Healing the Land Continues in Arctic Bay Revisited -- July 25 - August 2, 2012

Arctic Bay, Nunavut, is the third most northern community in Canada, and is right up at the very top of Baffin Island, well North of the Arctic Circle.

The Arctic Bay area has been occupied for nearly 5,000 years by Inuit nomads migrating from the west. The Inuktitut name for Arctic Bay is Ikpiarjuk which means "the pocket" in English. This name describes the high hills that surround the almost landlocked bay.  The Inuit had their own names for the sites, the settlements and the mountains in this region.

Whalers visited the area in the 18th and 19th centuries, although no whaling station was ever esrtablished in the Arctic Bay region.  The whalers overhunted the whales, particularly the bowhead whale, in the North Baffin region during the 1800's.  By 1840, the whale population had become so diminished in North Baffin that many whalers went further South to the Cumberland Sound (near present-day Pangnirtung) where they continued to overhunt.

In 1872, a European whaling ship, the Arctic, captained by William Adams Sr., passed through and gave the area its English name--Arctic Bay.  Ignoring the original names given by the Inuit in the region of North Baffin Island, the British imposed their own names on the sites, settlements and mountains.  Not only was "Arctic Bay" named after the Whaling Vessel "Arctic" commanded by Captain William Adams Sr., but the sound adjacent to Arctic Bay was eventually named "Adam's Sound" in the same captain's honour.

The Dendee Whaler "Arctic" sailed in North Baffin waters until 1874, at which time it was crushed by sea ice not far from present-day Arctic Bay.  The Government of Canada declared its interest in including the Arctic islands within the Dominion of Canada on October 10, 1874.  It was considered a necessity due to the increasing entry of American and European explorers, whalers and traders into the Arctic regions.

The trade goods that the Inuit received from the whalers and from the traders in exchange for labour on the whaling ships, and for furs, in some ways made life easier, but it also brought in sickness and disease, as well as a greater dependence on goods from the South, which began to change their way of life on the land, and their total dependence on the hunt for food to eat.

In traditional society, every family member, including the children, had responsibilities, and had to help the family in order to survive.  Men (along with their sons when they were old enough) did the hunting, and women (along with their girls when they were old enough) did the sewing of clothes from animal skins, and prepared the food.  Every member of the family was needed, and each one had to carry their weight for the family to survive.  With the trade goods, however, some of the elders began to feel a cultural void, and that their traditional knowledge was no longer useful, and many turned to alcohol in order to anesthetize the pain.

Under the command of Captain Joseph E. Bernier in 1904, the CGS Arctic patrolled whaler activity in the Hudson Bay.  Captain Bernier extended the surveillance of the CGS Arctic into the North Baffin region by 1906.

Here Captain Bernier is raising the Canadian flag and claiming all of Baffin Island for the Dominion of Canada in the presence of Inuit and officers during a ceremony on November 9, 1906.

Arctic Bay in 1950 was a small Qallunaat (non-Inuit) settlement with an Hudson Bay Company post, and Department of Transport weather station.  The HBC post had been operating continually in the area since 1936, and a weather station was established in Arctic Bay in 1942, and was operated by the DOT until 1952 when the maintenance of the station was taken over by the HBC personnel.  A few Inuit working in the settlement lived there...

...but the majority of Inuit in the Arctic Bay region still lived in camps.  Throughout the 1950's, Inuit lived in camps, only visiting the settlement to trade, for medical attention, or at ship time. Increasing government services in Arctic Bay drew the Inuit camps closer to the settlement after 1950.  In 1961, Arctic Bay's Inuit population was 44 while 139 Inuit living in camps were reported to be trading there.  By 1967, the community's population had increased to 159, with only 55 Inuit living in camps but trading at the Hudson Bay Company in Arctic Bay.

Here, in July of 1951, a group of Inuit are watching the landing of a helicopter from the C. G. S. "C. D. Howe," an Eastern Arctic Patrol Vessel at Arctic Bay, Nunavut, in July of 1951.  The community was serviced by the Pond Inlet detachment of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) which made annual patrols to the settlement and camps in the area.

