Our departed Presiding Bishop
Asia and The Great Commission
Mission Information
A REPORT FROM THE PHILIPPINES
UPDATE: +Magdalen/Thomas continues to work closely with Bishop Jose Milan and the Grace Mountain Mission.
Pastors, the husband & wife missionary team, Seken P. Bangun and Ernawati G. Bangun of Indonesia, now serving in Malaysia. Canidates for Holy Orders and were ordained on June the 13th 2004 by Bp. Darkus at Grace Mountain Cathederal, Sinipsip, Benguet.
WE WELCOME Fr. Charles "Francis" Schmidt to the Holy Order of Priest. Fr. Francis was ordained by Bp. Darkus on January the tenth, 2004, at the International Convention Center, Tagaytay, Cavite Prov., the Philippines. Fr. Francis is the Dean of the School of Nursing, Tagaytay City College. [posted Feb. 12, 2004]
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Archbishop Jan Visser was laid to rest on September 21, 2005 at The Grace Mountain Mission, may he rest in eternal peace.
[Recorder: Wesleyan Missionary, Mrs. Budensick]
Conversations with Archbishop Jan Visser,
THE BEGINING
It all began with a casual conversation around the luncheon table in the mission home on the campus of a Bible college at Rosales, Pangasinan. We were three, seated there in the tropical heat of mid-day. John Visser who had come south from the mountain province of Benguet to bid good bye to Miss Grace Tsutada, a missionary from Japan who was about ready to return on furlough, and myself, a Wesleyan Gospel Corps worker.
Prompted by some innocent question of mine, Brother John began talking of his early experiences in working with disadvantaged people in his native Netherlands. This had been followed by similar experiences in Canada, Indonesia and finally Northern Luzon in the Philipines.
Here, for two hours we sat, ignoring the heat, the flies and the outside noises. The house girl came to clear the table and we talked on. The bell rang for classes-a student banged on a steel hoop with a rock- and still we sat, asking questions and listening to this normally quiet, gentle reserved servant of God telling how he had been led through four countries, doing what lay before him as God’s work for him.
After he had finished, I said, “John, what you have just told us would make a powerful book. From boyhood on a small farm in the Netherlands, hiding as a youth from conscription in the German Army of Occupation, immigration to Canada, working as a lumberjack, taking training in the care of mentally disturbed children, on to Indonesia for the same work and now to the Philippines. What a life!
Modestly, John said “No.” I urged him, offered my tape recorder. Grace offered tapes. Still, “No.”
Two weeks later Brother John stopped at the mission home in Rosales on his way to Manila. “I have not come for food- only coffee,” he said. “I have decided to do it.” Of course we knew what he meant. So we made plans for the next week, which was test week at the school, and I would be relatively free. We spent two afternoons making tapes in interview style. The following chapters are the result of this conversation. I hope you will find them as thrilling and inspiring as I did.
According to his promise, John appeared at the door one hot day. He arrived by tricycle, accompanied by barking dogs and welcoming students. A Philippine tricycle is a motorized bicycle with a sidecar attached. He had made the long trip from the mountain province of Benguet by bus as far as Baguio City. Then after another ride to the barrio of Carmen he had endured the shaking ride to Rosales and the Bible school campus. The bus line is named the Philippine Rabbit. “Quick, and jump like one, too” said John.
Brother John reported the weather in Sinipsip to be cool and pleasant, becoming increasingly hot as he neared sea level. The road down the mountains is hazardous. Many times there is only one lane and it is subject to washouts.
After lunch, we began our conversations regarding the way John had been led by the spirit to do his unique and invaluable work with some of the world’s needy children.
“You say you stayed a while in Baguio City on your way here?”
I ask.
“Yes, I was attending a conference of Christian educators. It included both teachers and parents. We had one teacher there representing our school through all the sessions and some of the students and me were there too.”
“I think you should tell us more about the school now. How many students do you have, and where have they come from?”
“We now have thirty eight students and most of these are from the mountain area. We have only three from the lowlands.
It seems there is a great difference in background between the mountain and lowland people. There are different tribes, with different emphases. Many mountain people are pagan. We have three teachers, and grades from first to first year high school.”
“That’s quite a load for three teachers. What were you doing before you came to the Philippines?” was my next questions. I was eager to know more of the work of this quiet, earnest Christian servant.
“I was working in Indonesia before that. I had an orphanage there. We sent the children to a Christian day school. We also worked with mentally handicapped children.”
“You’ve been in Indonesia for quite a while, haven’t you?”
“Yes, I was there in the army from 1946 to 1950. Then I visited there again after the revolution in 1965. I settled there in 1975.”
“How long have you been in the Philippines? You seem to have done quite a bit in a short time…”
“I have been here four years. But when I look at what I have done, and then look at what there is yet to do, you wonder how much time there will be.”
“Let’s begin with your boyhood days. You said you were born in Holland?”
“Yes, I was born in the Netherlands, in the province of Friesland---”
I broke in_ “Oh, tell me please, should we say Netherlands or Holland?”
“Well, most foreigners will say Holland, but we have second thoughts. We say we are living in the Netherlands. We are not Hollanders.”
