... and the Lord will raise him up.”

And they say, “Is that... is that really? Is that right?”

I said, “Well, I... I know a lot of American Christians that... that would say that was for a bygone age that we call 911 today.”

Because in Cambodia there is no 911, but anyway the ones that have... might have landed here. And {?} they simply believe the Word of God when they... I have not found the skepticism and the cynicism that you find in much of American Christianity toward the Word of God. And they just accept it. So they call the elders. They ... they, you know, I think it says anointing them with oil and pray over them in the name of the Lord and they did that. And it... the woman she was healed and she went to the doctor and he says, “You don’t need to see me. You are all right.”

And there is... there has been cases and... and some not nice things as far as we don’t like to talk about them, but cases of demon possession. We don’t go looking for them under... under things, but this is a non Christian, non Christian group of people who have ... how can I say it? There is no Christianity. Though they have idols on every... every house has a wall of idols. They have idol shelves in their houses and they believe these things. They worship them. They are as real to you as ... as gravity is to us, you know? And... and when they... when they... as a matter of fact, a man who is an elder in our church now he is a businessman. He actually has a small businessman and ... and his wife had an incurable ...

What happened was she has been called... drawn to the emergency room. Her chest swelled up to great big and the doctor is like, I can’t figure out. We have had CAT scans of her and all this stuff. We don’t know what is the matter with you. You have got elevated blood pressure and all this stuff. And... and then they heard about pastor Chen {?} who I work with discipling him, training him and... and helping him and they said, “You should call pastor Chen.”

So they called him over and he {?} who is now in Cambodia went over and they began to pray and all of the sudden this thing started shouting at them. Whoa. And so they... they told the church start fasting and praying. And so they did and they just commanded it just like Jesus did in the gospels. They commanded the demon to come out. Her temperature became normal. Her blood pressure was normal and along this... this slide the fellow happened to have a... a pornographic tape in the house. And he says.... he says, I... there is something...a reason why it won’t come out. And it was a very matter of fact thing to him. And he said, “You have got pornography in this house and you are the head of the home.”

So he found it. They threw the tape out. Immediately. So, I mean that... things that ... and we don’t... that... that doesn’t happen every... it has happened once, ok? But, I mean, they just... they.... they... the Word of God to them is very plain. They don’t make it complicated. We don’t talk about the fifth toe on the beast. We don’t... that is just... that is... we don’t have time for that.;

[Voice] Yes.

[Bailey] So... that is... that is kind of probably, too, the most dramatic and... and this brother actually ended up saying who was the fellow that this happened to and ... and he is forgiven and he has repented and become a... a wonderful Christian brother and friend. But he... he ... in his donut shop he was savagely attacked actually the year before last after... we were doing so many great things and 13 sometimes stabbed, lost his eye, was a... was crime. He ... some donut shop in Modesto and we had some marvelous things happen there. People rallying around and really supporting the family and not blaming it on racism or... or fate or ancestors because of... we {?} all the non Christians was to see. This is the judgment of the... of the idol gods on you for turning to this Jesus. Literally. And they... they tell them that. You know, because everything is karma and fate. Karma is a big deal.

[Voice] Yes

[Bailey] And... in Buddhism, so... what I have really found is the Word of God sets them free and... and...

[Voice] Yes.

[Bailey] ... it is very refreshing sometimes because I... I... we tend to complicate things a lot.

[Voice] Yes.

[Rushdoony] You seem to know the language quite well.

[Bailey] I know a little bit, just a little bit. My wife knows it a lot better. She has spent more time studying it than I have. So... but I... I am learning. We are all studying the language together, my son and myself and my wife.

[Rushdoony] Obviously these people are not given to taking only part of the Bible. They take all of the Old and New Testament literally. And they are not Antinomian it would seem.

[Bailey] Right. That is really interesting because they... they came to me once and they said, “Larry, I don’t understand. I ... this American Christian came to me and said that this part of the Bible wasn’t for today and this wasn’t for today and this was for the Jews and this was for that one.” He says... he said, “I thought God gave us the whole Scriptures.”

