High Arctic Relocatees Outreach to Qaanaaq, Greenland November 6-11, 2010 (part 1)

From time immemorial, long before Canada became a nation-state in 1867, the Polar Inuit of north-western Greenland would travel by dogsled in winter over into what is now a part of Canada on Ellesmere Island to hunt and to fish.

Hunting and fishing were essential to their survival, and to their way of life, and there were no political or manmade boundaries between Ellesmere Island and Greenland at the time.

By the mid-1800s, still before the Canadian Confederation in 1867, Qillaq, a powerful Inuit leader and shaman, led some 60 Inuit from Pond Inlet on the northernmost part of Baffin Island across both Devon Island and Ellesmere Island to discover the Polar Inuit of north-western Greenland, who had been isolated for over a century.

To this day, the Polar Inuit of Greenland and the Canadian Inuit, especially from Pond Inlet, are closely related, and have family members on both sides. They share basically the same language, culture and way of life.

The migration had a profound effect on both the Greenlandic Polar Inuit, and those Inuit who migrated from Pond Inlet. The newcomers introduced important Inuit technology, such as the kayak, the bow and arrow, and fish spear.

Consequently, there has been a spiritual, social, cultural and linguistic bond between the Inuit of what is now the Canadian High Arctic, and the Polar Inuit of north-western Greenland, a bond that is very strong and very deep at the heart level, and includes family ties on both sides who speak the same heart language.

Nearly 2,000 years ago, the apostle Paul stood on Mars Hill, and boldly proclaimed that it is the God of heaven and earth who chooses the places where the nations (ethnos) live on all the face of the earth, and "He has determined the boundaries of their habitation" (Acts 17:26). A nation in the biblical sense of the word is not the same as a nation-state that has manmade, political boundaries defined by colonization and warfare. A nation is an ethnos, an ethnicity, or a people group who share a common language, culture and way of life. The boundaries for these nations (ethnicities) goes back to the Tower of Babel when God scattered the nations and set boundaries according to language. Genesis 11:8, 9; Deuteronomy 32:7, 8; Psalm 74:17; Proverbs 22:28; 23:10,11.

Even though the Inuit of present-day Qaanaaq, Greenland, and Grise Fiord, Nunavut, share the same culture and language, and are just over one hour's flying time apart, yet because of the political boundaries that man has erected, the only scheduled flights for these families to stay in physical contact would require one to fly from Grise Fiord to Resolute with Ken Borek Air, then from Resolute to Iqaluit and from Iqaluit to Ottawa with First Air, from Ottawa through Montreal to Copenhagen, Denmark, with Air Canada, and then from Copenhagen to Nuuk, Greenland, and from there north to Qaanaaq, Greenland, on a Danish Airline. This is about a four-day journey at a cost of mega thousands of dollars.

How did these political boundaries come to be established? Between 1904 and 1911, Captain Joseph E. Bernier did more than any other person to colonize, and to solidify Canada's claim to the Arctic islands.

The Canadian government even produced a special postage stamp in his honor, and named Bernier Bay on the north end of Baffin Island in his honor as well.

Captain Bernier extended the surveillance of the CGS Arctic ship into the North Baffin region by 1906.

Here he is formally taking possssion of Bylot Island, just north of Pond Inlet, in North Baffin, raising the Canadian flag (which was then the Canadian Red Ensign) at a ceremony at Canada Point in August, 1906.

Here, Captain Bernier is claiming all of Baffin Island for the Dominion of Canada in the presence of Inuit and officers during a ceremony on November 9, 1906. At the time, of course, the Inuit travelled in clans, and had no collective voice to speak about their values, so really had no voice in these decisions pertaining to Canada's claim to sovereignty over the land in the far North.

By 1923, the Canadian government tried to further extend its sovereignty over the High Arctic by holding its first criminal trial in the far north based on the British system of justice. The court case was held at the RCMP detachment in Pond Inlet, pictured above. An Inuit leader by the name of Nuqallaq was charged with murder for in self-defence killing an independent trader who was extremely abusive and mentally unstable. Nuqallaq was found guilty by the all-white jury who had little understanding of Inuit justice, language or cultural values, and was sentenced to 10 years in Stoney Mountain Penitentiary. After only two years, Nuqallaq died of tuberculosis that he picked up while in prison.