Throughout the 1950s, the RCMP annual reports indicate that the Inuit society was changing during this period.  There was a transition from traditional caribou and seal skin clothing to more western-style parkas.  While hunting still provided the major source of income for Inuit, hunting practices were changing.  The high price of polar bear hides and seal skins meant that more Inuit were hunting these cash species for money more than to provide food for the family.

The 1950s were a difficult time for the Inuit of the Arctic Bay area.  RCMP annual reports spoke of near starvation (1957, 1958), deadly influenza and disease (1957, 1959), and dog disease (1952, 1955, 1956).  In 1959, Indian and Northern Health Services began patrolling the area by aircraft, visiting the various camps and providing the Inuit with medical exams.

And so, while the Great White Father in Ottawa did everything that it could in the natural to make life better, such as building houses in Arctic Bay, which is certainly preferable to living in igloos, yet many policies were misguided upon the assumption that the Inuit would be better off without their traditional knowledge, and by being assimilated into the Qallunaat (non-Inuit) world, and instead of relying as much on the hunt, greater dependency was placed on buying food at the stores other than the country food that was a part of their traditional way of life.

Yet, the reality is that it has become so very expensive to fly food up to Arctic Bay, and to other Inuit communities, that the present system is really not sustainable for the long haul, and it will be necessary for the Inuit to be more connected to the land again, and to live off the land, rather than on imported products.

Also, in the area of family conflict and disputes, before the coming of alcohol, the Inuit had a way of peacefully settling family offences and grievances through the wisdom of their elders.  The book Ilagiinniq (Kinship), Interviews on Inuit Family Values from the Qikiqtani Region, published in 2011 by the Niutaq Cultural Institute, documents the strong family values that were in the Inuit culture, and how disputes in traditional days were more often settled peacefully than they are today.

My belief that we can learn much from the wisdom of the elders from Arctic Bay, Nunavut.  They were the key to the healing the land process started in that community four years ago in August of 2008, and they were again the key in dealing with social and family issues upon our return visit between July 25 and August 2, 2012.  The following quotations are taken from the book Ilagiinniq from various elders in the Baffin Island region.

According to Namonai Ashoona, "We were prepared well in advance for what we had to do for our families.  It was always stressed that our families came first, and that we were to get provisions first.  We were taught to go to the elders or those who were older in our communities--such as our mothers, fathers, and grandparents--for day-to-day instructions.  We had to get along with members of our immediate families."

Elaiyah Mangitak stated, "It was the role of the elders to resolve problems.  The one creating the problems would be asked to attend a meeting and would be counselled by the elders.  He or she was advised verbally, and all those who were counselling took turns speaking.  I have seen this traditional way of counselling."

Or in the words of elder Josephie Padluq, "When people found out about a problem, they would initiate counselling.  The perpetrator and the victim--everyone involved--were brought together as a group to deal with it.  The whole process was open, and all were involved."

The counsel of the elders was to offer wisdom, understanding, counsel, and advice in a gentle, non-threatening way without raising one's voice or being harsh.  If, however, the offending party would not reconcile with the offended, any rebellion was not dealt with by imprisonment, but simply by being cut off from the community until they returned to a reasonable frame of mind.  In those days, to be cut off from community, was a matter of survival, because everybody in the family and the extended family in the clan or community had to work together in order to survive, and to live off of the land.

To be an "elder" is not just referring to a person who is "older" physically, but a true elder was one who had the wisdom to be able to settle disputes peacefully.  Children would not mature at a certain age of maturity, but only when the youth's individual physical and mental and spiritual development matched the expectations of adulthood--at whatever age that occurred for each individual.

Nowadays, we do things differently in both the areas of counselling, and in how we treat the one who will not receive counsel, which leaves many homes where wives or children are being abused with a sense of being "trapped," or "stuck."

