travel spreading 1858gc

Mostly tho, it was quite enjoyable, especially the times when i could study the 1858 Great Controversy with people, and also when told by someone that i had helped lift them up closer to Jesus.

Was it worth it? DEFINITELY. Seeing the low state of my Seventh-day Adventist Brothers and Sisters in most countries was painful, but the nice thing was finding out that there were nearly always between 1~3 people in every church that are really on fire, and really hungry for the truth as it is in Jesus. The only exception i can think of was at what is probably the richest SDA church in SE Asia. But that was a common thread for everywhere – where the people are rich, they don’t feel much of a need for Jesus, where the people are poor, they do.

Living for extended periods in places where you can’t speak the language or know what’s in the food or much of anything can make one feel pretty small. Seeing how God has been leading me, i realize that there must be a lot of pride in me to make God want to chisel it out this much – thank you Lord!

A list of my travels, in as good an order as i can remember:
Philippines – Malaysia – Thailand – Cambodia – Vietnam – Cambodia – Thailand – Myanmar – Thailand – Malaysia – Singapore – Thailand – Sri Lanka – India – England – Holland – Germany – Switzerland – Italy – Greece – Turkey – Georgia – Armenia – Azerbaijan – Georgia – Armenia – Georgia – United Arab Emirates – Nepal – Thailand – Philippines – Thailand – Cambodia – Vietnam – Cambodia – Thailand – Malaysia – Thailand – Laos – Thailand – Cambodia – Thailand – Cambodia – Thailand – Myanmar – Thailand –

As you might have surmised from the above list, i spent a lot of time in Thailand – nearly half of the total 38 months. I even “settled down” there, renting an apt for 10 months and working as a teacher of 4th grade for 7 months at a SDA-layman-run international school in Bangkok. My next longest-stay place was Malaysia, where i met the most humble, hungry-for-truth, and on-fire people in all my journeys – Sabah Malaysia on the island of Borneo.

Did i learn to speak other languages? Not hardly at all. This travel reinforced what i already knew – that God has prepared things, using even stuff that is looked on as “evil” by Christians (and rightly so), to spread the language that he gave his prophets the words in around 150 years ago. Everywhere you go, especially in the cities, there are people who can speak English. And every church seems to have some too. What if God had given his words to someone in Phnom Penh 150 years ago? Who would ever know? And who would be able to translate those words into other languages today? But thanks to even bad music and movies which God has for some reason allowed Satan to make, he is still working to get his words out to everyone – amazing!

Other amazing things are the technologies that God has given to/allowed man to make: airplanes, telephones, computers, internet etc. It struck me numerous times how God has made it all so easy to be a missionary in these days. But where are the missionaries? For some reason, as things have gotten easier and easier, us SDAs have gotten lazier and lazier. What’s with that? As i write this, i think of the pics of students graduating from Union College in the 1910s or so. Whole groups of them holding signs with names of far-away countries they were going to, to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ. A similarly-done pic taken today of graduates from that school (or any SDA school) would probably show them holding up signs of companies or law firms or medical centres that they had gotten hired at.

But while the number of missionaries looks to be much less today, one person can do a lot more than one person could do 100 years ago too. To print a book back then, it took a team of workers: translators, proofreaders, literary assistants, gofers, type-setters, copy-proofers, layout artists etc. etc. Now it can all be done by one or two people using a computer with decent software! And if there is a question? just type it in, and within seconds, all the power of the internet is at your fingers to produce the answer you need. Need funds? send instantly. Need to talk to someone? Very cheap to free now. Even airlines, with their discounts, have made it very cheap and easy to cover vast distances in almost no time at all. Airplanes really are the “time machines” of the 21st century.

So did i accomplish anything? I pray so. I definitely know some people who got a fire in their bones to translate and print more Ellen White books in their language. Also, many people studied this 1858gc with me, and promised to read the whole book. For the numerically inclined:
2000 English printed in Malaysia
10000 English printed in India
1000 Malay
2000 Georgian
4000 Tamil printed in India
1000 Tamil printed in Malaysia
3000 Khmer
1000 Thai
Note: Many books and languages were done/still being printed or translated in northern India and the Philippines. In both of these places i have been sponsoring people for 3 years or more to work full-time spreading this book and/or doing pastoral work.