“I see. I get letters from the Netherlands, and they are always so marked. I thought I’d better be correct. Was your boyhood spent on a farm or in the city?”
“I was born in the city-in a hospital but was then taken back to the little village where my parents lived. They had a small farm. You might say I grew up on a farm. But in the crash of ’29 my father lost everything. The church bought his little farm and we moved to a little one room house in the village.”
“That’s interesting. The church there buys property and operated it?”
“Well, the Dutch Reformed Church is like the Roman Catholic Church was in the middle ages. It has the right to own property. You will find many farms owned by the church.”
“To go on from there, I grew up in the little one room house in the greatest poverty. I remember that the only time we saw an orange was at Christmas. I remember one Christmas my mother never wanted a tree in the house and our only observance was a little singing in the morning and a church service. The earliest Christmas that I can remember was when she came home one evening and I was sitting with my sister on my lap and singing and we had one candle burning. That was my earliest memory of Christmas.”
“Well, that was a small beginning. You have come a long way since then, haven’t you?”
“Yes, my life has been an exciting one, I’ve been many places and done many things.”
“Tell us more of your childhood. Did you go to a public school?”
“I went to what we call in the Netherlands a Christian School for almost seven years. That school was operated by the Dutch Reformed and Christian Reformed Churches, jointly. That was followed by Christian High School, operated on the same plan.”
“Was this free, or did you pay tuition?”
“Almost free. I remember every Monday morning we had to bring ten cents. We went to school from eight to twelve in the morning and from one to four in the afternoon.”
“Did you go home at noon or did you carry your lunch? I am sure you had no hot lunch program.”
“No. No hot lunch. We went home. Well into high school, I had to stop my education because of the German occupation of the Netherlands.”
“How did you avoid being conscripted in the German army?”
“Well, we had to hide. All the young people had to hide. When Corrie ten Boom writes about the hiding place, I know what she’s talking about. I had to hide about two years. But I dared a little bit too. I was on the road sometimes when I shouldn’t have been. In the end it became very serious. I spent much of my time in a little hole upstairs under the roof over the kitchen, during this final month of the war. I could come down, when there was no danger, but when danger came the boards were removed and replaced behind us and the ladder removed.”
“Were there any Jews hiding with you?”
“Yes, we had a young Jewish fellow staying with us. Actually there were three of us, sometimes four. We were hiding at my uncle’s place. He fed us, too. The food was brought up in a big bowl and we all had a spoon. That’s the way we ate. The time gets long. We could enjoy ourselves a little bit by lifting up one tile in the roof and looking out with one eye at what might be happening.”
I replied, “Outside the western city or Jerusalem there is a street called “Avenue of the Rightous Gentiles.” In honor of the many who helped hide the Jews or helped them to escape. It is lined with trees, each tree bearing the name of a person or family who had helped. There are many Dutch names among them.”
“Yes, John said, “but I believe some did this in a quiet way and didn’t want their name known.”
“Did you ever know anyone who knew Anne Frank?”
“No, but I remember how a little red-haired Jewish girl appeared in the village suddenly. She accompanied a certain family to church. We all knew she was Jewish but nobody said anything. We just had an extra girl, that’s all. Of course no one would say anything about those who were hiding, or who was hiding him or her. If the people had been caught at least the father would have been executed. What would have happened to the rest of the family I do not know. That was a serious thing to do. And even in our case, hiding out with a Jew would have put us in trouble too. And my uncle would have been in trouble for sure. So we really worried when the Germans came into the village because we were in extra danger,”
“The plight of the Jews during the second world war had made a deep impression in me. When the Jewish families in Canada came to us to seek admission for their mentally handicapped children we accepted them, ten percent of our children in our Canadian institution were Jewish, all of them children of war victims who had immigrated to Canada after their survival in prison camps.
We set aside an area in our chapel basement where a synagogue was created by the orthodox Jewish rabbi’s from Montreal. With fitting ceremonies the Torah was placed there and at regular times the Rabbi would come and hold services with the Jewish children, their parents and friends, followed by a meal and an afternoon of entertainment for all our children.
Where the Torah goes the Jew will feel accepted and I felt much honored to associate with and help these people, remembering that according to the bible they are the “Apple of God’s eye” and we should be careful not to offend them.
Three Jewish boys accepted Christ and became members of the local Baptist Church but were still regarded as members of the Jewish community in our institution as well.”
“After the war what did you do?”
“Almost immediately after the war I went into psychiatric nursing. In the first newspapers that came out- they were about 18 inches square- there was an advertisement asking for young people to do this work. I replied and was accepted. We speak today of a ‘call’. I didn’t know what a call was. I had seen a number of things happen in the war and when this notice appeared I felt that this place was where I had to go. During the war I had learned not to put to much value on material things. I had seen to many things smashed and I was looking for something else. I felt that with psychiatric nursing I could help some one else.
Until the Christians got to caring, no one had any concern for those who were mentally ill,”
I inserted. “These events were important in your life. If you hadn’t taken that first step in your entire life would have been different.”