I said, “He did.”

And he said, “Oh, good.”

[Rushdoony] What a relief.

[Bailey] Probably one of the biggest things I fight against is the TV, the Christian TV to be honest with you. They see what I call a warped picture of what Christianity is...

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] Or... or where I say it is not. And they... they get very confused and so I advise them to keep the TV off, off as the... I don’t know how you describe. You might call it a circus. I don’t know how to describe it.

[Voice] Do the converted Cambodians tend to be evangelistic? Do they tend to go back and evangelize their brothers and sisters? And ... and how effective is it compared to evangelism that we do in our culture? Comment on that for a little bit.

[Bailey] It is quite different. They... they do what I kind of call family evangelism. It is almost like when like the head of a household gets converted everybody is converted because they are the... I don’t know how to put it. They are ... the father is still not emasculated. I mean, how can I put it that way? He is... he is...

[Voice] He is a father, in other words.

[Bailey] Yeah. I mean, more so. I mean, they are ... they are becoming under the influence of American culture and so that is having... taking its toll, but very, very much so when they see Jesus forgave my sins, he washed them all away. I don’t have to ... to... to be in bondage to these idols anymore, which they took very seriously. And they tell other people about it so you don’t have to be in bondage. And that is how they present the gospel. And then they get off to the Scripture and, you know, explain. And they... and they are actually working on a little training session with the elders, the leaders there to teach them, ok, don’t use the four spiritual laws. Can we say that?

[Rushdoony] Yes, you...

[Bailey] Ok, ok. Don’t use the four spiritual laws. Just... just get out the Bible.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Voice] And Romans, John, even Isaiah and expound the Scriptures to... to people and let... let ... let God speak through his Word and that will set... that will set people free.

And I get... I think the one of the... the detrimental things that... that is influencing missions at really world wide, I would say is... and Dr. Rushdoony has talked about it years past. They had... I think he called it the star system with our... where we have someone on the platform on a television or on a big tent or a big arena much like an entertainer and it ... it is very hard to have any kind of a personal interaction with someone on that level and so I... if.... if you want to put it in American vernacular it would be called friendship... friendship evangelism. Excuse me. It would be more effective than the star system approach.

[Rushdoony] Larry, I am going to ask a personal question. You have a full time job with a corporation. Yet you and your wife are very much involved, many an hour every week and every day with this missionary work and teaching these Cambodians and college classes. How has it affected your family life?

[Bailey] Well, we really get everybody involved. I have four children and we don’t have a neat multi cultural education. We have got it. And so they are understanding another culture, learning to understand another culture and how to reach out to another culture and... and you have to keep balance. Of course, you have family time and... and keep communication open and we... we have started something about a month or so... oh, maybe it has been a month and a half ago which I had neglected as a parent, as a father realized that who was raising, who was teaching my children the Bible. Yeah, we have Sunday school. Yeah, they have Bible in their Christian .... my children are in a Christian curriculum. They are home schooled, but it is in a Christian curriculum and I assumed, oh, they are getting the Bible. But we went to a seminar on biblical parenting with the Cambodians because they... they really need a lot of help in that area. The Holy Spirit was working over time in my case telling how I needed to be a better father to my children. So we... every morning at 6:30 we get up and we ... we study the Bible together and I as the daddy explain the Scriptures to them and that way I can ensure that they are getting the Scriptures from their... from their father and it is... and that... and that is ... is the Cambodians are starting to do that now. They are actually getting up at 6:30. Yes. But it is really great because it starts the day right and... and... or... or, you know, as appropriate time, however their schedules fit.

