Participants:
Series Code: GMS
Program Code: GMS000905B
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00:09 Welcome back.
00:10 Next up we travel to Indonesia, 00:12 where Rick Kajiura is talking with Darren Boyd. 00:15 Thank you. 00:17 We're here in the Highlands of Indonesia, 00:20 right close to the Papua New Guinea border, 00:22 and we flew in a short time ago, 00:25 and with me is Pastor Darren Boyd 00:27 who is the Adventist Mission Coordinator 00:29 in this part of the world. 00:31 And, Darren, it's really good to have you with us 00:34 or I guess I'm with you today, 00:35 because we flew in here this morning. 00:38 Right here we're sitting beside something 00:40 that wasn't here too many years ago. 00:42 Can you tell us what this is? 00:43 This is a church that was the dream of Bob Roberts, 00:47 our mission pilot that was here before. 00:51 And yeah, 00:54 so he kept flying here 00:55 with material for commercial flights, 00:59 and kept seeing this, some Adventist members 01:03 from P and G came across and said, 01:05 "Why don't we have a church there?" 01:07 And so he began the process of building this here. 01:12 Not he himself, 01:13 but he hired some people to do it. 01:15 Those his vision and dreams. Yes. 01:17 And one of the things about anything that's up here is 01:20 you can't just walk down the street 01:22 and buy whatever you need. 01:24 Absolutely. 01:25 So, how does everything get here? 01:27 What does it take to build a church up here? 01:29 Yeah, nothing is easy. 01:30 Everything has to be created from something. 01:33 So all the wood that we have here is cut with the chainsaw, 01:38 a 36-inch bar chainsaw, three meters. 01:43 And then it's walked here probably a lot of this wood is 01:47 cut from two days walk away, so... 01:50 So then they have to carry it all... 01:52 By hand... Up the mountain. 01:53 Yeah, it's quite expensive because you have to pay 01:55 to the carriers for that and then for the fuel, 02:00 all the fuel has to be filled in 02:02 just to cut the trees. 02:03 Cut the trees and then any roofing material... 02:06 Roofing, screws, the windows, 02:09 everything is flown in by planes 02:11 and many, many trips coming by. 02:13 And if they could see the runway 02:15 it's not like this, it's like this. 02:16 No, they're landing uphill. 02:17 So landing on a side of a mountain basically. 02:21 Now we have a Global Mission pioneer 02:24 who's working here. 02:26 Yes. He's been here how long? 02:29 Just three weeks. Just three weeks. 02:31 So he's getting used to it, 02:32 but we have wonderful hopes for the future of the working. 02:35 Actually before him our builder was here 02:37 and he has quite a bit of skills in that area 02:41 and so for the last year or so 02:43 the builder has been the primary leader here. 02:47 And he's, the builder's here right now as well, 02:49 he's just finishing up, the work project here, so... 02:52 Great, and we saw little damage from a windstorm, 02:54 and that needs to be repaired as well. 02:56 So what are some of the challenges 02:58 of doing mission work in this region? 03:01 Transportation and communication, 03:04 that's our two biggest things most... 03:08 On the Indonesian side of the border 03:10 of the Island of New Guinea, there're 256 languages. 03:15 So when the Tower of Babel happened, 03:18 I think a lot of the people came here, so... 03:24 So you have probably preached 03:25 where it's been translated two or three times. 03:27 Yes, sometimes literally, from English to Indonesian 03:32 to whatever the local language is, 03:34 and you lose some of the concepts. 03:36 So our Global pioneer is learning the language here, 03:39 he was proud to demonstrate it and learned about 03:42 25 or 30 words in the last three weeks, so... 03:45 Now you were telling me a story 03:48 about another plan in another village, 03:50 you had some communication difficulties. 03:52 Yes, yeah, so recently I was on the South coast 03:56 about an hour south from here, 03:58 and our Global pioneer had been in one village, 04:04 for almost a year, he's 10 months. 04:07 And we had no way to send communication to him. 04:12 And so I said, how in the world, 04:13 I really want to get acquainted with him again, 04:18 and see how things are going after 10 months. 04:23 And so we dreamed and prayed, and how can we do this? 04:27 And I was dropping another Global pioneer 04:30 and I said to him, Melthy, we need to pray. 04:35 We've got to pray that God will work out something for us. 04:38 So we prayed, 04:40 we found a place to stay for the night in the village 04:43 where the Global pioneer was being dropped. 04:47 And then I said, 04:48 "Let's go find the restaurant where we can go eat." 04:52 As we were coming to town, the restaurant... 04:58 We were getting closer, all of a sudden I saw this man, 05:00 a bearded man, start running beside me, 05:03 along with our motorcycle and said, 05:05 "Pastor, stop, stop, stop!" 05:08 Who was this guy? Yeah, who is he? 05:11 And I looked at him for a while and I said, "Who is he?" 05:14 Oh, yeah, that's our Global pioneer. 05:16 He'd grown a big beard in 10 months. 05:19 The amazing thing is when we had prayed 05:24 God had given him a dream in the night 05:26 that he needed to come to our village. 05:29 So he came. 05:31 And he had just arrived. 05:36 Actually, he had denied the call, 05:39 he kept hearing that call, 05:40 he denied the call, all morning long, 05:42 but he finally said to his wife, "I'm going." 05:44 When he woke up, the reason he didn't come was 05:46 there was big waves on the river. 05:48 But finally, the impression became so strong 05:51 that he came anyway. 