“And now I can see the leading of the lord in it,” John Replied. In those days I was wondering about myself and wondering about what I would do next. I was a little worried about what the village would say, but I did it just the same and such things never stopped me. Maybe that’s the reason I did so many things. –because I didn’t care what anybody said..”
“Well, I replied, “From what I know about the rest of your life it seems to me that the leading of the Lord has been like a scarlet ribbon-tied on right here where you made this decision and is threaded through your life, trailing your footsteps all the way.”
“Yes.”
“How long did you stay in that work?”
“I stayed there about a year and a half. Then I was conscripted into the Dutch army. In the army I received training that was very strict, but for which I am now very thankful. We had to obey and we had to follow orders. We were checked on. While I was in training I thought it was too severe but now that I am training others I am copying that training in many ways. I am really thankful for it.”
“How old were you when you entered the army?”
“I was nineteen. We then had three months training, because I had experience in psychiatric nursing, I was given more nurses training as well. It was first aid work and I was placed in a field hospital. After that we left for Indonesia to oppose those who were fighting for their independence. After the Second World War there was an agreement between the British and the Dutch that led to the Dutch being in Indonesia again. In the meantime the Indonesians had proclaimed their independence. There was bound to be a struggle, and there was a struggle.”
“Did you see battlefield experience then or were you doing hospital work?”
“I was mostly in the hospital. We did not have much experience on the battlefield, although our hospital was usually on the front line. The first aid stations were usually on the front line so that was where we had the most of our battle experience. We had to go out and pick up the wounded. I was there a little over three years.”
“And then did you stay in Indonesia or did you go somewhere else?”
“I had a choice to go to New Zealand, Australia, back to the Netherlands or remain in Indonesia. I was engaged to be married so I felt I had to go back to the Netherlands. Later I was sorry I had returned, because my heart was in Indonesia.
It took many years before I returned to Indonesia. I went back to psychiatric nursing in the Netherlands. Then I began correspondence with Dr. Albert Schweitzer in Lambarene, Africa. I had tried to go back to Indonesia, but that was impossible at that time. I had also tried to go to Surinam, but that did not work out. I wrote to one of the Dutch nurses who worked with Dr. Schweitzer and ask for work there. She replied that I was accepted, and Dr. Schweitzer wrote in the margin of the letter “If you can get here without help you can work for me.” So I put a notice in the newspaper for a companion for a bicycle trip to Africa.”
“A bicycle trip to Africa! Oh my! That would have made you famous in it, wouldn’t it?”
“I don’t know what the people thought, but-”
“”You should have had a motorcycle, at least.”
“Well, we rode bicycles. We modified our bikes to carry our tent, enough kerosene for our cook stove and some little lamps and set out. It took us twelve weeks to get to southern France, working at the same time. We worked in the grape harvest for some farmers, one a Dutchman who immigrated there happened to be a relative of my mother. We stayed there for a while. We made good money in the grape harvest, because we were the fastest pickers in the bunch. The others did a little drinking before they went out into the field. We didn’t, so we were better pickers than they.
Then we got to Marseille, and couldn’t get any farther. There was trouble between France and her African colonies and we would have had to pay a very high fee. Then we would have had to cross the Sahara Desert. We had no money so we decided we would have to return to Amsterdam. We had enough funds to take the train back. I wrote to Dr. Schweitzer and said, “I’ve been on my way but couldn’t get there.”
“So I went to Canada, hoping to work with the Indians and the Esquimos. I never got there, though. I ended up in the woods as a lumberjack, and worked about four months. Then one day I passed by a little place and someone told it was a home for mentally handicapped children. I thought I ought to see about it. So I went there and found a lady from England who had a hundred and twenty six mentally handicapped kids under her care. I was hired on the spot. First, I was given money for a haircut. In those days men had short hair but mine was very long from living in the woods. So I got my haircut. The lady then said, “You’d better get used to Canada because we have to shovel snow here and I did that as my first job at that place. But very quickly I found myself caring for a group of twenty-four boys. They were severely handicapped.”
“Could you teach them to do useful work?” I asked.
“When we got there, the situation was that there was no training whatsoever. The boys didn’t even have chairs. They sat on the floor. When their supper was given to them it consisted of a few slices of bread, some bologna and bananas. It was just tossed to them while they were sitting on the floor. I thought it was time to put into practice what we had learned in psychiatric institutions. I went to seek the lady and asked her if she would mind if we began to improve our section a little- it would not cost her any money. I would use my own salary for it. I hadn’t gone there alone; I had a friend with me. She said to me ‘I know you Dutch people are a clean people, so I expected something like that from you.’ So we had some tables made and each child had a chair to sit on. We got drapes for the windows and put used Christmas cards on the walls. In about three months the situation looked entirely different. We had a pie plates for our supper plates. That was the first training that the kids had.”
“How did they respond to it?”
“Oh, marvelously! The lady had started this place in memory of her son who had died in the Second World War. She was one of the first to tackle this problem in Canada, and she was overrun with kids. Her good intentions had suffered from overcrowding.