Translated in Malaysian, Khmer, Burmese, Punjabi, Thai, and Romanian. The Tamil one was retranslated. Translation was started on Armenian but not yet completed. The Chinese and Azeri translations were started, but stopped,

Hmmm, typing this up just now, it makes it look like really i didn’t do hardly anything for 38 months…… Plus, the Malay printing and Tamil printing in Malaysia were not sponsored by myself. But that is one of the really great things – other people have caught a vision to get these book out, even if it means using their own money.

And this is where i find nearly all of us SDAs are failing — We are putting money above God. “Go, make the possessors of lands and money drunk with cares. If you can make them place their affections upon these things, we have them yet. They may profess what they please, only make them care more for money than the success of Christ’s kingdom, or the spread of the truths we hate. ….Crowd all you can around them to attract them, and they will be surely ours. ” Has Satan succeeded? “I saw that Satan carried out his plans well.” While we have the truths, especially the truth that about the state of the dead which will keep us from falling into the trap of spiritualism, we are easy prey for him when it comes to money.

Yes, i realize that in talking about this, some will think: “He’s just upset that he isn’t getting more of it”. No, that’s exactly the heart attitude that i’m warning against. Every morning i wake up and pray Matthew 6:33, and God has never failed to keep his promise. He knows just what we need. And if we don’t make a sacrifice now, we will be found outside the heavenly city one day.

This love of money is all thru our ranks, and i believe is the major cause of a huge problem i see everywhere: we are idolizing the world in our education. Our educational institutions are graduating people who have no inclination to spread the gospel. The main focus is on “getting a high-paying job”. But look at who the SDA schools hire – they try to get those with the highest diploma. So you have “Mission College”, the only higher-level educational institution we have in SE Asia, and how many MISSIONaries are they producing? almost zero.

So now one of my goals is to help start small, Bible-based schools all thruout SE Asia. It can, and must be done. We must get back to basics: Bible-based, agriculture, manual labor, technical training, and a humble heart that is on-fire to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ to a dying world.

I doubt i will go back to SE Asia soon, but am thinking about going to India. I do miss my friends in Thailand and Malaysia especially, and people in both places have asked me to come and stay as long as i like 🙂 Thank you! I want to help all that is in my power, but more than that, my dream is to get this 1858gc book into a 3D animated movie, and that looks to be driving me to go to India to fulfill that dream.

Lord, you are so lovely, the desire of all my heart. Nothing can compare to you. When my mind or eyes wander onto forbidden paths, please bring me back to the cross. Why do you love me so much? I’m nothing. Even people with some of the same blood as mine get angry at me for reproving their sins, Lord, but i love them, and want to see them in heaven. Please give me courage to call sin by its right name wherever it is – especially when it enters my heart. Please cleanse me, and make me holy.

All my friends/Brothers/Sisters i made/met on this travel, Lord, please keep them burning brightly for you. May the whole focus of their lives be sacrificing all on the altar for you. May you accept our measly sacrifice Lord, and sanctify it, change it into your likeness, so that when you come our faces will not gather blackness, but will shine with your glory, as Moses’ did when he came down from the mount after talking with you.

Lord, may your words spread thruout the whole earth. May everyone have a chance to prepare for what is going to come on the world as an overwhelming surprise. Thank you so much for choosing me to spread these words. They are life. They are joy. They are my everything – the truth. Because truth is eternal, and the truth is Jesus Christ.

Give me strength Lord to continue working for you. Show me how best to use my remaining energy and funds that you have so lovingly supplied me with. Send your angels to keep me from dashing my foot against any stones of my own making, or stones that others throw in my way.

The place i stayed is the family who printed the Japanese 1858 Great Controversy for me in 2001, and is mostly known for printing SDA literature including the “Study Bible” with the Ellen White quotes at the bottom of the pages. They are doing a great work, with a worldwide impact. Their current project is working together with the General Conference to print 2 million sets of 10 pocket-sized Spirit of Prophecy books.

Incheon airport is very nice, and in waiting for my bus, i thot back over the first time i came to Korea in 1988 – people wearing old-fashioned clothes carrying humongous bags with lots of tape and rope, and the ever-present smell of kimchi – all replaced by people wearing fashionably black clothes pulling fashionable small suitcases rolling along, and the smell replaced by cigarette smoke and Avanti perfume.