Because then the father is the prophet and priest and the teacher in the home and not the Christian school curriculum or whatever, not that those are bad, it just that... that... it... it sets the stage and then... and my wife has even told me that... that... it is like it just sets... it raises the spirit in the home. And so we have... it is almost like a family forum. We can... we can talk about very real problems and issues. We just finished studying Joshua and now we are on Jonah. And we are talking about running away from God. Can you run from God? And in those kind of issues and... and we just talk about that and the Bible study time. So I... I think the main thing for us has been keeping communication open and we... we cut out... we don’t have time for much recreational activity other than gardening. So...

[Rushdoony] Do you get damned as a Christian Reconstructionist who is off balance in his whole approach to things?

[Bailey] Yeah. That is real interesting. We were at a Christmas dinner kind of a thing a couple of years ago and I was explaining my, you know, my vision that God has given our family for... of missions and it is... it is very sincere Christian brother he said, he said, “That is kind of unbalanced.” He says, “Don’t you ... don’t you have a boat or do something?”

And I... and I says, “Well, I... I can’t afford that, but, you know,” I says, “of course, you know, we go to the park and play like any other family does,” but, you know, it was... he used the word, I guess if you are going to be imbalanced... because I was a little taken back by it. I thought maybe something is wrong with me. And then I talked to my missions pastor. As a matter of fact we... on the internet actually to... he is in Moscow now, in Russia and he said, he says, he says, “Larry,” he said, “Jesus said, ‘Occupy till I come,’ not recreate.” So he said, “Proceed.”

[Rushdoony] Very good. Very good.

Well, I think it is remarkable what you are doing, Larry. And I think it is going to produce out of these Cambodians a people more advanced in the faith than the average evangelical, beaus they take it so seriously. It is their whole life so that it isn’t fire and life insurance for them, but it is their marching orders day after day.

[Bailey] That is really true. You know, we talked about fire and life insurance, but they... pastor Chen once commented. He said, “But don’t you have to pay premiums and have commitments and obligations on insurance?”

[Rushdoony] Good.

Larry, when I was among the Peyote and Shoshone Indians, American Indians, I found that the Old Testament had a special appeal to them and the thing that gave me a strong point of contact was Genesis chapters one through 11, because their reaction was, oh, we know those stories. We had stories about the first man and the first woman, about doing wrong and about the flood and that sort of thing. And they recognized that the biblical account is the clear one. Theirs is mixed up with all kinds of mythological nonsense.

And so I always found that the Old Testament and especially Genesis chapters one through 11 gave a particularly strong point of contact and a means of approach.

[Bailey] I agree. You are talking about... you are the biblical scholars here. Is it in God... in Romans where God... Paul says about knowing God...

[Rushdoony] Their foolish minds were darkened.

[Bailey] Right. But... but.... the idea that and a missionary named Don Richardson who worked with a people group in Papua New Guinea he called it the redemptive analogy that God is... he believed that... that his theory was that God has put in every culture a redemptive analogy and Cambodian culture they have a legend, a Buddhist legend. It is actually... the Christians think it was... predates the Buddhist time. They call {?} which means God the mighty highest one. And the legend... the legend goes that their ... that God, this God would come to them riding a white donkey with palm leaves. Of course, they have palm trees there, of course. And, of course, it got all twisted around and everything in their... their legends and culture and they are... they are still looking for this Messiah. But the Christians have found him, Jesus Christ.

And so when they read in the gospel Jesus, his triumphal entry to Jerusalem, they say, that is him. That is him. So they can... they can actually... can ... can tell their ... their country, their... their people, saying, this is the one. He is here. Our Messiah has come.

And they have legends about the flood and about creation, about man and woman. I haven’t got that much.... that... that much involved in that, but whenever... when we ... when we were teaching about God one God, the true God starting from Genesis one in the beginning and about creation, they were all shaking their heads and nodding and said, “That is right, that is right. That is what grandfather said, you know?” And it is... it is exciting because it is like God has put something. Even though it is marred by sin and everything else and ... and the sin nature and all that, there is something that God has put in ... in all mankind that longs after him, that wants fellowship with him.

[Voice] Larry, do any of them have the aspirations and the hope that one day the situation may change in Cambodia so that some of them can go back there?