There was a group of people now who had come over from Holland. There were some Canadian ladies and also my mother and father. So we had a little Dutch colony there helping this lady and it became a real nice little place.
We worked there for three years. Then I felt we could go a little further yet by creating family style living for these boys. So I went to see the lady and she said, ‘John, it’s fine with me but my family objects. They feel that the way you are going, will cost too much money and they don’t want mother’s last days to be bothered with financial difficulties.’
So we decided that we would look for another place. It took more than a year, driving through the countryside of Quebec, to find a place where we could start on our own. One day we were attending the anniversary service of a little Baptist church in the village Dixville province of Quebec. The Dutch people were asked to sing. One thing I remember well was that the choir was larger than the congregation.
When we were leaving, the old Baptist pastor said, ‘See that building down there? Our parsonage we are going to demolish it and make a parking lot’. I ask why they needed a parking lot with a congregation of fourteen. Again, I knew this was the place where we were going to be.
The next day I said to my friend, we must go back to that village. We asked for a day off and went back to the church and saw one of the trustees and asked if we could rent the parsonage they were going to demolish. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘there is a regulation. In the deed it says that if you are not a Baptist you cannot rent it.’
In those days I didn’t say ‘Praise the Lord’. Today I would have. I told him that was all taken care of. I’d been baptized in a Baptist church. And so the deal was made. We paid a rental fee of twenty-five dollars a month.
We moved in. The place had been empty for about ten years. The wallpaper was hanging in strips. There was a foot of water in the basement. Te heating system was out of order. So we had a real challenge there.
Soon someone notified the Department of Health of what we were doing. The inspector came. He said ‘Gentlemen, this is not going to work. You will not have a license to operate. But I will be fair with you. I’ll give you six months, then I’ll be back and make my final decision!’
So we started to work. After six months, almost to the day he came back. We were just putting in a new furnace. The tinsmith was sitting on the floor putting pipes. The inspector opened the door and called, ‘It’s all right, goodbye!’
So we were in business. We got a license to care for thirteen kids. The church canceled the rent, and said, ‘you can stay there as long as you want.’ So in a year’s time we had thirteen children living there as a family.
We bought the house next door. We bought a two room-Catholic school building, which had become available and made another place for children there. My father and mother took charge of that.”
I asked, “You had a definite income of some sort, didn’t you”
“We had no income, When we got our license we got a dollar and eighty cents per child per day. That was just enough to feed them. We had no wages or anything. But the village people who had been very standoffish as far as mental incompetence was concerned thought they ought to do something. They began to give us quilts and dishes and all sorts of things that we needed for our housekeeping. They even had a shower for us. One gentleman supplied us with black blankets. When the beds were made up with white sheets and the black blankets the place looked like a funeral parlor. But that was all right, it worked. We got army beds from somewhere and so before long we had a nice home. That’s how we started.
We grouped the children in families of twelve. In those days the French Canadian families were about that size. By now they have pared down the number till they have from four to six in a unit.”
“Is this home still in existence?” I asked.
“Still going on today. In 1973 there was a law made that all institutions with more than twenty beds should be controlled by the government. So the board was changed, even the top management. So we had to decide whether we would become government employees or leave. So another friend and I not the one who had come with me- but one who had joined in the mean time, decided that we could not accept the new situation, so we began to look for the opportunity to start a similar work elsewhere.”
“These youngsters that you had taken care of – did they get any training so that they could be self-sustaining at all?”
“Oh yes. We developed a complete system of training. The child was trained in four areas: social, academic, vocational and spiritual. All four areas were taken care of by qualified people.”
“About what year did this begin?” I asked.
“Our first school started in 1962, with a retired teacher from Vermont who came across the border every day to teach. Then job training and farming were added. The little house by then had grown into a complex of twenty-two buildings with about eighty hectares of land. So we created a tree farm. Once in my life I had asked the Lord that I might own one tree in its own plot of land. One day I sat down and did a little thinking about those things. I had just had a call from the farm manager that now sixty thousand pines had been planted. So my prayer was really answered in a big way. I saw the forest about three months ago and those trees are really beautiful.”
“What then was your next step?” I wanted to know.
“We had known since 1969 that the government of Quebec was about to take certain steps that would put our work in trouble, as far as a Christian work was concerned. The work was to be secularized. We had already made a trip to Surinam, India and Indonesia. I was looking for a place where we might start again. It was decided it would be Indonesia, where I had been in the first place.”
“Did you speak Indonesian then? I know you do now.”
“I spoke enough to get by. We went for a visit, and then for a second visit. The government gave permission to visit every school for the mentally handicapped in the country. In order to finance this we had to sell our properties and whatever else we had.”
“Leaving all else behind and pressing on.” I quoted.
“Yes. I didn’t have that saying in mind but that was it. The Lord was in it. Children were getting Christian care. It wasn’t like a worldly proposition. At that time I did not fully realize what it would mean to leave everything behind. It meant EVERYTHING. I wasn’t prepared at that time. Even though we were selling our property, I interpreted it as a good investment in a new country where we could work. It was so, but not in the same way as I had thought. The selling meant far more than I thought. It meant family and everything. When I went back a few months ago and looked for what still might be mine, I found only an Old Frisian clock. That was all that was left. I had been one of the well-off people in the village because at the end the government had subsidized our work very heavily and we had good wages before they had taken over the operation. Being a single man I had invested in buying property and renovating my house in the New England colonial style. That all had to go. I didn’t realize at the time how it had to be uprooted, not only the top but the roots too. We went to Indonesia and started all over again.”
