Book: Walking His Trail
Author: Steve & Ginny Saint
Publication: 2007
Pages: 229
Completion Date: 4/12/25
This book was a continuation of the book called “End of the Spear” by Steve Saint. This book had about 1/3 of the chapters written by Steve’s wife, Ginny, which offered a different perspective on the entire story. This book was a bit easier to read since I already knew much of the story and there was not a need for so many details, which this book did not provide as it was written in a different style. At the same time, it was a bit harder to read because the chapters were not written linearly in time with one chapter after the other. They jumped around with one chapter talking about the past and the next chapter talking about the present and sometimes from a different perspective given that there were two co-authors. One hard part is that they rarely list out dates or even years when events are taking place, so you have to do some calculations to estimate when it is occurring.
The book starts mentioning how Steve, who was working in Ecuador after graduating from Wheaton College, was tasked with being a tour guide (in approximately 1973) to a musical missionary group from the Swedish Convent Church of Minnesota. He met a young lady on the trip, made a connection to her and it then talks about how they got together and ultimately got married.
There was a chapter mentioning how his Aunt Rachel came to live with the Waodani in late 1950’s and stayed with them for 36 years, ultimately dying there and being buried in their jungle cemetery.
One chapter mentioned how Steve was flying to Mexico in his plane when he stopped in Texas due to a storm. While there, he witnessed to the airport manager. Knowing the story of Steve’s dad, the manager & his girlfriend accepted Christ, got married and turned their lives around.
Ginny has a chapter mentioning all of the different places they lived and houses they occupied. Over about fifteen years, they moved from Wheaton, IL to Grand Rapids, MI to Minneapolis, MN to Willmar, MN to Dallas, TX and then to Mali, Africa as missonaries for a year. There are multiple instances where they met people who had read the story about Steve’s dad and told Steve about it.
There is a detailed chapter where Steve reveals exactly how his dad died, who killed him & why they did it. After that, he decides to interview the widows of the four other missionaries (he already knew his mom’s story) to get their perspective on how they ended up in Ecuador, their husband’s lives and how their deaths affected them. These stories were intertwined into the the movie, Beyond the Gates of Splendor, released in the late 90’s.
Steve outlined a chapter about how the movie End of the Spear was filmed in Panama in early 2000’s. The movie was released in 2006. He flew an exact replica of the plane that his dad flew for the filming of the movie. The last chapter of the book listed out how this movie was shown at the United Nations across various ethnic groups, religions and countries and widely received and accepted by both ambassadors and their staff.
There was a chapter that detailed how I-TEC actually taught basic dentistry to the Waodani who did extractions and basic restoration. They would earn the right to minister to the patient’s spiritual needs while their physical needs were being treated. Later, other developing countries asked the Waodani & Steve to come demonstrate how this basic dentistry program worked.
What I learned that will help increase my prospects for success after prison:
1) The Waodani had a different way of viewing Christianity and it is outlined by several statements they made:
a) “If we follow our own trail, at the end, where are we? By following God’s (they call him Waengongi) trail, at the endd we come to His place. He has made us a place where we can all live happily and in peace.”
b) “We have a spiritual enemy. What if the devil wants to use this to keep us from doing something God wants? It isn’t worth the risk.”
2) There were multiple Bible verses & statements that resonated with me, which I listed below:
a) God exists and he rewards those who seek him (Hebrews 11:6).
b) Forgiven people can forgive people.
c) About Jesus: “He paid a debt He did not owe; I owed a debt I could not pay. I needed someone to wash my sin away.”
d) Hatred is suicide on an installment plan.
e) Gratitude is the shortest-lived human emotion.
3) Steve outlined that he knew that what he read in the newspapers and other news reports does not bear close resemblance to the actual state of world affairs. The older I get, the truer I realize how true this statement is. I was just reading in the Economist how many more busloads of people were sent back across the border under Biden’s adminstration vs. now (Trump administration). Granted, there are less coming across from south to the north now, but all you hear about in the news is how many people Trump is sending back, when in reality, it is less now than before. It is basically propaganda. There are multiple other instances of this that I can think of.