Here Judge Rivet, on the far left, is explaining the outcome of the trial, and the advantages of Canadian citizenship to the Inuit.

The Canadian government established RCMP posts at Pond Inlet (on northern Baffin Island) and at Craig Harper (on Ellesmere Island) in the year 1922. These posts were established for political purposes. In the early 1900s, the only people to venture that far north were a handful of explorers, the Canadian Inuit from North Baffin and the Polar Inuit from north-west Greenland. Since the Polar Inuit continued to treat Ellesmere Island as a hunting ground without regard to Canadian sovereignty claims, the need was seen for a greater presence in the region.

By August of 1953, the Canadian government sought to further legitimize its claim to the High Arctic region, including such Arctic islands as Cornwallis Island, Devon Island and Ellesmere Island, by establishing a High Arctic Relocation policy. Through this policy, they were able to convince some 35 Inuit from Inukjuaq, Nunavik (northern Quebec), to relocate to Resolute Bay on Cornwallis Island and Grise Fiord on Ellesmere Island. Today, these are Canada's two most northern communities.

There is little doubt that the Canadian government's goal was to not only establish a Canadian presence on those northernmost islands, but a Canadian presence that would keep the Greenlanders away, and establish Canadian sovereignty up there. Yet remember that these Greenlandic Inuit had family ties to the Baffin Island Inuit in a way that transcended Canadian-Greenlandic political borders.

The Inuit from Nunavik were only convinced to relocate based on the understanding that there would be plenty of game, that the group would be kept together, and that they could return home after two years if they so desired.

Only after the C. D. Howe ship, which carried the relocatees, was past Pond Inlet (where they had picked up a few more relocatees) did they inform the group that they would be split up. Some of them were dropped off right here, on the side of this mountain, near present-day Grise Fiord, where for two years they lived on this land-locked site in tents. They felt like aliens in a strange land, not knowing where the animals were, or even fresh water. Among those dropped off was Larry Audlaluk, who was only three years of age in 1953.

Within eight months of being dropped off here, Larry Audlaluk's father Isi died of a broken heart, sighing with his dying breath that if he had know what they were getting into, he would never have agreed to this relocation.

Here, in 2005, some 51 years later, Larry Audlaluk and his son stand at the site of their father Isi's grave, which is right on the mountainside where their family was originally dropped off.

This is Larry Audlaluk when he was five years old, standing outside of his family's new dwelling, which by now had become a sod house covered with furs. Larry's mother spent much of her time looking for lumps of earth with which they could build this sod house after they moved a few kilometers to a new location in 1955.

Larry's dear mother lived pretty much out of a box over the next few years, always moving to a new location a few kilometers away after a previous location proved inadequate. Some times the ship failed to get through with supplies, and they had to survive for long periods of time on seal and walrus, two very strong forms of meat, and had to find a way to extract fresh water from salt water.

In the meantime, the Greenlandic Inuit (wearing polar bear pants) whom the Canadian Inuit were supposed to push out of Ellesmere Island, were actually more helpful to the High Arctic relocatees than even the Canadian government. They showed them where the fresh water lakes and animals were located. The man with the black pants (second from right) is Larry Audlaluk's brother-in-law, who also ended up dying prematurely.

The rest of the High Arctic Relocatees back in 1953 were dropped off at this exact spot near present-day Resolute Bay. Here are three of the original relocatees still living in Resolute Bay--Louisa Gillespie, Allie Salluviniq (Louisa's brother), and Simeonie Amagoalik (who was 19 years at the time of the relocation, and is the oldest living relocatee).

These people, too, felt like exiles, and lived under very difficult and harsh conditions, especially for the first two years at Resolute Bay. This picture was taken of their camp in 1953. Since there was a Canadian army base nearby, these Inuit survived by scavenging food from the army dump on occasions, but their emotional pain was aggravated when they learned that they could not return to their families in northern Quebec after two years, as was originally promised.

So over time, with Canadian Inuit now living in Resolute Bay and Grise Fiord, and with RCMP posts established in Pond Inlet in North Baffin and in Craig Harbour (pictured above) on Ellesmere Island, the presence of the Greenlandic Inuit did diminish in places like Ellesmere Island, although some ongoing contact was maintained for many years.