1.  First of all, in the area of counselling, we tend to counsel only the offended party, and the offender is more often than not unwilling to show up, and to receive advice about a needed change of behaviour.  The traditional Inuit way was for the elders to deal with the offender and the offended together, and to have a hearing and a clearing of the air in a way that led to reconciliation and restoration of relationship.

2.  Second, if the wisdom of the elders was not heeded in Inuit traditional approaches to counselling, the offender was cut off from the community until they changed.  That was a real deterrent.  Today, the alternative that we have to counselling to to lay charges in the courts.  The problem is, while sending somebody to jail might remove the offender from the community temperarily, he eventually has to return to the community, and usually his time in jail will have done nothing to rehabiliate him.  So he returns to reoffend, and to repeat the same type of behaviour unless there has been a true heart change from within, a transformation and a personal revelation of what the offender is doing to himself, a revelation that leads to repentance.

During the week of July 25 to August 2, 2012, in Arctic Bay, this ministry worked with the elders and community leaders to emphasize that what they had in their traditional system of justice, for whatever shortfalls it had, was still preferable to what we have today.  Today, we have many children living in broken homes where the parents are fighting, and are on the verge of divorce.  This is very painful for the children, and they feel "trapped."

We have many women today living in a situation where they are being abused by their partner, and he refuses to go for counselling, and continues to traumatize her.  What is she to do?  She can go for counselling, and be counselled to leave the abusive situation.  She may do that for awhile, and perhaps live in a shelter, or place of refuge, but eventually, she longs for a relationship with somebody who gives her even a measure of security, and so she goes right back into the relationship again, sometimes even after having laid a complaint in the courts, and so the cycle continues.

What to do?  The message that was shared with the elders and community leaders in Arctic Bay was that the issues go deeper than the physical (being contined physically for a season in jail), or the mental (being given advice to leave the relationship, and information of where they can get support while trying to form new family relationships).

Somehow we have to find a way for people to release the emotional pain that is in their life with somebody who can handle it, and not get upset when they release their emotional pain and anger.  The heavenly Father is just such a Person.  We can release our emotional pains to Him in intercession, with groanings too deep for words, with cries, with sounds, with shoutings that our deeper than our troubled minds and our anxious thoughts.

When we go into a deeper place in intercession, we begin to tap into the place where the heavenly Father's love is present, like water in the deepest part of a well, and we begin to release that by the power of the Holy Spirit who prays within us when we do not know how to pray as we ought to.  The life of the Spirit begins to intercede within us, and it is like a birthing process, the life of the Spirit pushes back against the external pressures, the cares, the anxieties, the fears, the anger, the bitterness.  These things begin to be replaced by a sense of the Father's love for us, and that we are His child, and He will provide and make a way for His children who trust in Him.

This intercession from a deep place begins to address the lies in our life, the lies that we are not loved, the lies that we have no family, or nobody who cares for us.  These lies become a stronghold that keep people who are causing conflict in our homes to remain in rebellion, and in disobedience, and in defiance.  Yet the apostle Paul claimed that he had weapons that could address these kinds of spiritual strongholds that keep people imprisoned within thoughts of bitterness and anger and hatred and pride.

These are not weapons which are designed to externally pressure those who rebel, or to punish them physically as with a prison sentence.  These are weapons that are exercised out of weakness, out of helplessness, and out of a humble crying out to God at a point where we have nowhere else to turn for help in our time of need.  As Paul said,

"It is true that I am an ordinary, weak human being, but I don't use human plans and methods to win my battles.  I use God's mighty weapons, not those made by men, to knock down the devil's strongholds.  These weapons can break down every proud argument against God and every wall that can be built to keep men from finding Him.  With these weapons, I can capture rebels and bring them back to God, and change them into men whose hearts' desire is obedience to Christ" (II Corinthians 10:3-5, The Living Bible).

In the church world today, we hear a lot of teaching, but very little real intercession.  As a result, we have a lot of head knowledge, but very little manifestation.  Intercession is a birthing process that brings to birth what we believe in our hearts, whether truth or lies.  Much of the western church separates the spiritual realm from the natural world altogether, as if there is no connection between them.

