It was a real blessing to spend two and a half weeks in Port Vila during August as part of Vanuatu for Christ.
Long before the meetings began, the Tupoa church had been preparing the community. For months, members had been running health programs and heading out for street witnessing every Sunday morning from 6:00 to 8:00 am.
The meetings were held on a street corner owned by a local chief, who had given the church permission to use his land for God’s work. The church purchased a new stage and constructed it right there on the corner.
After the first night, one of the deacons decided the sound was not travelling far enough into the community. His solution was simple: buy much bigger speakers.
Before long, the message could be heard kilometres down the road. People listened from their cars, beneath banana trees, in the tall grass and from inside their homes throughout the surrounding community. If they were not coming to the meetings, the meetings were certainly coming to them!
Behind every program was another important group that could not be seen from the stage. Throughout each meeting, people gathered in a prayer room, continually praying for the speaker, the message and everyone listening.
After the first three meetings, the local chief was visited and shared that many people had been asking whether he was going to become a Seventh-day Adventist.
“No,” he replied, “but I do like their messages, and I want God’s work to go ahead.”
But God was still working on his heart.
After attending every night for two weeks, the chief and his wife asked to study the Bible with the local elders. Praise the Lord!
The experience highlighted an important truth: every connection we make with another person can become a link in the chain leading them to Jesus. Some people may form the first link, others may come somewhere in the middle, and someone else may be there when a person finally makes a decision—but every link is vital.
The meetings concluded with a baptism of people the church had been working with during the previous 12 months. A new group also made decisions during the series and will continue studying the Bible in the coming months.
The meetings may have finished, but the chain is still growing. – This was the experience of David Cherry.