But this is still Korea, and things don’t work like in Japan – for better and for worse. The ticket for my bus says to go to 8B stop, but in going there, the driver tells me to go to 8A. My 4:20 bus i’m told will not come, so have to wait for the 4:50 bus. But everything is of much higher quality than i remember it, and soon i’m sped off to KINTEX where my friend comes to pick me up. He shows me his family’s publishing office, and i’m duly impressed. It’s one of the greatest things probably i’ve ever seen to tell the truth, except for the huge presses i’ve seen at a SDA publishing house before, and when i saw books i have ordered being printed.

I’m quite surprised at the house, as it is in the city, because the 2 times i have met them before, they lived out in the countryside. But it is very near their office, which is just next door to the printer they use, so it is very convenient in printing the books and literature. The office is large, and has around 5 or 6 computers and space for workers, with a very large area for displaying books or holding meetings etc.

Sabbath we went to the Northern Asian Pacific Division Headquarter’s English-speaking church. It was amazing to me that the president of the Division in his sermon quoted Ellen White extensively. Yes, Lord, please increase our faith. Several people were very friendly to me, and i could give a short testimony to a very small group in the Sabbath-school lesson time.

In the afternoon we walked up a hill behind the house, and were rewarded with a view extending way-out over the Han river, clear over into North Korea. It was my first time to see North Korea, and it was interesting to notice some of the contrasts with the South – no satellite dishes, no trees, no visible cars, smaller buildings etc. May God help the persecuted Christians there. It made me feel so strange to be able to worship God freely, knowing that just around 5km away, the people did not have that privilege. It was also strange to ride on the expressways seeing the high barbwire fence on the side to keep out anyone trying to infiltrate South Korea.

The family had a mini family-reunion, so there were lots of people, but my friend kindly gave me his bed and he slept on a futon on the floor. The house was very modern, and the food and everything was very good. The best thing, is that Korean houses usually have warmed floors – very nice! The Japanese could learn something there.

Sunday was mostly a computer day, but the highlight, and the highlight of the whole trip here, was in studying carefully chapter 30 of the 1858 Great Controversy with my friend. He was deeply affected, and it affected me too, giving me more energy to want to spread this wonderful book and its tremendous truths to others.

The friend and his father gave encouragement to go ahead with the 1858gc movie, giving me a heart-boost. I heard that the Korean 1858gc that was printed several years ago has gotten out to a few people, but the main translator is now in the Philippines, so i didn’t learn much about the results of spreading the book here in Korea.

And God bless me how to speed talking to them using our own national language tagalog, after i’d promoted 11 pastor order GC book including pastor bacdayan who order again bacause he knows already this GC book since 2005 he is the 1st pastor here in manila appreciated this GC book. They want to use this GC 1858 in their evangelism crusade this year, as of now i just waiting some tagalog GC book arrive from GenSan that my wife took to shipment yesterday. The central luzon conference president asked me how many tagalog GC 1858 available now, maybe he also have a evangelistic crusade in this year.

The 3000 copies additional english GC is yet finish in printing, i have no english available now, and i want to print 5000cps additional cebuan version because i have no available copies, many churches that i have not yet promote GC book in visayas and in mindanao. i want to pursue to promote over there after i finish there in northern luzon area of ilocanos people. Mrs Domingo said that we continue promote this book until in the time of jacobs trouble, she believe that this is the precious book , that she translated beside she translate another kind of books now from PPH that she do translation.

Last sabbath i’d visit 2 church and i’ve promoted this GC to the brethren in like a sermon style with my personal testimony and my life experience, why that this is the only GC 1858 book that i’ve doing missionary all over philippines riding a motorcyle. They were shocked when they heard that i’ve riding a motorcycle from gensan up to here in manila that i have no experience in flatire or trouble engine. I said that i was loaded of GC book when i was in travel and God send His angels for my protection in the road.

Thank you brother Daniel for this motorbike that have a great help for me to bring more copies of GC books to our churhes here in the philippines.