However, the Greenlandic Inuit did tend to settle near Qaanaaq, presently a community of some 650 people, and to Sioraupaluk, an unincorporated settlement of about 60 people that is some 40 miles still further north. During the same year (1953) that the Canadian Inuit were relocated, the Qaanaaq Inuit were also relocated from Thule, which was near a U. S. Air Force base, some 40 miles further north to present-day Qaanaaq. They were given no choice, and were given only three days to make the move or their houses would have been bull dozed.

However, there was still some ongoing connection between the Inuit of Qaanaaq, Greenland, and Grise Fiord, Nunavut, as they could go back and forth between Ellsmere Island and Greenland by dogsled in winter without a Passport from either side. Larry Audlaluk writes that "I had been involved with exchanges every year since 1973 to 1990 without fail."

However, 911 changed all of that. Concern that international terrorists may want to get into North America through the Canadian Arctic has led to a rigid insistence that even the original peoples of the land now need a Passport to travel between remote communities like Qaanaaq, Greenland, and Grise Fiord, Nunavut. This is a huge challenge for Inuit who are distant geographically and culturally from government offices, not to mention the language barrier.

This, together with the melting ice in the Baffin Bay, has made it impossible to travel back and forth by dogsled any longer. The only option in staying physically connected is to charter an aircraft (unless one takes the round trip through southern Canada and Europe at huge time and expense).

Air Charter expenses are very high, along with significant landing fees imposed by the Danish and Canadian governments on all aircraft. There is a scheduled Kenn Borek flight from Resolute to Grise Fiord every Thursday and Saturday, but from Grise Fiord on to Qaanaaq, Greenland, one must Charter, with costs of nearly $18,000.00 for the return flight, even though the flight from Grise Fiord to Qaanaq is only about 1 1/4 hours.

Meanwhile, Canadian sovereignty is still not fully recognized between the Canadian and Danish governments in the area between Ellesmere Island and north-western Greenland. A tiny island known as Hans Island is still under dispute to this day. Bare and uninhabited, Hans Island is very hard to find on a map, and yet this small island is much in demand--so much so that Canada and Denmark have both staked their claim to it with flags and warships.

Here, the Danish sailors are raising their flag on Hans Island in 2002. It is estimated that the Arctic has as much as 25% of the world's undiscovered oil and gas. There is also a potential for minerals and diamonds. All this has pushed governments and businesses to scramble for sovereignty over these priceless seas and waterways.

Significantly, some of these very communities like Pond Inlet and Resolute Bay are right along the North West Passage, which is also still under dispute as to Canadian claims to sovereignty. The Americans, for example, hotly insist that the North West Passage is neutral, not a Canadian water way, and that security for vessels that go through it are to be under international, not Canadian surveillance.

As the North West Passage becomes increasingly navigable, especially during the summer months, Canadian claims to sovereignty will come under increasing challenge from nations who do not want to see it come under the control of one nation-state that can unfairly discriminate. The Europeans will want to increasingly use this water way, as it shortens the journey from Europe to parts of Asia by some 4,000 kilometers if they go this route, rather than through the Panama Canal.

All of this is in addition to the Russian claims to the Canadian and Danish High Arctic. On August 2, 2007, the Russians planted their flag 4,200 meters below the seabed at the North Pole. The rust-proof titanium metal flag was planted by explorers travelling in two mini-submarines. The Mir-I (pictured above) is one of two Russian craft that dived to the Arctic floor at the North Pole.

In 2004, Russian President Vladimir Putin called the sovereignty issue "a serious competitive battle" that "will unfold more and more fiercely."

After the Russians planted their flag on the seabed below the North Pole in 2007, the Hon. Peter MacKay, representing the Canadian government, responded, "This isn't the 15th century. You can't go around the world and just plant flags and say, 'We're claiming this territory.'" Try and tell that to Captain Bernier who planted the Canadian flag on Bylot Island in North Baffin in August of 1906, and soon thereafter, in November of 1906, claimed all of Baffin Island for the Dominion of Canada.