“You did not see more service in the army after that, did you?”
“No. When I was released from the army in 1950 I was called back almost immediately, because the Dutch and the Indonesians were fighting again. I refused to go back. I felt that having experienced the German occupation and service in Indonesia making a total of ten years of war, I should not have to go back again. I had become more or less a pacifist. So I refused to go back and this caused unending trouble. The military court gave me about six months to decide whether I would serve or not. When I refused, I was then court-martialed, so to speak. I was called before a religious committee because I had claimed exemption on religious ground.”
“Isn’t that the time they told you your Savior was not a pacifist?”
“Yes. So I had to find a reason. I had put myself in hot water. So I had to think and pray myself out of it. That’s the time I began to pray a little bit more. Looking back I can see that it has always been the Lord that had a hand in things, I decided that if I was asked to defend my position I would talk about Jesus not being a violent man and I being one of His followers could not be violent either. When I was called into the courtroom there were a number of ministers sitting there. I understood that they were about evenly divided between various denominations. When it came to the point where I spoke of Jesus and told them he was not a violent man, they quoted the New Testament event where he had driven the moneychangers out of the temple with a whip. So I said, “Yes, that’s true. But let’s talk about the whip. The Roman whip made of rope, with pieces of glass and steel embedded in it. It would really hurt the back of one punished with it. I believe that Jesus used a hemp rope. Hemp is soft. He drove them out that way. So his nature was. So the president
of the board, a man with a long beard got up and said, ‘Mr. Visser, you will not have to worry anymore. You are exempt from military service as far as the Dutch Government is concerned and you will have a letter from Her Majesty the queen telling you so. That came in about three month’s time.”
“Weren’t you glad you knew your Bible?”
“Yes, that’s where my Christian education paid off. I remember my old teacher very well. He was so faithful in teaching a half hour Bible lesson every morning. When I was home five years ago I went to see him and found he was in the hospital at death’s door. I was not allowed to see him. I had wanted to tell him how I appreciated the way he had taught us. His wife then told me that of all the students he had taught only two had come to thank him. The other one was my boyhood friend. We knew him as Mr. Scheiber”
“Weren’t you telling me the other day something about when you were in the army, finding a child who needed a friend?”
“Yes, when I was in Indonesia in the army, I was selected to run a polyclinic for harbor workers. Going to the docks every morning I passed by the market. There were a number of half naked kids there. I knew there were victims of the war between Indonesia and home. The center of the city had been bombed out and these kids had lost their families. There were about thirty of them, I guess. They were living from stealing and so on. I had to walk by the market on the way to the polyclinic and back and I felt as I saw them I should do something for one of them. I had money in my pocket from my army wages and I felt that at least one of them should be cared for. I talked to an old gentleman who was sitting in front of the market. He wore an army uniform so I knew he was a retired soldier. I said to him ‘I’d like to have one of those kids. What do you think about it?’ And he said, sure, why not?’ And I said, ‘but how am I going to make the selection? I want you to help me.’ ‘Well, he said, get any change in your pocket, give it to me.’ So we went inside the market. It was about four o’clock in the afternoon so most of the merchants had gone. There were not too many people around. So he took the change and threw it out. All these little kids were running to get some of it. All except one little fellow who couldn’t get up. The man said, ‘That’s the one you take.’ So I took the little one with me. He had only a little burlap wrapped around him, very dirty. I had a sudden thought. ‘Oh, let it be a little boy’ I said. So when he went behind a tree outside the market and I peaked. It was a little girl. I thought ‘Now what am I going to do?’ Because this is certainly not going to be appreciated by the military leadership. A boy might pass, but a little girl –that cannot be. Anyway I took her with me back to the polyclinic. I got some hot water and a pair of scissor and cleaned her up and cut her hair. Then I went to the army tailor. I knew him quite well. I said to him, ‘I’ve got a problem. This little girl has to look like a little boy before we go back to camp. He said, ‘Well, we’ve got to work fast.’ Well, anyway we stayed at the polyclinic for a day or so till he said, ‘The uniform is ready.’ He had made a nice little uniform for her with a little cap on the head. She had been to the barber in the mean time and now looked exactly like a little boy.
So that’s the way I brought her into camp. It caused a lot of laughs and joking. The army soldiers were very rough. For instance, we had three steps outside the house. The soldiers were teaching her Dutch when I was not there. One day I came home and she said ‘Pak, (that’s Indonesian for father) I have learned Dutch! The name of that first stair is the Father (in Dutch) and the next one is The Son and the next is the Holy Ghost! The men I knew was religious, you see. But they were very nice to her. She had everything she could possibly want. I remember a captain took us out in a jeep. He said, ‘I’m going to help you. I am going to tell those guys I’m in favor of what you are doing.’ He took us through town. He let her sit on his lap and help steer the jeep.