Sleep left me at 1:10am as the friend i was staying with woke up, turned on the light, said it was one o’clock, then went back to sleep. He did that several more times until it turned 5 o’clock, when he said he was going to sleep, and i could get up now. He seemed a bit surprised when i said i hadn’t slept since around 1 o’clock. I leave at 5:30, ride the subway to Umeda, then wait for my friends who are going with me, at JR Osaka station. Our train is pretty full, and i have to stand up a while, but after about 20 minutes a space opens, and the husband of my friend and i sit down and start eating breakfast. It takes about 1:30 to Himeji, and we just barely make the bus to go to church. After getting off at Aoyama-saka-no-shita, we turn left and walk about 5 minutes straight up a hill to a nicely-built “house-style” church.
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himeji sda churchRead More »

Some poor taxi driver comes up to me outside and tells me that it is “only” 600baht to downtown. I tell him it is only 35baht by bus. He looks at me and says i’ve been here a long time, then looks down, dejected. I tell him i hope he can get some business soon, and he brightens up and walks away. Thai people are a very “maipenrai” people, not lingering long over things. One security man is playing games on his cell phone, and the other one is walking around smoking a cigarette with an absent look on his face.

My friends are ready at their 14th floor apt., working on the 1858 Great Controversy in Thai and Romanian. After the intense time in Myanmar with several hours each day spent in a complete detailed proofreading of this book, i’m in full-aware mode, and hit the ground running. It is so nice to see especially the Thai translator really giving this translation priority in her life. Up to now it has seemed like just about everything little thing has been an excuse to lay off work on this book, but now it the attitude is opposite – she’s got fire!

The days flow nicely, with at least part of nearly every day spent with this 1858 Great Controversy book. Even at the Bangkok Chinese Seventh-day Adventist Church, the studies i’ve held with around 7,8 people go well. The first Sabbath back is the last one with my only Thai church friends, and we part, encouraging each other to stay true to Jesus. The next week we finish the book, and all of us are quite moved at how God has planned to save us in a beautiful home forever and ever. I’m quite moved too at what the two sisters who’ve been the mainstay of our study group do for me. May God especially bless you two, and may you stay strong for him.
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super detailed great controversy proofreadingRead More »

In walking around the city, it seems like even more shops are closed than when i came almost 3 years ago, and that there are more little stalls on the streets. Has the economy worsened? One morning in a group, one man says that the global economic difficulties don’t have much impact on Burma, because they’ve been in difficulties for 40 years! – ouch! But in an interesting way, he is very right. That interesting point, is when i think about why God allows this to happen. One possible reason that comes to mind, is that if everybody was plugged into the same economic system and thinking, it would be easier for Satan to get his one-world government going. But with some countries totally “out of the loop”, it is harder. Also, some very good qualities such as helpfulness and modesty are still practiced here, which are rapidly disappearing from richer-freer countries. It is so nice to walk around and not be greeted with belly buttons or vertical smiles.

The food for lunch every day is amazing. I’m pretty much used to rice with one cooked vegetable and one or two raw vegetables, but here it is like a full-course non-stop array of cooked veggies coming – eggplant with tomato sauce in oil, okra, some kind of curry, bean sprouts, little fried gluten pieces, etc. etc. I’m sure i’m going to gain at least one kilo from this 🙂

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myanmar musingsRead More »

What to do? I walk a bit down the same way, thinking that i will go to the closest bus stop and catch the next bus. I ask the lady in the VCD shop if bus 551 stops in front of her store, and she and several others have a fun time trying to communicate with me (at least the one lady smiled a lot). I gave her a pamphlet when i see the next bus going to the circle, and sure enough, in a minute it comes to pick me up 🙂

In around 10 minutes i see one of the most horrible sights in my life. 4 police cars with their lights on – OK, must be a drunk-driving test seeing it is 12:20 midnite – wrong. There is a form with a white sheet covering it and a slightly bruised motorbike already put up in a pickup nearby. Oh no!!! God, please comfort his family…….. All his hopes and dreams and family’s hopes and dreams for him, wiped out in an instant……. Next thing he knows, he’ll see Jesus…… Hope he is in the 1st Resurrection!

With a touch of dread i make it to the airport around 1:00 and try to curl up on a chair in front of the check-in counter as many others are doing. It is cold. After sipping a bit of cough syrup i drift in and out, not being able to drift anymore when two people on the chairs on the back side of me tell about their experiences in Thailand. After they get up, i rub my eyes and put on my glasses. Within one minute a visibly agitated youngish white man comes up to me, and tells me his story of how he was robbed the day before, and he has overstayed his visa and needs 2,000baht. My self-preservation indicator is pinging pretty solidly in the yellow area, but i think what i would want him to do if the situation was reversed, and after showing him that i only have 800baht on me, i gave him 600 and prayed with him. Later i saw some other man walking with him to the entrance of the immigration area, so i guess he was able to get the rest of the needed funds. Lord, please bless him and myself too.