[Bailey] Some of them already have gone back and I showed you some pictures of a brother named {?}. We went kind of personally discipled for about two and a half years and then he was actually taught in some of my Bible school classes as well as we did... he did a lot of the translation work on the catechism. And he is back there. He is in Phnom Penh right now. The {?}... I forget where I am... He... he is in Phnom Penh right now and what he is... he is doing is these are... he is ministering out in the provinces, because, as is typical as what happens in ... in mission work is they all stay. It is like the first Christians stayed in Jerusalem, well, they all want to stay in... in the big city. The problem is... is that is not what God intended. God wanted all the provinces to be reached. You know, he said, “Unto Jerusalem and to Samaria...”

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] “...and unto the uttermost parts of the earth.”

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] And so he is working in {?}, {?}, {?}, you know {?} all these provinces around Phnom Penh. It is not a very big country. And raising up leaders, using this catechism material. And they... when they carry this stuff, you can’t... it is incredible. They carry it like it is a treasure. I mean, it is a dirty, dusty country. There is... there is not a lot of paved roads. So there is dirt and dust everywhere and {?} thought they were carrying the crown jewels or something. And he says, “What are you carrying?”

And he says, “That is my catechism notebook.”

Because no one has ever put anything down systematically. We would call it systematic theology and maybe it would be on a little higher level. I... I call it basic theology. But it is so critical to lay a foundation.

[Voice] Yes.

[Bailey] You start with the beginning so they get the right concept of God, the true God.

[Voice] Yes.

[Bailey] And ... and the closer I stay to the Bible the better off I am. When I stray away, I will be honest with you, then I get in all kinds of problems trying to explain and why isn’t it this way in the American Church and, you know, I say, “Well, I don’t know. I... but... you know...” So I ... I... They have gone back and they are going back.

[Rushdoony] Good.

[Bailey] And they have many, many people from ... from our group in Modesto, that is their vision is to send them back. The problem is getting into American culture and into money and into the American dream and all that stuff, they lose, I call it they lose their first love. And we haven’t seen that yet. So we are trying to prevent that, but, yeah, it is exciting because... so Ben is in Cambodia right now with that very purpose.

[Voice] That is great.

[Bailey] Because he kind of has the best of both worlds, because his ... his feet are solidly on the rock, you know, theologically. And so he knows what he believes. He knows why he believes it and he knows his call and he knows his purpose.

[Voice] Larry, how well does the Bible translate into the Cambodian? Any special problems that arise?

[Bailey] Oh, sure, in ... we were singing a chorus. Oh, it might have been a hymn and it had the word adore in it. We have that word, English word adore. Well, there is no word for adore. We have love. We have adore. But how do you say I adore you? It means something to us in English where we say it to the Lord it means something. And so what they say is {?} {?} which is love, love. So it is like extra love. That is... that means adore. And so you run into those kind of things often. And we were... we were just ... I can’t remember, but you... you run into it all the time and I can’t... we... we just on Monday we had a... an elders meeting and ran into that same thing, how the English ... the English had one thing, had like two words and the Cambodian they just used one of the words. And so we use both... both Bibles all the time.

[Rushdoony] It is very interesting, Larry, that languages are remade as Christianity goes into a culture.

[Voice] Yes.

[Rushdoony] ...because the Bible requires an expansion of the vocabulary and we fail to appreciate how much the English language and all the European languages are products of Christianity and of ancient translations of the Bible.

[Voice] Yes

[Rushdoony] So much so that a scholar, a master in the field of Hebrew studies, very much a Modernist told me that Isaiah gives the flavor of the Hebrew so much so that it is like reading the Hebrew, because the idioms, the rhythm is so much shaped by the original text. So western languages have been remade. They are not the languages of the pagans of old Europe.

[Voice] True.

[Bailey] And that happens all over that the challenge as a... as a missionary or church planter or leader is to ... there is a concept that Wycliffe Bible translators have talked about and the linguistics called dynamic equivalency. When you go with dynamic equivalency and when do you say that is not going to work here?

