Refine Search

The South Pacific Calls

By a family on a South Pacific Island

IN 1951 the Watch Tower Society’s president told us of the great work to be done in the islands of the Pacific. He said that official prejudice and hatred make it impossible for the Society’s missionaries to enter many of these islands. When my wife and I heard this we decided that we would try to get to one of the suggested islands. (Names and places we will not mention, to safeguard theocratic interests in these areas.) We talked the matter over with our son and daughter. They were all for the idea—so pioneering was for us!

Suddenly we were plagued with a wave of frightening thoughts such as, Would it be wise for us to engage in such a tremendous undertaking? What about our health and age? We were close to fifty. Maybe it would be better to leave the islands to the adventurous young. We thought, too, What about our children, their education and their future? Island work meant giving up good jobs, high wages, savings and many things we thought quite highly of. The branch servant told us that island preaching was difficult but very urgent. We thought it over as a family and it was still for us. We would go to the islands. But where? What island? Oh, we talked about several places. With the Society’s approval we wrote to a brother on an island and asked what work was available; could an Australian own land, run a farm, have a business? etc. We leaped for joy when the reply came with the advertisement of a farm, a small freehold property for sale with a house.

We still owned our 3,000-acre farm, which was fully stocked and equipped with the latest farm machinery. The farm had served us well, but now it was demanding more and more of our time and effort. We had been holding on to it for the sake of the children. But we asked ourselves, Why should they want old-world materialism? We would sell the property. Hardly had we decided on selling when there was a buyer at our door. The price was soon agreed upon and Australia would be left behind without any worldly ties.

Major difficulties melted away one by one once we firmly made our decision. Ours was a lovely home pleasantly set in a driveway of pines. It was modernly furnished too. Seeing our beautiful place, people couldn’t understand why we wanted to sell. Frankly speaking, it wasn’t easy. It was a very hard decision to make. After years of pioneering and clearing the land, fencing and watering the property, pasturing and stocking, also planning for an assured old age and the children’s future prosperity, then suddenly up and selling all that we had lived, hoped and worked for wasn’t easy by any stretch of the imagination. It didn’t sound like the sensible or the reasonable thing to do. I know it didn’t to people of the world. Yet we did it.

It didn’t seem long before we were saying good-by to our friends, our relatives, our car and Australia. From a mountain of material substance we stripped ourselves of all but sixty pounds of personal clothes—the weight for air travel to the islands. Empty-handed, so to speak, we were about to pioneer as a family for the new world. The missionary spirit and outlook filled us with excitement. It thrilled us.

But the initial thrill soon wore off after we arrived in the islands. We have had many ups and downs. Sometimes it seemed impossible to carry on, and yet we stuck despite ourselves. Now, however, with Jehovah’s loving guidance and mercy, we never want to leave this most joyful harvest field ripe for gathering. We had a new farm to start, new buildings and fencing to put up, but with a different end in view, that is, to remain in the islands, finding and feeding the Lord’s other sheep. Our son helped on the farm, our daughter had to finish her education—this by correspondence, because we were about forty miles away from a European school. Prayerfully we tried to live the life of a theocratic family. Added privileges have been ours as a family, because we have been able to work together on and off the farm. Our daughter is at present vacation pioneering, which, of course, brings us great joy.

At first we cared for interest in unassigned territory, developing Bible studies held weekly some fifty miles away. We would start early and work late. Local interest began to quicken as more public talks were held and door-to-door work was established. Now we work closer to home, giving more time to the feeding program. Can you visualize us sitting on mats crossed-legged on the floor with these Bible-loving folk very attentive and wide-eyed as we explain Bible truths to them? They are great readers of the Bible, reading and rereading it. They are so familiar with the Scriptures that some of them can recite chapters from memory, but they have so little understanding. They want the truth and have a love for it, but they possess a great fear of religion.

Fear of dead spirits keeps alive old witch practices, exploitation in the past makes them suspicious and raises barriers. It does our hearts good to hear islanders say that they are learning the truth. To fellowship with them and enjoy their company is worth a million Australian farms! How they love their fun! And what love! The womenfolk invite the sisters to swim with them before having their studies. They love with a whole heart and you know it.

To do God’s work as a family is indeed a blessed way to carry the Kingdom message to the people. We conduct twenty and more studies regularly. Our daughter holds studies with the girls, our son with the youths, and then older ones appreciate older aid to break down the “female barrier” among the Hindu women. Our joys grow as each step is taken. The present urgent need is to reach the educated islanders, who, in turn, will be able to carry the good news in their own language. Many speak the languages of the islands, but cannot read it. To witness effectively it is necessary to do both.

What better field could one serve in? To hear these islanders say that they have come to know Jehovah, to hear them call our children their children, this because they love them so for the truth, to watch both Kingdom interest and attendance grow, to hear these lovely people say: “My children will marry only in the Lord,” and this after being associated with many centuries of tradition and Eastern-type marriages, to watch them straighten and clean up marital tangles, to see a Hindu explain Bible literature to an island Sunday-school teacher, to hear Indian tots learn their first English words, Jehovah’s name and the books of the holy Word, to see them studying as they mind the cattle by the roadside, after backbreaking work in the rice field, to know that they are discussing the wrongness of idolatry, the beauty of Jehovah’s name at the local store and other places, to have an elderly Indian mother call you brother and sister and ask to go with you to tell the folk about the true God, although she cannot read or write any language. She can speak the truth in her own tongue. All this adds up to a priceless reward for having taken the step that we did in answer to the call from the South Pacific. For Jehovah’s goodness we are most humbly grateful.

We hope that our little experience will awaken in you the desire to come to this joyous field ripe for garnering. In the New World society of Jehovah’s witnesses there must be many more persons that can answer a call where the need is great.