Ironically, it was Inuit like Ootah (Odak is the modern spelling) who was the main guide for the early North Pole Expeditions, such as those led by American explorer Robert Peary. It was Polar Inuit who knew this territory better than any of the explorers, and without their guidance, these discoveries would not even have been made.

A picture of Odak, the famous Inuit guide, is hanging in the Municipal Council Chambers in Qaanaaq, Greenland, today.

Yet this is a story that some of the High Arctic Relocatees believe will have a happy ending. On August 18, 2010, after many years of stonewalling, this surprising headline appeared in the CBC News: "Inuit Get Federal Apology for Forced Relocation."

On this date, the newly installed Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development for the Canadian government, the Hon. John Duncan, travelled to Inukjuaq, Nunavik (northern Quebec), to say to the High Arctic Relocatees and their families: "The Government of Canada deeply regrets the mistakes and broken promises of this dark chapter of our history, and apologizes for the High Arctic relocation having taken place." There was not a dry eye in the audience.

One week later, on August 25, 2010, Prime Minister Stephen Harper was in Resolute Bay, Nunavut, and had a private meeting with the High Arctic Relocatees to repeat the apology to them in person. Included in this photo, along with Prime Minister Stephen Harper, are Larry Audlaluk from Grise Fiord, and Allie Salluviniq and Louisa Gillespie from Resolute Bay, all original relocatees.

This newspaper story on the Prime Minister's 2010 Arctic Tour mentioned that in Resolute, Nunavut, the Prime Minister "met privately with Inuit elders to repeat the apology made earlier by Indian and Northern Affairs minister John Duncan for the federal government's forced relocation of eastern Arctic Inuit."

Here, on this very meaningful occasion in Resolute on August 25, 2010, one can see Prime Minister Stephen Harper along with some of the original relocatees--Allie and Susan Salluviniq, and Louisa Gillspie. Through their faith in a God who keeps His promises, they had found the grace to release forgiveness for the relocation even before the federal goverenment had apologized, knowing that God can use even our sufferings for a greater good.

These believing relocatees have no bitterness in them, and truly now believe that what once seemed like a curse can be transformed into a blessing as they fill this part of the earth with God's Presence and forgiveness. Here, Allie and Susan Salluviniq can be seen with the Hon. Leona Aglukaqq, the Minister of Health for the federal government, and the first Inuk federal Cabinet Minister. She was also in Resolute with the Prime Minister on August 25, 2010.

Please proceed to part 2 for "the rest of the story!"

High Arctic Relocatees Outreach to Qaanaaq, Greenland November 6-11, 2010 (part 2)

The Canadian government's official apology on August 18, 2010, to the 1953 High Arctic relocatees who were relocated to Resolute Bay and Grise Fiord, Nunavut, (which have become Canada's two most northern communities) was the catalyst in prompting Canada Awakening Ministries to facilitate a Charter flight with Kenn Borek Airlines to reconnect the Canadian relocatees with the Greenlandic Polar Inuit who were also significantly affected and impacted by that policy.

Kenn Borek Airlines has a scheduled flight every Thursday and Saturday from Resolute Bay to Grise Fiord, return. Therefore, it was decided to bring a team that included Vae Eli and Lima Nanai from Samoa in the South Pacific Islands along with Roger Armbruster from Niverville, Manitoba, through Resolute Bay on a day when they could connect with Allie and Susan Salluviniq and Louisa Gillespie in Resolute. They would all then take a scheduled flight from Resolute to Grise Fiord, and from there join Larry and Annie Audlaluk from where they would charter a flight with Kenn Borek Air from Grise Fiord, Nunavut, to Qaanaaq, Greenland.

So arrangements were made for six people to fly from Resolute Bay to Grise Fiord on Saturday, November 6, on a scheduled flight and from there on to Qaanaaq with eight people on a chartered flight, with the return flight from Qaanaaq to Grise Fiord and Resolute Bay taking place on Thursday, November 11.

Qaanaaq, Greenland, is home to some 650 people, some from Denmark, but they are mostly the descendants of the original peoples of the land, which includes the Polar Inuit, but also some who have family connections in Pond Inlet, the descendants of those who migrated from Pond Inlet to north-western Greenland in the mid-1800s.

This is the local symbol of the community of Qaanaaq as seen on the outside of the local Municipal Office building.