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] I think before you have talked about some modern translators have been a little lose in...

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] And... and instead of saying the Lamb of God they said the pig of God because it wasn’t a lamb. And Cambodian, a lot... fortunately has no major things like that have happened. So they don’t have a cross. They say cross. This is the cross. And you have to teach to it and explain it. It is like you have to raise the expectations to... of them and say we have to teach this as a new concept. They don’t have a concept of sacrifice for sins. It is... it is more like penance and karma. It is just... Karma is totally different than the Christian concept of redemption.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] And so you ... you just basically... ok, here is a new concept that we are going to talk about. And you are always doing that. And working with an interpreter all the time.

The only problem like with the Cambodian language is it being a third world country and a third world people, well, actually there are several people groups in ... in the... in the country of Cambodia, but the main group, the {?}, the {?} they ... the language does not lend itself well to technology. And so that is a continuing struggle for... for the country and so they just... they just adopt the English or the French word. Obviously Cambodia was a French colony, part of a French colony at one time, so...

[Voice] Are the... I am not up to date, Larry, on the political situation. Are not the Khmer Rouge still in power there or is... and how does that work out as far as those who are there preaching the gospel and so forth?

[Bailey] In the northern provinces it is the {?} Greek Mountains, {?} I guess, the mountains that border Thailand. There are a lot of ruby mines, still. And at one time they were taking a million dollars a day out of those mines and taking them over the border and selling, exchanging them in China for arms and obviously for 30 odd million a month you can probably finance a pretty good army. So it is very disruptive, but what has happened, again, God is greater and it just amazed me. It amazes me. I don’t know why it should, but he is the Lord of creation and... but in one of these northern provinces, {?} province, actually, as I remember, that... that might... it is... it is in that area and pastor Chen when he was just over there about three, four weeks ago, he said there was a lady who was through hard work and she had been converted, became a Christian, through hard work and a lot of things she became fairly prosperous just with her chickens and her little micro businesses. And the Khmer Rouge saw this and they wanted to basically rob her. And one of the people came up to her and she opened her house to him and she gave him food and his heart was so touched that here he was going to go and burglarize their house and take all their livestock and any wealth she had, any chance of wealth that he ended up coming to a church meeting later, as I understand. I don’t know if he was converted, but he was sincerely affected by her charity, by her actions. I think when {?} he said love is not something you feel. It is something you do.

And ... and those kind of simple charity toward even the Khmer Rouge. As a matte of fact, last... pastor Chen was in Cambodia last year and he was kidnapped by the Khmer Rouge for five days, four or five days and it turned out one of the guys his captors was an old boyhood playmate, because he is from {?} province. And it... he had been with this... this like a... kind of like a limousine taxi kind of thing because no one ... no one... no one drives. He says, “No, we are going to drive.” He says, “It is too dangerous.”

And so... but, anyway, they did get kidnapped by this group of Khmer Rouge and they didn’t know what they were doing, you know. They are... half the time they are not fighting. You know, they don’t have anything else, no work to do, so what do they do? They take up arms. They have no faith. And so what happened was he had a chance to preach to these guys.

But guess what? He didn’t do that first. An American would do that first, some Americans. But what he did was he ... these guys were starving. They didn’t have any food. So he... he had some American money. Actually he had stashed it in his Bible and they had taken all of the other money. They didn’t look in his Bible. So he... when they went to the village they said, “Can you go in the village?” And they... they prepared this huge feast for I think it was 70 men. And they were so touched that act of generosity and they gave them extra food for a few days that they sat and listened to a whole sermon and were deeply touched and released him unharmed.

[Voice] Yeah.

[Bailey] And it... those kind of things happen often and so even ... I am encouraged that even in... in the darkest thing with when you have terrorism and anarchy and all this stuff going on, God is still at work. And that is... that always amazes me.

