From the bustling harbor in Sydney to remote tropical lagoons...
From busy city streets to jungle landing strips...
From modern medical facilities
to village clinics...
Welcome
to the South Pacific Division.
The South Pacific Division of the Seventh-day Adventist church includes Australia,
New Zealand, Papua New Guinea
and the islands of the Pacific south of the equator.
While small in terms of Adventist membership, the South Pacific Division
occupies a large geographical area.
The majority of Adventist members are scattered across thousands of
Pacific islands
and 20 million square miles of ocean.
Here are islands
such as Nauru, Fiji,
Samoa,
Solomon Islands, Tonga,
Tuvalu, and Vanuatu.
Over the years Adventist missionaries have answered the call to mission to the
islands.
Gary Krause, director of Adventist Mission, talked with some of these missionaries
about their experiences.
One of these missionaries is Fran Newman, a missionary nurse who went to Atoifi
Hospital in the Solomon Islands in 1969.
"It was only a little hospital compared with the way it is now.
It was a 90-bed hospital, but when I did my monthly returns we usually had an
average of more than 100 patients per day.
But you didn't turn anybody away, if they'd paddled their canoe for several days
to get there.
They were happy to sleep wherever they could."
Mrs Newman remembers meeting an old friend for the first time while in the
Solomon Islands.
"It was probably one of the most exciting experiences
that I had while I was there, I went up to the hospital one morning
and then I saw
a name of a patient who had been admitted overnight. His name was
Daneen Wanasuka.
And when I had been training at the San I had had a pen pal at
Betty Carma School by that name.
And it turned out it was my pen pal.
After all those years. Yes, and so we went up to his village,
which was up in the hills and there had been people coming down.
But I guess
because there were no roads on Malaita,
it was either walk or
paddle your canoe to get there."
Travel on the islands was a bit tricky sometimes as Mrs. Newman can tell.
"And that's where I was taught to
paddle a dug out canoe."
"Ok, which is a handy skill to have."
"Well, yes, because I was all right in the canoe as long as I didn't breathe, as soon as I breathed I fell out
so I
gave the children at school a lot of laughter."
"I'm sure you... and they're ready to laugh too."
Another of those missionaries to the South Pacific Islands,
Bert Godfrey
and his family
went to the Solomon Islands in 1964.
"We had a little boat,
or at least we were supposed to when we got there. It was out of commission for a while
and we only had canoes,
and I had
about a two-month old daughter,
which was a little nervy
but at any rate, we got the old Keema back
and we were able to travel around in the little ship called the Keema."
"Now did you go to the Solomon's with the baby?"
"She was just
few days old when we left. Weeks old I suppose would be better, yes."
"Now that was a big decision to go with a newborn child."
"The medical care wouldn't exactly be what you might wish for."
"We were many hours away from the nearest medical help.
And I must confess I had a shock when I walked on the island.
I walked up to the big school there, and there was plaque at the entrance to
the school that told the story of a missionary who came out with his young wife
and she was buried there.
And I thought, what have I done. [Laughs]
But the Lord was good to us and we had no problems whatever.
Everything went very, very well."
Mrs. Lynn Anderson,
went to Papua New Guinea in 1968 serving first at
Togoba Leprosy hospital
and then working on a floating clinic
traveling part of the 700 mile Sepik River.
"So we spent virtually two, two and half years,
just doing clinics up and down the river as far as we could in day trips.
We did at one stage do clinics the full 200 miles
of the river, which we virtually did
later on the Pathfinder, that was our section of the river,
because the Sepik River's 700 miles.
And that was just phenomenal.
Doing clinics for the children all under five
for immunizations then dealing with all the pregnant mothers up and down the
river
as well as, we did all the schools
on the river, and some of them had
200 students and there was a lot of schools.
Some very big villages it would take us anywhere from six hours to
do a clinic.
So that was quite an experience.
We actually did the whole river and actually lived in villages, all our section of
the river I mean
and lived in the villages
at one stage and did it over a period of three months so that we could
give them the immunizations.
I guess one of the things that I can say
about
was when I had a child that I actually lost. It actually died.
And when I went back and did the clinics, the people said to me, the women
said,
we never thought white women's babies ever died.
And that brought the women and me much closer.
I had the first one while I was on the Sepik, she went out for her first clinic when she
was two weeks old.
And she joined, she was with me for the clinics every time until she was about two,
and then that's when we went back to Togoba."
"Looking back on your mission service, any regrets?"
"No, no.
Nothing at all. But I just didn't do medical work. I, wherever I went I was always
in charge
of the children's Sabbath schools
and that was a big thing in my experience because
children would come,
some of them up 12, 13, 14, and you run this Sabbath school.
Not Adventists, but they just enjoyed it,
and I just hope some of that has made a difference in some of their lives."
Thanks to the love and dedication of missionaries like these,
the foundations were laid for a church that would grow rapidly on the islands.
Yet there are still mission challenges here.
There are still many areas that are remote, where medical care and spiritual
resources are scarce.
For years, the Adventist church has operated clinics in these remote
villages.
As time passed, the facilities grew old and they were ill equipped.
In 2007,
the Adventist church in the South Pacific launched Adopt a Clinic,
a program to team each Adventist church in Australia and New Zealand
with one of the region's clinics, which range from bush huts to modern-style
buildings.
Now they are looking at building some new clinics in villages that are in need of
some type of medical care.
Today mission planes are helping ferry people and resources to these remote
areas thanks in part to worldwide support of the Thirteenth Sabbath
Offering several years ago.
These planes have a tremendous impact on the lives of people living in the areas they serve.
Yet the mission challenge remains.
One of the major challenges is reaching secular and post-modern people in the
major cities of the region,
including the secular and post modern people of Australia
and New Zealand.
Lynn Anderson: "And even though I 'm back here in Australia, I think our church, we've got a mission
field right here in Australia.
And I'm pleased that I still work outside the church
and I can witness to the people that I work with and I hope I do the right thing."
Please pray for mission in the South Pacific Division and thank you for your
support of the mission offerings.