This is the inside of the State Lutheran Church in Qaanaaq, where services are held at 10:00 a.m. on every Sunday.

There is also in Qaanaaq a small house church that is presently pastored by Tukummeq and Arqiunguaq Qaerngaaq, who were both led into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ by Samson and Pauline Larson (Greenlandic believers from Central West Greenland) in November of 2005. This couple, along with the 15-25 believers who meet in their house, have been mentored by ministries who teach on "healing the pain of the heart" workshops, such as YWAM minister Errol Martens, and also by a pastor from a local church in Nuuk, Greenland, John Ostergaard Nielsen.

Tukummeq (on the left) declares: "We used to be alcoholics...Now it is like a light has come on. Jesus has opened our eyes. The Holy Spirit has come into our lives." Tukummeq teaches school in Qaanaaq, and Arqiunuaq is a full-time hunter. He has brought in more seals, walruses, polar bears and foxes than he can remember.

Their family is part of the famous Polar Inuit hunters, and they still hunt narwhales with harpoon and kayak. Their nuclear family is pictured here, from left to right, Arqiunuaq, their son Erik, Tukummeq, and their daughter Marie.

So when the Kenn Borek Air Charter carrying the High Arctic relocatees from Resolute and Grise Fiord landed at the Qaanaaq Airport on Saturday, November 6, 2010, some 40 of the community's residents were standing outside, waving enthusiastically, even before the passengers could get off the plane. Many of them had walked the 3-4 miles from Qaanaaq to the Airport to warmly welcome the guests. Among those at the Airport were Arqiunguaq and Tukummeq.

The Polar Inuit have a proud heritage, and it is obvious why they will want very much to preserve and redeem what is precious and valuable in their culture, traditional clothing, and way of life.

This includes redeeming the Greenlandic Inuit Drum, which is being restored to its original purpose to glorify God!

This is as light as it gets in Qaanaaq in early November, even at high noon. They will not see the sun again until next February 17.

Amazingly, these Inuit communities (Qaanaaq, Grise Fiord and Resolute) still speak basically the same language, and can understand each other quite well without a translator. Here, right on the first evening of November 6, 2010, Larry Audlaluk from Grise Fiord, who was three years of age at the time of the High Arctic Relocation, is apologizing from his heart to the Polar Inuit for the role that his family had played in the policy that he knew had caused pain to them as well when they were pushed away from their traditional hunting and fishing areas on Ellesmere Island.

This is the Greenlandic head of the Canada Committee, responding to Larry Audlaluk on the evening of November 6. The Canada Committee is the group that exclusively looks after any exchanges between Qaanaaq Polar Inuit, and Inuit from Grise Fiord/Resolute Bay/Pond Inlet in Canada.

On Sunday, Monday and Tuesday evenings, November 7, 8 and 9, the meetings were led by the house church group at the local community centre. Larry Audlaluk reported with thanksgiving, "The whole events went beyond my expectations. I had no idea what was planned prior to the Sunday, Monday and Tuesday meetings. I have never seen the Holy Spirit work the way He did each night! I have been involved in exchanges every year from 1973 to 1990." Yet he had never seen anything like this!

A full house in the local community centre came out for each of those three nights, in which there was participation with freedom from both Canadians, Greenlanders, and South Pacific Islanders in testimony, in song and in dance unto the Lord!

By the Monday night of November 8, the elders from the Polar Inuit in Qaanaaq began to step forward to release forgiveness to those Canadian Inuit who had been instruments in pushing them and their ancestors out of Ellesmere Island. Prayer for healing and restoration followed in a spirit of mutual humility, repentance, reconciliation and restoration of relationship.

Each and every one of the High Arctic Relocatees hugged and spoke directly to each of the Polar Inuit elders, in response to their forgiveness. Love was flowing like a river that night, and hearts that had been hardened by a sense of rejection and abandonment began to soften, and to vibrate once more.

Later that night, this picture was taken of some of the Polar Inuit elders with the Canadian Inuit from the High Arctic, after their reconciliation. There to witness and to bless this process from the South Pacific Islands was Vae Eli, a chief from Samoa, who is in the back row on the right, and who leads Island Breeze Canada along with Lima Nanai.