[Rushdoony] The time of the Khmer Rouge triumph about a year later I met a couple, very fluent in both English and French who had escaped and came here. I think they wound up in France. But they said something which emphasizes the importance of the work you are involved in. They listed six or seven categories of people who were immediately executed when the Khmer Rouge triumphed. All who had been abroad, all who had worked for a foreign company, all who were Christians, all who were educated and so on. They eliminated the Christians and the educated classes as far as possible so they would have a malleable mass of people left. They told me that it was their belief that 50 percent of the population had been wiped out.

At the time there were American experts who agreed, but since then they have tended to revise that downward which is usual amongst scholars.

Now the one thing this couple stressed was that the renewal of Cambodia would come from Cambodians outside of Cambodia. So this is what you are working at.

[Bailey] Of course, we want... we want our... a Christian influence.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

[Bailey] Because their... their culture is so ... we as people in North America we just can’t... can’t imagine how Buddhism can totally permeate a culture. We have idols everywhere. We look at these quaint little things as, oh, just a wooden little thing and a trinket, a tourist thing. But it is very real to them and it permeates everything. And it... and that ... the only thing that will save the country and give them anything to salvage at all is Christianity.

[Voice] What ... Larry, what percentage of the people here yearn to go back?

[Bailey] Not very many. Only the ones that are... that are truly dedicated in their faith, because they realize. One brother told me. He said, he said, “Jesus has done so much for me. This is the least I can do for him.”

It is very matter of factly. And because many of them go back and they are... they are looked on as foreigners now, somewhat, but the country is so needy that any help at all is... is welcomed.

[Rushdoony] It is interesting that even Vietnam is thinking of ... a flag now with the seven headed serpent god on it that faith is so deeply embedded in south east Asia.

[Bailey] Yeah, the... the head ... one of the chief heads of the Buddhist religion in Cambodia when the top leaders he made a statement two weeks ago. I think it was two and a half weeks ago that the key to Cambodia’s renewal as a.... as a real vital force in south east Asia was that everyone began to worship the{?} or {?}. I can’t remember the pronunciation, this seven headed serpent. And it is interesting. In their legend this serpent crushed the heel of man, just the opposite...

[Rushdoony] Good.

[Bailey] ... of the Scripture... what the Scripture says where you shall bruise his heel. And it is just interesting.

[Rushdoony] You have that {?} cult even in India. It is very prevalent in that part of Asia.

[Bailey] This absolutely devastating to their culture because it... it ... it locks them into, well, the Christians say, the Cambodian Christians. Again, I am not... not saying this as an American. They say this is God’s judgment on their culture. If they allow this to go unchallenged with out... they approach this as a battle. And it very ... it is very real. When they go into a village they go in praying and... and... and because that is the only thing and it is very serious. It is a life and death thing, you know?

[Voice] Maybe you could encourage them just to stay here and work amongst the Christians in this country.

[Bailey] Well, it... at sometimes when like when pastor Chen goes to speak at... at your main line American churches there, it is very unsettling to some people because when they see the pictures of the... the dirt and the filth and... and all the devastation that has happened after, you know, what... it is almost 20 years now since the revolution. It has destroyed their country and one simple thing that the Christians have done they destroyed... they killed all the dentists. And pastor Chen, he was a... like it would be equivalent to a dental hygienist and there they can fill teeth and all that kind of stuff. Well, but... what they found is in that time from the late 70s till the early 90s is they had a whole generation that had no dental... no oral hygiene. So... so children were dying of bacterial infections to the brain. They were killing... thousands and thousands of children. I could... I could... I have a video that I had. It was incredible that... that you wouldn’t even imagine just simply oral hygiene would have prevented most of that and even just dentists pulling teeth, well, Christians and it was World, you know, World Vision. You know, give them credit for that. They actually through a group of actually dedicated evangelicals in the Portland area, they reopened the... the dental school in Phnom Penh as a.... as training a whole army of Christian dentists.