I took her to church and asked to have her baptized. The chaplain refused. So I resolved from then on that I would not salute the chaplain even though he was an officer. As my punishment for this I was required to spend many extra hours a day laying out the dead and preparing them for burial for the remainder of my term of service.
Then I got a letter from Jakarta then Batavia headquarters that the military authorities were very much displeased with my action in befriending the little one and the child had to go back to where I found her. That was hard thing. She never got back but I was in trouble after that. It was one of the military actions that the Dutch started that saved me. I had to go with the troops and couldn’t take her with me. I left her with a Roman Catholic nurse in the city and that was the last I saw of her. I have investigated and found that part of the Catholic community was murdered by fanatics. The church was burned down, the parsonage too burned down and we believe she died in the action.”
“That was when you were in the army before you were working in Canada?” I asked.
“Yes, in 1947.”
“When you came back to Indonesia after your work in Canada did you came alone?”
“No. There was a young man, a co-worker in our Canadian institution who came with me. He was a Christian and he did not believe that he could work under the existing situation. I asked him to go with me to Indonesia to help and he accepted. It would strengthen our situation there, I knew, for he was a faithful worker.
When we came to Indonesia, one of the first things I was asked to do was to speak to a group of Indonesian women who were in welfare work and also worked with the mentally handicapped. I was speaking to them in English. One dear old lady stopped me and said ‘That name Visser sounds Dutch to me.’ I answered, ‘I am a Dutch Canadian. ‘Would you please speak in Dutch?’ she asked me. ‘We understand it better.’ So I felt right at home then.
At first we went to work at a little institution that had sixty mentally handicapped children and started the family system there. It took us two years to upgrade it and we were supported in that work by the Baptist convention of Ontario and Quebec, Canada. After two years it was really a model of how such children should be cared for. I was happy to see about three months ago that it was still intact. The same system was being followed.
After we finished that project, although we retained connection with it in a supervisory way, we left it and moved into the city. We rented a house from a Chinese lady with the purpose of starting an orphanage for normal children. We had ten to begin with. It was also family style. The first institution we were working with was a mainly Muslim institution. But when we began our own work in the Chinese home there it was a Christian institution. Some of the Muslims began to be a little bit annoyed with it. One day I was asked to come to see the leader of this group. She said, ‘Pak John, I want you to sit down. I have something to say to you. You have a beautiful little orphanage.’ I said, ‘Yes, thank you. That’s true. Because it was true. She said, ‘there are two things wrong.’
“Please tell me what they are.”
She said, “You are reading the Bible to them twice a day.”
I said, “Yes, that’s an old Dutch custom.”
She said, “You are praying in the Christian way with them. These two things must stop or we won’t support your work.”
I replied, “Sorry, but that cannot be.”
It didn’t take long for me to make up my mind. Something paralyzing happened to me right there. I realized that it was the end of my stay in Indonesia. Just as that thought flashed through my mind she said, ‘Then your visa will not be renewed the next time it comes up.’ And it was to come up in ten days.
So I went back to the orphanage. ‘Sorry, but I’ve got to leave in ten days.’ Some people went to work on my behalf without success I had to leave.
In the mean time I had come in contact with the Wesleyan people. One of the Wesleyan missionaries, Brother Robert Smith, came and talked with me about the situation. I said to him, ’Well, Brother Smith, there is one thing I don’t want to lose out of all of this. I don’t want to lose the peace that passeth all understanding. That’s the one thing I want to keep. So we prayed about it. He said, ‘you’d better leave. You’d better go to the Philippines.’ I said, ‘I don’t want to go to the Philippines.’
‘Well, then go to Singapore.’
‘O.K’. I said, ‘I’ll go to Singapore.’
While I was on the plane I got an idea. That was to go right back to Indonesia and get another visa at the embassy. So when I got to Singapore, the next day I went to the embassy and asked, ‘how long does it take to get a visa for Indonesia? I have to go on an emergency?’ The clerk replied, ‘About forty - eight hours.’ I can have it ready in forty-eight hours. Then I knew they had not yet had word that I was not supposed to reenter. In forty-eight hours I had a visa and was back in Indonesia. And whom did I run into on my way to Brother Smith’s house but the same lady that had caused me to leave! She passed by in a car and saw me. And I could ser her lips moving and saying ‘oh! Pak John is back.’ And I was back, with three months time to wind up business. The Indonesian Brother Bangun who was working with me and is now working with me in Sinipsip said, ‘I’ll stay till things get settled down and I’ll take care of things.’
I could smile because this place was still in existence and here is this Indonesian Christian in charge.
They came one day and took seven of our kids away and put them in another institution. That same night the children ran back home to our institution. They slept there that night. Brother Bangun and Brother Smith thought it was not good for the children to be disturbed like that. It might be better to close the house and spread them out among Christians. Some went to a family that had cared for orphans before and a small group went to live in a little house behind the Wesleyan Bible School. So the problem was settled in that way. When I went back a few months ago I met four of these young Christian fellows. I introduced them to Brother Smith and said, ‘here is Bible School material for you someday.’ One of them is coming to the Philippines next year to go to Bible School here.
