Borneo Island Work

Date: Apr 17, 2004

Borneo Island Work

Date: Apr 17, 2004

Yes Ikan-san, Where did we drop the ball? Surely the angels are sad

How can we recover lost ground? We need boots on the ground, and literature in the hands.

You have a visa for where you are???

I was able to get a 5 year missionary visa in 1999 for being director of the SDA English school here in Osaka, but my job only lasted 7 months because of me bringing some homeless friends to church. They said they would get my visa cancelled, but still was able to use it 2 weeks ago when i got back from America. If everything works right, and it is God's will, hopefully i'll be here until Fall - 2005.

Shake!

Date: Apr 17, 2004

There is a special visa situation for Americans in our host country, that I will explain to you in a private e-mail. I sorta promised the Immigration Minister, whom I know when we cooked a veggie New Year's party last year for some Buddhist friends, NOT to spread it around.

"Where did we drop the ball?" I figure about the middle of the 1950's, when Americans felt they had conquered the world and SDAs wanted to be just Joe in the religious world. Then we lost the Holy Spirit's power to teach us, reach us put fire in our bellies for the Truth.

Please write me if you are serious about that printing press idea

Date: Apr 21, 2004

Middle 1950s? hmmmmmm No doubt that was big. I especially remember (thru books), the Questions on Doctrine compromise with the Evangelicals to get Seventh-day Adventists off the "cult" list. No, No, don't want to be "cultish" now do we? Let's just try to be like the world as much as we can and still slide into heaven huh? Sounds much easier.

Just from my own studies, it seems like big changes to the Adventist group came in 1863 with incorporation (a good thing of course), 1881 when James White died and Uriah Smith became chief editor (very bad), 1888 when the church formally rejected the Holy Spirit (nothing is worse than this), 1902-3 when everything burned up and was forcibly scattered, 1950s with afore-mentioned QOD, 1980 with major revision of sanctuary doctrine and denial of God's Word being without error etc. by many SDA leaders & teachers, and perhaps the going to law in the 1990s to "protect" the name SDA.

I see pics in the old books of whole classes of students planning to be missionaries, holding signs of the countries they were planning to go to, and wonder what happened. Personally, i chose not to go to a SDA university because my relatives who did go seemed less interested in spiritual things than before they went! The "higher criticism" Jesuit method of education is thoroughly imprinted on our SDA school system. That is why many of the teachers there have degrees from Babylonish schools. Or did it come about the other way around? Whatever, it is very difficult to find religion teachers in our schools who totally believe the Bible or SOP is without error.

Date: Apr 21, 2004

That's the time line-up I got too, Dan. As a matter of fact, history shows that is exactly what happened.
The "dumbing down" of the Message's presentation (not the it's archived writings!) by selfish, Victorian "men of policy" came quite early, though, I say by 1858, due to many factors outlined by the True Witness, elaborated by EGW and freshly re-asserted by EJW and ATJ. But it appears that the church as a whole merely knodded about the 1888 message, leaving the Holy Spirit's direct envolvement out im a large degree by 1893 or so. I notice a brave attempt by EJW and ATJ to stick to their guns, but U.Smith and Co. really didn't want the boat roccked too much; just a wee bit was OK, but nothing too radical. Intellectualism,"double-speak", and conformity to "society" were bright shiny newborn babes in the late Victorian period, and unsaved SDAs sucked up to it, while keeping a "painted face" of piety plastered on thick.

Yes: I have a good collection of really old SDA books with the group shots of Missionary groups;
I have their books on what happened to them, at least from those who wrote or actually had a real solid term in the field, which apparantly was a rare event. (I have a ATJ report on missionaries failures from the 1897 General Conf. Bulletin)

By 1925 or so most "missionaries" were just hospital workers, as the boom in colonial Asia for hospitals was at a peak, soon to die during the Depression and WWII. I have a hard time calling them true medical missionaries, as by that time drug use was on the raise, the Sanitarium system was being phased out, and Sanitary Restaurants and food factories were just in Australia,Singapore or New Zealand...hardly Asia! The fear of the Asian was still deep inside most SDAs from Middle America.

But there were brave unsung heros out there, unattached to the Church's payroll, learning the language, living as locals (instead of the SDA compounds or closed housing areas), tending the sick and the homeless, preaching to any that would listen. And I am sure there were some ON the payroll too. Only Jesus knows.

I have not followed checkered history of SDA schools so much, so I can't speak with authority. Jesuit? Maybe. Worldly? No question. http://www.sparkimg.com/emoticons/hmm.gif

Date: Nov 15, 2004

Ikan, please tell me what SOP books you need to scatter from door to door on this island where you are working. Will the book "Steps to Christ" in the English language be put to good use? Please tell me of your needs.

Date: Feb 11, 2005

Where is Ikan & is he ok ? His e-mail in Borneo will not take mail anymore. What has happened to him & his wife ????

Date: Feb 23, 2005

I went to see Ikan-san last October. You are welcome to see my somewhat lengthy account here:

http://great-controversy-movie.com/blog/index.php?p=55

It was very sad to learn that Ikan has a bad lying habit. I pray he can overcome it, and be a shining light for Jesus again.