(Voor Nederlandstalige versie, zie link onderaan.)
Our dear sister Iris Bowman passed through the veil into Glory during the night from Wednesday to Thursday (August 20/21) in her apartment in West Papua, Indonesia. It was two months to the day after her 73rd birthday. Born June 21st, 1952. She was found in the midst of her work with her iPad in front of her and a glass of water in her hand. She had not shown up for breakfast, so Victor went up to the apartment they had built for her and Janny 5 years ago and found her there.
Iris brought a brother from West Papua, and during the ceremony, the brother representing Papua New Guinea joined together with the brother from West Papua (Iris in the center, uniting them) and proclaimed that spiritually, the two nations of this Island would become one.
The upcoming conference would be the fulfillment of the vision as both sides would come together for a fellowship over the High Holy Days. Iris was preparing several people for the dances which she and Janny had developed over the years, showing the roles of Ephraim and Judah coming together as One in Messiah. The Dance of the Golden Bride. She had also developed other dances that would be part of the conference program, like the Dance of Gomer, the Dance of the Last Eve[2], the Dance of Return to the Garden and the Machanaim (Song of Solomon 6:13).
From the time Iris was young (born in the Netherlands) and entered the “mission field”, as she understood it at the time, she never looked back. Despite many challenges and a reliance on faith[3] for provision for the ministry they were called to together, she kept her eyes on the goal. (Phillipians 3:13,14). It never seemed there was a pause in the assignments Abba gave them. Prophetic calling and anointing kept her looking for the meaning behind the many twists and turns she experienced. Part of that calling was to the Land of Israel. Living in the City of David for many years and then in the Arava, where we brought many to the Land for tours and prophetic ministry, it was in 2010, through James and Liz Block, that we were introduced to the fellowship group led by Ephraim and Rimona.
In 2014, she, along with the Franks and Hanoch Young, planned the first Ephraimite group to participate in the Jerusalem March. She provided beautiful banners for the march. In 2016, she led a group to the 2nd Bney Yoseph National Congress, where she presented the “Dance of the Two Brides”, culminating with one, “Golden Bride”.
Janny always had a great cup of coffee ready and special baked goods for our long visits. All of you who have ever spent time with them would attest to that! It was never a short visit. Many times, Janny would get up and prepare a soup for sustenance as the hours continued in deep conversation. Their journeys would take them on many more adventures, including circumnavigating Australia and doing more prophetic acts in Europe. We would see them for the last time in 2018 when I played violin for James Block’s tour in the Netherlands. But the connection with them continued as we represented them for a prophetic act in Israel in 2020 right as COVID was being announced as a Pandemic (or was it plandemic?)
In 2021, when Janny passed away unexpectedly in Australia, as they were preparing to return to Papua to live, Iris knew she was meant to continue on and return to Papua. She took Janny’s ashes with her. Her work was not finished. It would be the greatest challenge of her life. She called Papua “The land of broken promises and broken things”. There was never a time she didn’t have a battle. She returned to the people they had reached in the midst of the jungle – the Bauzies. She even sponsored a family to come into the city to learn Indonesian and attend Bible School, so they could return to the village and teach their people how to read and write, hopefully setting up a school.
Her health began to fail progressively in the past 4 years as she experienced high blood sugar, high blood pressure, heart issues, and cataracts. She would tell me about episodes when she felt she was walking through the valley of the shadow of death, but she would press through and despite her weakness, Yah sustained her and kept her going from one assignment to another. It was truly miraculous! Perhaps those of us who prayed for her and interceded on her behalf “held up her arms” as Aaron and Hur held up Moses’?
After Janny passed away, I somehow became Iris’s “ear”. She would call, and it was never less than 2-3 hours that she would pour out both complaints and revelations. She became a dear friend and mentor. Not knowing it would be our last conversation, I spoke with her last Shabbat. She was sharing details about the conference preparations and how I could pray. It always seemed the people of Papua saw her as a resource for everything, and often the burden became almost too much to bear. Two things stood out to me in her sharing this time. “I’m so tired” and “I don’t want to eat anymore”. But she kept running toward the goal, carrying the people group she and Janny had adopted decades earlier. They called her “Mama Iris,” and though she never married, she “birthed” many children for the Kingdom of Elohim.
A true servant of Yah, she ran her race until her heart could no longer beat to the rhythm of this world, so Abba took her home to rest in His peace and His arms. She will be buried tomorrow morning (August 23) next to her ministry partner Janny, in Waena, West Papua, Indonesia. 9:00 AM Saturday Papua time (8:00 PM Friday EST – 2:00 AM Saturday European time).
May her memory inspire us to keep running the race set before us (Hebrews 12:1-2).
I am sure she heard Yeshua say,” ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You were faithful with a little, so I’ll put you in charge of much. Enter into your master’s joy!’ ”
In Yeshua,
Rebecca Hazelton (aka Rivka)
Eustis, Maine, VS
[1] the coordinator of the movement in the Pacific that started 40 years ago by the prophet Rev. Michael Maeliau and was still called All Pacif Arise.
[2] Van het album Trumpets to Tabernacle – A journey back to the Garden https://open.spotify.com/album/5F7vWk71LWxVgXAmdQz5g9
[3] She called her travels always FAITH-travels: Fantastic Adventure in Trusting Him