With the blessing of the elders, what a joy it was to see the next generation of Polar Inuit youth begin to worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. The touch of God's Presence is at the core of what is needed to heal these wounded and traumatized lives, many of whom have been abused and mistreated, but who are opening their hearts now to the heavenly Father to worship the Father in spirit and in truth.

During the meetings, this young man boldly and openly shared his testimony about how God had delivered him from a life of gangs, drugs and violence. Nobody could refute the wisdom and spirit by which he spoke, as everybody in town knew him, and could not argue with the testimony of a changed and a transformed life!

On Wednesday evening of November 9, Tukummeq read this letter from a Qaanaaq resident to the Canadian Inuit on behalf of the people gathered: "Thank you for coming to our community, a community that is distant from other communities. Thank you for showing us peace, something that makes us rest. You brought something great to us, while you are here."
As Louisa Gillspie later wrote, "It was such a surreal trip with the Lord leading us all of the way... Larry had this dream of going to apologize to the elders in Qaanaaq before more will pass away, and Larry himself will be too old to do this. It was an honor to be a part of this team, as my dad was a regular connector with the hunters of northern Greenland."

In the above picture, Louisa can be seen with her father in the early days just before the relocation, she on the far left (at 1 1/2 years), and her father on the far right.

Louisa continued, "After the apology, there were about 10-11 elders who responded, and accepted the apology, and forgave us. I sensed my dad was one of the 'cloud of witnesses' in great joy. I 'saw' him in a sealskin parka, and snow pants and kamiks. It was such a joyous occasion!!!! Thank you so much for your prayers."

Louisa is on the far right of this picture, with some of the Greenlandic Inuit elders who had just released forgiveness.

Louisa Gillespie added, "I also have a new spiritual brother in Vae Eli, a Samoan warrior. What a love of the Father he carries! He came to breathe in our garden, and connect with the Greenlanders."

This was a reference to the scripture in Song of Solomon 4:16, "Awake, O north wind! And come O south! Blow upon my garden, that its fragrance may flow out."

On this picture, Vae Eli is in between Louisa's brother Allie and his wife Susan Salluviniq, with Lima Nanai, another Island Breezer, on the left.

Louisa Gillespie went on to say, "I connected with many youth, as they were drawn to the anointing that the Lord gave me to drum and to throat sing. I connected with a young lady who taught herself to throat sing, and a young man who beatboxed (a form of verbal percussion) as I throat sang. It was such a breakthrough for their sound to come out. The last night there was a man who looked at the drum, and said he probably could make one!!! Thank God for the gifts that we had to communicate with."

The last evening of Wednesday, November 10, was again organized by the Canada Committee, and this time it was held in the large school gymnasium. The evening opened up with an excellent rendition by the Greenlandic choir under a Greenlandic flag.

We were told that more people came out to this than even come to the community Christmas events in Qaanaaq.

The evening was a time of mixing and mingling, interacting and engaging with one another from both a churched, and a non-churched background. It was a time of connecting on different levels--spiritually, socially and culturally. This picture shows an example of one part of the evening where the people played games. Activities like this really caused the walls to come down, and for people to get to know one another without their defence mechanisms being up.

The whole evening went from around 7:00 p.m. until midnight, and included a fireworks display outdoors. Near the end of the evening, Larry Audlaluk started giving gifts of appreciation and pictures to the elders in the community, renewing old memories and making new ones.

He presented a plaque to commemorate the restoration of relationships to Jens Danielson who has much influence in government matters in the whole region. Jens responded with a moving tribute to Larry, and to the High Arctic relocatees. The plaque read:

During the course of the evening, among other gospel numbers, Larry and Annie Audlaluk sang Larry's testimony song that he wrote himself of how God delivered him from a life of alcoholism. Louisa Gillespie is accompanying them on the Canadian Inuit drum. Every time that the chorus was sung, his "thank you" to Jesus was repeated at least four times!

When the time came for the Kenn Borek Charter to fly back into Qaanaaq to pick up the team, this dear lady from Sioraupaluk, a small nonincorporated settlement of some 60 people that is about 40 miles further north from Qaanaaq, showed up to thank us for coming. We were given to understand that she had come all that distance just for this occasion. This was significant, because some of the Greenlandic Polar Inuit from Sioraupaluk were adversely affected and impacted by the High Arctic Relocation policy as well.