You know, maybe they don’t have the high tech jet aircraft equipment that we do, but it gets the job done. The children aren’t dying and ... and what is happening is because they are taking care of people’s teeth, they are willing to listen to what they have to say about their faith.

Surprise. The doors are open.

[Rushdoony] Yes.

Well, when you got involved in this you, perhaps, had no real vision of how far it would take you, Larry, but...

[Bailey] Yeah.

[Rushdoony] ... what the future will be, God only knows. But certainly you have embarked on a wonderful course of Christian action.

[Bailey] It has been very... I was ... I told my wife it has been very fulfilling.

[Rushdoony] We have five, six minutes. Is there something that you haven’t been able to tell us because we have interrupted you that you would like to take the time to tell us about now?

[Bailey] Well, I would like to encourage all believers that you… you don’t have to... to jump of a cliff and say get involved in missions. It is a step by step thing. And faithful and little, God will get you more, God will give you more. Faithful in little, faithful in much. And that ... that I ... my prayer and hope is that... that people would just be a little more aware of the... the need of... missions to friendship peoples like the Cambodians, to unreached peoples who have no... no gospel, no ... no indigenous church at all and who get to know the missionaries that are in their circle of friends or influences or churches.

We are friends of many missionaries and it can be a very lonely thing out there and... and simple letters and correspondence and sending cartoons from home even can cheer people up. And certainly prayer and, of course, tangible monetary support. And ... and to encourage people to get involved with... with missions that aren’t just preaching, but are... are really doing I call works of charity, works of Christian reconstruction in that culture that are appropriate because I have seen many, many doors open that way that were just slammed shut before.

[Rushdoony] Now is there any newsletter or report that goes out telling of the work you and others are doing in this area?

[Bailey] Not that I know of. The ... in Cambodia it is kind of a chaos right now as far as through a combination of world events and... and a lot of other circumstances there is five warring factions. No, there is... there is no newsletter as ... as such.

[Rushdoony] Well, what about your work here? The work you are involved in?

[Bailey] Well, I ... I have a family newsletter that we put out. But to... to friends and people that I ... I don’t need any support. The Lord provides that, but I mean, you know, it is just my personal newsletter. But it is...

[Rushdoony] Yeah.

[Bailey] ... but it is more for friends and family and, I mean, people that are praying for us and... and our church family in Pullman, Washington.

[Rushdoony] Well, I know our readers and listeners will be interested in knowing more about your work. Why don't you write a little article describing some of the things you told us about. We will run it in the Chalcedon Report and from time to time give us an update, because I know our people will be intensely interested.

[Bailey] I would be glad to do that.

[Rushdoony] Just mail it here in care of Andrew to the Chalcedon address.

[Bailey] Sure.

[Rushdoony] Because one of our problems today is that Christian faith and Christian action have been separated.

[Voice] That is right.

[Rushdoony] And one without the other is no good. You have to have the biblical ground and the biblical faith must lead to works.

[Voice] Yes.

[Rushdoony] Faith without works is dead and our Lord said, “By their fruits shall ye know them.”

We want to encourage others to do the kind of thing you are doing, because there are opportunities everywhere. Of course, you know from the report Chalcedon Report of Steve Schlissel and his work in New York City, urban nation. And this is the kind of thing that Christians must think seriously about instead of bewailing the fact that we are getting too many other races here in this country. We need to see it as an opportunity to reach these people because they are God’s creatures and are as important in his eternal plan as any of us.

[Voice] Yes.

[Rushdoony] That is why I feel that your work and Steve Schlissel’s and that of others is so extremely important. And I believe that our readers need to learn more about it.

[Bailey] {?}

[Rushdoony] Well, thank you, Larry, for coming and do come again some time and tell us more. Give us an update because we will be happy to hear about it.

Well, thank you all for listening. Be in prayer for Larry Bailey for the work among these peoples in Cambodia and here.

If you remember them in prayer, I believe God will bless you, because we have an obligation as members of one another in Christ to support one another by prayer.

Well, thank you all for listening and good night.