"We should kill a chicken, you know." These words, uttered matter-of-factly, were not about preparations for that night's dinner, but about successful well drilling procedures. I was in Gesses, in the dry lowlands of northwest Ethiopia working among the 150,000 Gumz people.

The Gumz are one of the least developed and least cared for people of Ethiopia. They are "least cared for" in that very little outside assistance has reached them, but also "least cared for" in that nobody likes them! Surrounding tribes consider the Gumz to be sly hunters, vindictive murderers, and highly successful cattle thieves.

SIM is opening a new station in Gesses, and I was looking for reliable water sources for the new station and surrounding Gumz villages. Gumz country is in the midst of a very serious drought. Six Gumz men helped us hand auger boreholes at the most promising sites. In one location, after repeatedly hitting impenetrable rock only four feet down, one of our Gumz workmen offered his critique. Spirits of that gully and spirits of the groundwater were resisting us, and to appease these resisting spirits, we should sacrifice a live chicken and ritually sprinkle its blood around our drilling site and in the borehole. It was just common sense.

Westerners may smile at these beliefs. Successful well drilling does not involve chicken blood and spirits, but a complex technical problem to be solved. Or is it? Such a completely secular view might be just as far off base as the Gumz's animistic one.

Does the heavenly Father have power over every evil spirit present? (Yes) Is He the Creator, Lord of the rocks, water, and every created thing? (Yes) As we pray and trust Him, does He guide us and strengthen us in this drilling work? (Yes) Does He care for these forgotten Gumz people and their desperate needs? (Yes) Has He miraculously brought us here to care for this inhospitable tribe? (Yes) Is He powerfully active right here, able to cause our equipment and technology to be successful in spite of the seemingly hopeless, dry, rocky conditions? Yes, He is! And we have the pleasure of presenting these new and revolutionary ideas as we work.

This is the joy of our work—encountering hidden, deeply held worldviews foundational to their society and a chief cause of their broken moral compass. Someday soon the Gumz may be changed, not only by provision of safe drinking water, but also by an internal Spring of Living Water. Someday soon they will abandon chicken blood, finding the shed blood of a loving Savior all sufficient.