Some 40 people from Qaanaaq went all the way to the Airport to bid farewell, many of them again walking the 3-4 miles. The plane did not take off until around 3:30 p.m., and by that time of day, it was completely dark, but it was a touching scene for the passengers to look out of the window, into the dark, to find that the Qaanaaq residents had lined up along the fence. What they saw was a number of people synchronized in waving their flashlights in circular motion, shining a light into the darkness. Several of us on the aircraft had flashlights that we also rotated in circular motion on the window, deeply feeling a heart connection that no manmade boundary can ever sever.

Since returning home to Grise Fiord from Qaanaaq on November 11, 2010, Larry Audlaluk has written, "Amen! Praise the Lord! How can I ever repay you and your church for the help that you and the two brothers from the South Pacific have given?"

We need to make clear that this story is not in any way a political statement to apply political pressure to the nation-states to harass them to change their political boundaries. This outreach was spiritual, not political. The need is for all of us, including the rulers of the earth, to humble ourselves under the supremacy of God, and to acknowledge the spiritual authority that still exists within the ancient boundaries of nations (ethnos) (who share a common language and culture) to bring reconciliation to their people, and healing to their ancient homeland.

Isaiah 40:22a declares, "It is He who sits (enthroned) above the circle of the earth." I like to think of that "circle" as the Arctic Circle, above which God sits enthroned above the earth, from where He is pouring out of His Spirit on the circumpolar regions, and from where it will come down to bless other nations and regions of the earth as well.

YWAM Founder Loren Cunningham and a British intercessor by the name of Lee Ann Thompson have had visions of a "ring of fire" around the Arctic Circle.

However we interpret that, we do know that the word of God has now gone from Jerusalem "to the ends of the earth," right into High Arctic communities like Resolute Bay on Cornwallis Island...

...and to Grise Fiord on Ellesmere Island, the most northern community in Canada...

...and to Qaanaaq, Greenland, the second most northern community in the world!

We also know that in the biblical world, and even scientifically, there is a continuum between "space" and "time." They are connected. The phrase "the ends of the earth" is also connected to "the end of time." The word "end" can refer to "the final part of a period of time," and it can also refer to "the place that is furthest away from the beginning of something"

Could it be that God has a special plan and purpose for the people living at the ends of the earth at the end of time?

Canadian High Arctic Relocatees such as Larry Audlaluk and Allie Salluviniq have already travelled from the "ends of the earth" back to Jerusalem to express their appreciation that the message that began in Jerusalem has reached them. Here, at the cradle of the great civilizations of the last 2,000 years, in the heart of the MIDDLE East, where East meets West, where the heart and the mind connect, where the objective and the subjective intersect, and where the spiritual and the natural and come together into oneness, Larry and Allie are at the Western Wall to pray for the peace of Jerusalem, and for the peace and the healing of all nations (ethnos), right to the furthest corners of the earth.

Here, Larry Audlaluk is pointing out to a Jewish audience in Israel where he lives at the ends of the earth, as one who has also known rejection, abandonment and exile, but who also now has a story of healing and redemption, and a testimony of how God can restore the past, and give a meaning to the present, and a hope for the future. He can reverse any curse into a blessing.

"All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the LORD, and all the families of the nations shall worship before You. For the Kingdom is the LORD's, and He rules over the nations" (Psalm 22:27, 28).

"Arise, O God, judge the earth; for You shall inherit all nations" (Psalm 82:8).

This was the sun at 1:00 p.m. on Friday, November 5, 2010, taken just before the journey to Qaanaaq, Greenland on November 6. To me it speaks of the dawn of a new day in the Canadian High Arctic from where the light of God's glory (that reveals the interior world of the heart) is now shining over into northern Greenland, even during the time of year when it is physically dark.

To the Canadian and Greenlandic Inuit of the North, the word of the Lord is, "Arise, shine, for your Light has come, and the glory of God rises upon you" (Isaiah 60:1).

This is an actual photograph of a sunrise taken at Grise Fiord, Nunavut. It reminds me of the promise in Malachi 4:2, "Unto you who revere My Name, the Sun of Righteousness will arise with healing in His wings." Can you see the Son arising?