05:52 And so he, he came to us, 06:00 to our village, we're sitting on the side of the road praying 06:03 when we passed in front 06:05 and amazingly how we were right there 06:11 at the time that he had just prayed. 06:13 God answered, He did the communication for us. 06:16 So there are communication difficulties, 06:18 but there are other ways around it when God's in control. 06:20 That's wonderful. 06:22 You know, we're here not far from Papua New Guinea 06:25 and not long ago I was in Japan 06:27 and there was somebody from Papua New Guinea working there, 06:30 an Adventist working there. 06:32 People go, missionaries go from everywhere to everywhere today, 06:35 but you've come a long way from America here, 06:37 what motivates you to leave home and come out here? 06:44 Yeah, I was pastoring for 17 years, 06:46 in Georgia and Tennessee. 06:51 And I had worked as Adventist Mission Coordinator 06:55 similar to that of evangelism coordinator 06:59 in the Chattanooga area where Mark Finley had come. 07:03 And one day Mark called me on the phone, Pastor Finley. 07:08 And he said, "Darren, have you thought about 07:11 doing some mission service sometime?" 07:15 And I said, "Well, yeah, 07:18 obviously I've gone with you several times." 07:22 And he said, "Good, because your name is on the list." 07:26 And so, here you are today, 07:28 because of that, your name was on the list. 07:30 Well, thank you, Darren, 07:32 it's been wonderful talking with you, 07:33 it's wonderful coming to visit some of these areas. 07:35 It's a beautiful area 07:37 and it's wonderful to see the challenges. 07:38 You guys said there at least 100 villages 07:41 that could still be have churches planted 07:42 and a whole lot more... 07:44 Oh, yeah, 60,000. 60,000, more than 100. 07:48 So thank you very much. And back to you. 07:51 Next up, we travel to Italy 07:54 and specifically to the Waldensian Valley 07:57 where a Global Mission pioneer 07:59 is starting a new group of believers. 08:11 This place has a great significance 08:13 for the history of Protestants in general, 08:16 and also for us as Seventh-Day Adventists. 08:19 Visitors to Italy's Waldensian Valley 08:22 are struck by its beautiful scenery. 08:24 But these beautiful valleys 08:26 are also a testament to faith and courage. 08:29 More than a century ago this is where 08:32 the Waldensian people fled to escape persecution. 08:36 They setup a missionary training school 08:38 and when persecution followed them, 08:40 they hid in caves to worship. 08:43 These valleys also played an important role 08:46 in Seventh-Day Adventist history. 08:48 And it's also significant place for us 08:50 'cause the baptism outside of the United States of America 08:55 was done here in Torre Pellice. 08:58 The Waldenses believed that 08:59 it was their duty to spread the gospel, 09:02 not keep it to themselves. 09:04 They wanted the world to know God's message 09:06 despite the risks that came with sharing it. 09:09 Today, as Christians 09:11 we still have a message of hope for the world 09:14 and a commission to carry the gospel to the world 09:16 so Jesus can come again. 09:21 Gabriele is the Global Mission pioneer 09:23 here in the Waldensian Valley. 09:25 Global Mission pioneers are lay people 09:28 sent out to plant new groups of believers. 09:31 But Gabriele's challenge is a little different. 09:34 His task is to share the Adventist faith 09:36 with people in these historic valleys. 09:39 We're trying to rekindle this faith in the Waldenses. 09:45 They were students of the Bible, 09:46 students of Bible prophecies, 09:48 so we're kind of trying to awake them to the heritage 09:51 that was left to them by their fathers. 09:54 Right now actually we have a small church 09:57 about 30 people in attendance. 09:59 And the thing is that we don't have an Adventist presence, 10:04 presence here in the valleys. 10:06 Basically all the members come from outside the valleys, 10:10 except for three of us 10:12 who live in the church buildings. 10:14 Members get together often, but have to travel far 10:17 to attend church or study together 10:19 during the week. 10:21 Gabriele's time is devoted to leading 10:23 and growing this small congregation. 10:26 You have many denominations here in the valley so, 10:29 there is good protestant presence here, and so you can, 10:33 you can speak about spiritual topics very, very freely. 10:38 It's not uncommon here to speak about God. 10:42 Since religion is so freely and commonly spoken about, 10:45 it takes a lot for people to stop and really listen. 10:49 Gabriele has only been here for about a year, 10:51 and he's experienced many of the challenges 10:53 of sharing his Adventist faith in this part of the world. 10:57 Please pray for the people in this region of the world. 11:00 Pray that pioneers like Gabriele 11:02 can be a light to these valleys. 11:21 Well, that's about it for Global Mission Snapshots today. 11:23 I hope that you've been inspired and challenged 11:26 by what you've seen and heard. 11:28 Around the world today from Italy to the United States to, 11:32 big cities to rural areas Seventh-day Adventists 11:36 are sharing the light of God's love, 11:38 in practical, tangible ways. 11:41 And I want to thank you for your support 11:42 of this mission through your prayers, 11:45 through your finances, and through 11:47 your personal involvement. 11:48 Before we go, I'd like to offer you a small free gift, 11:52 you can see it on your screen now. 11:53 It's just a small token, a small thanks 11:56 for your continuing participation in mission. 12:00 Well, for Adventist Mission I'm Gary Krause 12:03 and I hope that you can join me next time 12:05 right here on Global Mission Snapshots. |
Revised 2015-11-30