The Inuit have always known that the spiritual and the natural, the people and the land, are connected and integrally joined.  The shamans truly knew how to tap into the spiritual realm, and they saw the spiritual world manifest.  They knew something about intercession.  Some of them tapped into the dark side of the spirit world, and used their supernatural powers in a way that could even kill people.  Let us not forget, however, that there were leaders in the European church who also used their powers to kill people, and they, too, were tapped into the dark side of the spirit world. 

Many of them, however, were true prophets of God, and God heard their prayers, even as He heard the prayers of Cornelius (Acts 10) well before he even heard the gospel message.  They tapped into the spirit world through releasing their hearts with unutterable cries and sounds, desperate to get answers from God when they needed it.

They were like Abraham, who built an altar wherever he went, and would "call upon the Name of the Lord" (Genesis 12:8).  When Isaac grew up, there was no doubt many times when his father could not answer all of his questions as to how God was going to give him and his descendants a land of promise, but Abraham believed the promise, and gave glory to God, and called on the Name of the Lord, believing that what He had promised, He was able also to perform. 

I am sure that Isaac respected his father Abraham, even when he did not have all the answers, because he saw that his father was a humble man, and to called out and interceded to a God who was greater than he was.  God knew how He would fulfill His promise, and Abraham believed the promise, and was strong in faith, and became the father of all who are of faith in the promise that God would send a Deliverer to the people of faith through whom they would rule and reign in the spirit realm over the spiritual forces of darkness, and live freely and securely in the land that God had promised to their forefathers.

So that is exactly what the elders at Arctic Bay are doing!  Here, you see some of their elders, including former Mayor Andrew Taqtu, down on their knees, and like Abraham, calling on the Name of the Lord, claiming the promise that this is the land that God has promised to their forefathers when He established the boundaries of the nations (ethnos).

"Remember the days of long ago!  Ask your father and the aged men, and they will tell you all about it.  When God divided up the world among the nations, He gave each of them a supervising angel" (Deuteronomy 32:7, 8, Living Bible).

"God created all the people of the world from one man, and scattered the nations across the face of the earth.  He decided the times and the places where people would live, and He determined their boundaries" (Acts 17:26).

These elders in Arctic Bay are renewing their covenant with the Lord, and are giving the land back to Him, because He created it in the first place.  Interestingly enough, the nation-state of Canada has not yet been able to establish its sovereignty over this area which is right along the North West Passage.

Nations like the United States and Denmark dispute Canada's sovereignty over this Passageway, but the original gatekeepers of the land in this region, are recognizing that this land belongs to the Creator who created it to be inhabited by the people that He placed in this part of the earth.  They have a spiritual authority to welcome the outsider and the alien, and to release forgiveness, and to see the heavens opened, and the Holy Spirit poured out!

This is the point, just a few miles out of Arctic Bay, where a healing the land process was done on August 3, 2008, and it was again renewed and established at a ceremony that was held at this point on July 29, 2012.  Just as Abraham erected an altar to call upon the Name of the Lord wherever he went, an altar of stones was erected on both occasions where people could call upon the name of the Lord whenever they are in crisis, whenever there are family disputes where present-day counselling falls short, and where the courts cannot help, whenever people are desperate, and have come to the end of their rope, and when without divine intervention that have no hope whatsoever.

Throughout the week that I was in Arctic Bay between July 25 and Augut 2, 2012, it was a vital part of pretty much every service that we would call out on the Name of the Lord for help where the pain was great, and we could not even express it in articulate speech, so we would release intercessions and groanings and cries and shouts for the heavenly realm to invade the earthly, and to bring peace.  It was powerful to see a whole congregation of people interceding in one accord together.  One could literally feel the Presence of the Holy Spirit pushing back against the forces of darkness, bringing freedom, bringing release, bringing hope, bringing joy, bringing peace that God has everything under control, and that He will reveal Himself to those that no human being or human method can change, but who are not beyond God's help or God's grace.

