SULADS STORIES

Our Church Was On Fire

By:Joseph Oguel

Formerly a student at  Bulalang Mission School

I paid a sentimental visit to my home village in Bulalang. I am now a graduate of theology from MVC and I’m thinking of what help I can give my people. My heart goes out for them.

Coming to a spot in a cool forest mountain where I can view the village, my heart broke. I couldn’t hold my emotions.  I recalled the days when I was still a boy in the former Bulalang Mission School. I was innocent, skinny and with bulging tummy because of malnutrition. It never came into my mind that I would one day be a theology graduate and soon to be a minister.  But how can I ever turn my back on my people? This thought kept disturbing me.

I hurried my pace so I could reach there before dark.  Then I found myself in the midst of wide rice paddies with full-grown rice ready for harvest. WOW!  What a beautiful sight.  This swamp used to grow weeds.  The only rice paddies I saw before was that of our SULADS teachers behind their cottage. Those good teachers left an example of “life” for my people. Now my people no longer feed on sweet potatoes and rats anymore but on rice. I was sad to know that the SULADS pulled out from Bulalang because the government has come in with a formal school. I count it a “work well done” by the SULADS because they were the ones who sacrificed their lives to pave the way for the government to come in.

Coming in to the village, I saw the former airstrip where we used to run dangerously to meet Mr. Don Christensen’s Cessna. No more dormitories, no more school, no more cafeteria, no more missionaries.  Oh how I missed those times that molded me to be the real me I am now. I was relieved though that a new government school now stands in the midst of the village.

Then I saw the church still standing where it used to stand. “How’s our church?” I asked my brother who is now the church elder. 

“The church is full every Sabbath,” he said. My heart leaped for joy upon hearing the news and I wiped a tear away.

“How’s your new school here?” I continued.

“It’s doing good but I still miss the SULADS missionaries,” he said.” Our government teachers don’t lead worships. They are not SDAs.  I missed the SULADS’ songs that bring the children in, filling the air with heavenly music.  I miss their stories from the picture rolls, and their visit to our homes to treat the sick. I miss the company of the SULADS.

“I’m sad that lowlanders brought some evil to the village,” my brother continued.

“What’s that?” I inquired.

“Gambling, drinking, smoking and disco have disturbed our village and divided our people.  Our village was such a peaceful place when the SULADS missionaries were here,” he recalled.

“You need to do something to keep our church members intact,” I reminded him.

“We just continue our worship everyday and night, our church services every Wednesday and Friday evenings and the whole day of the Sabbath.” 

“That’s great”! I congratulated him. “Don’t you sometimes feel discouraged and weak with the absence of the SULADS,” I frankly asked.

“I surely am discouraged many times, but I am strengthened by the new experience we have just had.”.

“Would you tell me that please,” I pleaded.

“One Tuesday night”, he begun, “three of our Adventist boys were tempted to join with two other non-SDA boys at the disco at the basketball court just across our church. The rock beats vibrated and the deafening noise brought the village to a mood of dancing with the demons.

“As the boys were getting nearer to the crowd of the disco place, the attention of those three boys of ours was caught by the light and singing in our church.

“‘OUR CHURCH!, OUR CHURCH!’ they shouted.

“‘What about your church?’ the other two boys asked.

“‘Our church is on fire! It‘s on fire but not burning! Listen to that music! I can hear a choir singing!’

“‘Yes, BEAUTIFUL isn‘t it,’ the other two SDA boys approved.

“‘What are you talking about?’ The two non-SDAs were impatient now.  ‘We don’t see any fire; we don’t hear any singing. I can’t see your church, it’s dark there,’ the other boy continued.  ‘Come on let’s go,’ they persuaded. 

“But the three were just standing there in awe. ‘WOW! What a beautiful music,’ they said.

“‘Do you have worship tonight,’ the other boys asked.

“‘No it’s Tuesday,’ they answered.  ‘Please be quiet! We are listening to the music.’

“ The two boys left them standing there, and they listened to the heavenly angelic music, until it faded softly away. All of a sudden there was darkness! They couldn’t see the church any longer. All they heard then were the hard beats of rock noise from the disco again.  They raced back to their homes to tell their parents of the unusual sight they saw and heard.”

“The LORD is reminding us today to keep our church burning with heavenly music to get the attention of our youth; to hold on to the ROCK of AGES not to the world‘s rock-n-roll, I reminded my brother.”

Is YOUR church on fire and filled with heavenly music?  If not, why?