Finally i check-in around 5:40, and go to the even colder boarding area where i get on the AirAsia flight to Yangon. I don’t have any bags, but notice on my boarding pass the RGN code, causing me a smile at how place names may get changed, but some things remain the same 🙂 The flight is around 90% full, amazing. I eat some bananas and gluten steak sandwich my friend made for me, and leave the starfruit alone as i spilled it out on the dirty pavement once, and forgot to wash it. Sorry to waste the one banana that went out to the sea via a grate to the sewer in Bangkok – ha!

While on the campus i met the daughter of a good friend from Sabah. She had been handed over 5 English 1858gcs that i had printed there in 2005, and being down to only 4 copies myself, it was good to get replenished – thank you!!

The following evening, my friends came up with a pickup from Bangkok, and with several of us riding in the back with the computers and books, 4 of us sprawled spaghetti-like in the back, and endured over 12 hours of bouncing around. Actually, it was quite nice at first, with the rising moon providing a soft light for the rice fields and rows of shoplots that we passed. As the nite progressed tho, it got a bit chilly. As usual, i envied all the others who seemed to have little problem dozing off to sleep. How can anyone sleep when you are moving is beyond me, but i admit that it is within the realm of possibility. I finally got some sleep in the morning when we stopped at a relative’s house, and i drank some cough syrup 🙂

We arrived in Phrao around noon. One church member runs a fried-banana shop, and i ran over there to say “konnichiwa” to her. She and her husband lived in Japan for several years, so we usually speak in Japanese. She graciously presented me with some yummy fried-bananas, which i took back to everyone who were already starting to eat in the little vegetarian restaurant.

The pastor’s house is just a couple of km out of town, but is very large and old. It sits on about 1/3 acre of land with some lychee trees and a vegetable garden. Actually, he is just renting it – for 1,000thb a month (30usd). Most of the houses there are grouped together, surrounding large rice fields. Sometimes we could hear the chanting of the monks in the large temple nearby, but overall, it was very quiet.
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regenerate northern thailand tripRead More »

The main reason i went was to help get the 1858 Great Controversy book translated into Chinese. A Malaysian lady of Chinese descent invited me to come so we could work together in translating the book. We had many emails before arriving, and she kindly asked a church member to let me stay at their place which they graciously agreed to.

Malaysia is my 3rd favorite country in the world, after America and Japan, as it is quite safe, full of good food, mostly cheap, nice climate, and best of all (in Sabah anyway) there are many on-fire Seventh-day Adventists.

After arriving at the small Senai airport that serves Johor Bahru, i called my pastor friend who quickly came to pick me up. I spent the first 5 days of my stay with him, traveling 8 hours by car to Kuala Lumpur. We took the back roads to avoid the tolls, which was nice, as we could see the countryside. The talks in the car were very deep at times, among the most interesting i’ve ever had with any pastor anywhere.
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in malaysia-2008Read More »

The bus ride the next morning on Captial Tour was supposed to be from 6:30 – around 1:30, but was from 7 – 3:30. The super-bumpy road to Sisaphon has been asphalted, so is very smooth now, so smooth in fact that the bus can stop 3 times for food instead of the normal one or two….. I was hoping to arrive in Phnom Penh and get to the pastor’s house where i’m staying by 3:30, as a group was waiting for me to introduce the 1858 Great Controversy to them, but didn’t make it until 3:45, after i had to point the way to the moto-taxi driver who had assured me he knew the place…right.

But this morning was nice in going to the Mission. I met a pastor who says someone copied the Vietnamese 1858gc for him, and now he is using that with his Vietnamese contacts – 17 members. Then the Mission receptionist called me in her office, and showed me the list she has for the number of books left in storage, and talked a bit about how they are getting spread around a bit. Then i met the man who is acting as director. He was very supportive, and said i could have the Mission morning devotional next Wed, Thur, Fri – so of course – the Khmer 1858gc will be the studied object 🙂 Also i got permission from the main Mission church leader to give a 2 – 3 minute introduction to the book tomorrow morning during church service.

You’ve got to start somewhere.

The Tamil-speaking church i went to in KL rents the 2nd floor for around 200usd/month.  There were around 100 worshipers in the 20feet by maybe 60feet long room.  While the speaking was all in Tamil, most of the written material on the screen was in English.  It was interesting to note that when asked what language they wanted the study material in, about half said “English”. 

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malaysian lifeRead More »