“Many of the Indonesian comes to the Philippines to study, don’t they?” I questioned.
“Yes, especially to learn English. Indonesia has now adopted its own language as the approved one. It is not a world language and English is not well promoted as it is in the Philippines, so it is a problem for the young people. Some make arrangements to come here and stay with us for a while. If they stay only a year, they are about ready to go to college. As our language of communication is English they are able to catch on very quickly.”
“Well. John, this is a goodtime for you to tell us about some of the people who have had an influence on your life.”
“Yes, very early some people had a great influence. My grandparents had a great influence. In my case, it was my father’s father and mother. I spent much time with them. I was the first grandchild. They were devout members of the Reformed Church and they lived accordingly. They also had an early influence as far as Friesian tradition was concerned. My mother believed in praying for healing, which was unusual in that church. One day I was ill, she said, ‘I’ve given you this and I’ve given you that and you are no better. Why don’t ask the Lord to heal you?’ And that is exactly what we did. I remember that very strongly. I couldn’t have been more than four or five years old.
When I became a bit older other people came into my life. I remember an old lady who lived next door to us. She had much
Influence because of what I know now as her simple Christian walk. She probably had never heard of holiness or knew it was possible to live a victorious Christian life, but she lived as if she knew both well. When I adopted this little girl in Indonesia I gave her name, Anskje, coming back home a while ago. I stopped at the churchyard where her grave marker is, and considered her life. She was kind and honest. She never asked us to do anything for her unless paid us for it, even though it was only a Botsen-two and half Dutch cents. That made us good friends.
When I was in psychiatric training there was a couple who taught me. They really went all out in showing their concern for the people of their world. Part of the training we had was a religious type of training so that we could deal properly with the mentally ill. Although much has changed in that institution I really appreciate the way these people were involved in our training. They cared that we should live Christian lives and were disappointed if we strayed.
Then in Indonesia I ran into Brother Smith. He was to become a deciding influence. Meeting him was actually a turning point.”
“How did you meet him?” I asked. “What was your first contact with him?”
“My friend met him first, in the city Post office. He came home and said, I met a missionary of the Wesleyan Church today.’ I said, I don’t want anything to do with it.’ It seems to me that it sounds like another sect and we have enough of those around. That was that, I thought. A little later one of his Bible College students came by to borrow book. I got him out of the house quite quickly by giving him some copies of Time and Newsweek. But he came back again later and soon Brother Smith himself to see our work. That was the beginning of a relationship like I had never before experienced in my life. There was a man, outgoing and full of enthusiasm. I had never met anyone like him. He said to me, ‘I am looking for a piece of land for a Bible School. We knew of a little church, an old Christian Reformed Church connected with a plot of land. It had been a special project at one time but had been destroyed by the war. So he said, ‘Let’s go there and see it.’ We looked it over and he finally bought it. That was my first introduction to the Wesleyans. Although after this I had to leave Indonesia as I told you earlier, the thought remained with me. I soon had plans to become part of the Wesleyan Church but didn’t want to be hasty.
Brother Smith and his students had a great influence on me. They had a form of training that was foreign to me and they had an openness and message. It was a relief to me to know that we could live a victorious life while we were still alive and didn’t have to wait till we reached heaven. Another Wesleyan influence came into my life when I met the Paul Turner family.”
“When did you come to the Philippines?” I wanted to know. “Did you come straight from Indonesia?”
“No, I went to Singapore. I tried to establish a work there but it didn’t get off the ground. I was there seven months and I could not do anything. I don’t know why, but the Lord didn’t want me to stay there. It took Bob Smith again, to make a visit and to say, ‘John, you cannot stay here.’ ‘Well, I wanted to know why not. He saw the situation very clearly. He said, ‘I’m on my way to the Philippines and I want you to go there with me, I will talk with the leaders in the Wesleyan Church there, to see if they won’t sponsor you in the Philippines. I didn’t want anything to do with it, so he went promising to return into two weeks.
When he returned he said, ‘It’s all set. They are going to sponsor you.’ ‘But I am not ready to go there’. I said. He talked and tried to persuade me. I said that the Lord had not told me to go. ‘Let’s go to bed and we’ll take it up in the morning.’ Which we did. In the morning he said, ‘There is a little place where there is a house available for you.’ I said, ‘Let’s stop everything, breakfast and everything. ‘Now the lord has spoken to me. If a house is ready for the care of Children I cannot hold back any longer.’ So a telegram was sent to Rev. Turner, the mission coordinator and we took steps to go to the Philippines.
“You went directly to Turners then did you?” I asked.
“We, Brother Bangun who had joined me in Singapore and went to a hotel first because we didn’t know the Turners. We had their address and the next day we looked them up.
I believed they sensed our situation and they invited us to stay with them, rather than to stay at the hotel. This was a good thing because we had money enough for only three nights in the hotel. We stay with them for about six weeks.