Not only was a community altar erected where people would call upon the Lord, but every home and every family was strongly encouraged to have a family altar, with fathers, mothers and children, praying together to the God of Heaven for help in their time of need when they do not even know what to do.  As men, we often like to have all the answers, but God is inviting fathers and husbands in particular to humble themselves, and to admit it when we do not have the answer for our wives and our children on many occasions.  They then need to see us, like Abraham, calling out to a Father who is greater than we are, and allow Him to touch us at the level of our deepest emotions, wherever we have experienced pain and wounding.  Men need to use their strength and their aggressiveness to protect and to provide rather than to hurt and to wound.

This is the same point from which the last picture was taken.  Here, on August 3, 2008, the head of the elder's committee in Arctic Bay, Tommy Tatatuapik, is calling upon the name of the Lord, releasing a powerful prayer of intercession and repentance on behalf of his forefathers for wherever and whenever they used their spiritual powers wrongly.  He is also welcoming the Holy Spirit to come, and to open the heavens, and to come and heal the land of his forefathers which God has entrusted to them as stewards.

The heavens really did open up that day.  It was a powerful experience for everyone who was there.  It shifted something in the spirit world, and many community residents are telling us that it made a marked difference on their land, and on the fish and animals and plants which are becoming more abundant both in quantity and in size.

Again, on Sunday afternoon of July 29, 2012, we interceded at this very same spot, and without trying to force anything, without trying to make anything happen, people started to respond to the Spirit of God.  One woman got up and stated how tired she was of the life that she was living, and that today she was yielding her life back to God, and to His Son Jesus Christ.

Another man got up and said how there had been a lot of conflict in his home, and that he and his wife were on the verge of divorce, but today he was surrending his life to God, and asked Him to fill Him with His love, so that he could love his wife again in the way that she needed to be loved.
When counselling fails, when the courts fail, we have weapons which are not of the flesh, but which are divinely powerful to the pulling down of the enemy strongholds.

"With these weapons, we can capture rebels and bring them back to God, and change them into men whose hearts' desire is obedience to Christ."  And, as the indigenous peoples of the North have known all along, there is a connection between the heart and the land, the soul and the soil.

On Tuesday, August 7, I received this Facebook message from Philip Kalluk, one of the intercessors in Arctic Bay.  He wrote, "We are blessed, Roger, because of what Jesus did over 2000 years ago.  We are at the same place where we did the ceremony at the point." This picture was taken at the very point where we had a healing the land ceremony on July 29, 2012.

They are also catching salmon fish now, even in these Arctic waters, something that they have not seen before the healing of the land process according to II Chronicles 7:14.

This is the size of the fish that they are now catching near Arctic Bay.  The fish have come in with greater quantity as as as larger in size than they have seen before.

There is also an increase in seals, narwhales and beluga whales.  These animals are the very staff of life for the Inuit, and it cuts down their cost of food considerably.  The Inuit do not waste any part of the animal that they catch, and they give thanks for God's abundant provision through the healing of the land. 

"For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer" (I Timothy 4:4, 5).

For killer whales on YouTube in Arctic Bay, check here.

For narwhales on YouTube in Arctic Bay, check here.

Even mushrooms of a large size are beginning to spring up from the Arctic tundra. Some people attribute this to "global warming," but whatever global warming means, the predictions of the ocean levels rising are not taking place. Many Inuit see it as a "God-ordained" warming, and that "the desert shall rejoice, and blossom like a garden" (Isaiah 35:1).

For a report on the healing the land process that Canada Awakening Ministries started in August of 2008 in Arctic Bay, check here.

Inasmuch as our home community can be likened to our "Jerusalem," I believe that the people of Arctic Bay can pray this prayer, as can can the leaders and people of any community upon the face of the earth who is willing to call upon the Name of the Lord.  The intercessors are the seers, the watchmen on the wall in any community.

"I have set watchmen on your walls, O Arctic Bay.  They shall never hold their peace day or night.  You who make mention of the LORD, do not keep silent, and give Him no rest till He establishes and till He makes Arctic Bay a praise in the earth" (Isaiah 62:6, 7).