This Wesleyan way of life began to bother me to a point where I had to make a decision, I thought that I had better get away for a while. I asked if I might go to Rosales where I knew the mission home on the Bible School was vacant. We got permission to go there and we stayed there about six weeks. Little did I know I was in more danger from the Wesleyan there than anywhere else. Some of the students began to take an interest in me and we talked. One night one of the students came to me and said, ‘Brother John, I need to interview an old man for one of my class projects and I have selected you. May I go ahead and interview you?’
‘Yes, go ahead.’ So we talked for a little bit and he asked me some questions. Then I said, ‘Let’s turn this thing around. I want to ask you some questions.’ So I asked him some questions about the Wesleyan Church and the Holiness Movement. He said, ‘Brother John, I’ve been observing you and believe you need the second work of Grace in your life.’ I thought to myself, let him explain it. And he explained it. I said, ‘let’s stop interviewing and start praying. I’ll pray and you pray for me.’ And so it was.
A few weeks later I was upstairs praying. I told the Lord I wanted a solution in my life. Finally I came to the conclusion that I was empty and needed to be filled. I said, ‘Lord, I am empty. Will you please fill me with the Holy Spirit. I can go no farther. I am stuck.
And that’s exactly what happened. I was called downstairs for lunch and sat to the head of the table. I was asked to pray. I couldn’t pray. I was emotionally completely gone. I did pray, but I do not know what words came out of my mouth. I excused myself, knocking my glasses off my nose where they fell to the floor. I went back upstairs. That afternoon I was going to settle it between the lord and myself. The lord by his grace sanctified me whole. And then I could go downstairs and sit in front of the house and look at the world in an entirely different way. Myself, I was gone. There was only the Lord left.
After that, immediately the question came up as to where we would work. The little village of Sinipsip in the mountain was suggested. I was ready to go where -ever the Lord would send me. So I was ready to go to Sinipsip, which is not appealing if you have never been there. Maybe I would have said ‘NO’ previously but now I could cheerfully say ‘YES’.
“Were you at Rosales all this time?”
“Yes, I was at Rosales.”
“When did you first see Sinipsip?”
“Just a little bit later. I asked to go there for a few days and look it over. When I saw it I knew that was the place to go. We sat around there for two or three days just to get the feel of the place. I like a difficult situation anyway and I knew that was going to be a challenge. Soon I could say, ‘Let’s go the sooner the better.’
The site was a former Bible College campus. The buildings included a chapel-library and classroom building, boys and girl’s dormitory, a kitchen and dining room, president’s house and mission home. The countryside is beautiful. There are mountains all around and the air is always fresh and cool. In the winter the temperature may go below freezing occasionally. It is the only place in the Philippines where cabbage, potatoes and carrots can be raised commercially. An ideal place for the project. I could foresee a thriving school garden.”
“Where did you find the children for your school?” I asked. “Did you have any trouble finding them?”
“Yes, we did. We were there three weeks without any children. The local pastor said he didn’t think we’d ever see any children, for the mountain people were not ready for this. I was sure the Lord would send them.
I went on a visit to Valenzuela, a part of Metro manila and the location of the church headquarters. I met Mrs. Garcia there. She is the wife of General Superintendent of the Philippines church. She said to me, ‘I have a boy for you. Do you want to take him?’ ‘Well, I knew that was to be boy number one. Then in comes another little boy who swings himself around the door. I know right off that he had the use of only one leg. Mrs. Garcia said, ‘Do you want to take him too?’ I said I would take him too. There was boy number one and number two. They happened to be brothers. They went with me to Sinipsip. We were eating supper one day and two more children came in. Their parents had sent them.
Soon after that I went on a preaching mission in the mountains and when I came back I had fourteen children given to me on the way. So from not having any children at all us were suddenly flooded with children.
And then the question came up as to how we were to care for them. That would take funds and people, both. Financially we didn’t know where to go. I had learned to follow the same principle that George Muller had, and pray. Not to ask anything anywhere but to pray for the daily needs. There were two of us so we could handle a dozen children but not many more. So far all needs had been met. That had been the thing to do. Even on my last trip to Canada I did not to ask for anything.”
“Didn’t you once pick up a young man in Manila - in the park?”
“Tell us about him.” I suggested.
“Yes, his name is Leo. I was taking the place of Brother Paul Turner who was on a short holiday. It is part of his responsibilities as mission coordinator to take care of travel details for the missionaries. I had to go to the travel agent to see about one of their passports; so coming back from the office I walked through Luneta Park. I saw a boy sitting on one of the benches. He had two paper bags with him, and a radio. The bags were soaking wet, for it was raining. I asked him where he was from. He answered, ‘Leyte.’
‘What are you doing here?’
‘I have no place to go. I just came of the boat.’
‘Have you been eating?’
‘Yes, I’ve been eating from the garbage can over there.’
So I said, ‘Do you want a hamburger?’
He thought that was something great. Then I had to go home. I said to him, ‘what are you going to do now?’ He said, ‘I’ll go back to the park bench.’
‘No’, I said. You have two choices. You either go back to the park bench or you go with me. I’m in a place where there are plenty of empty beds. You make up your mind.
‘I’ll go with you.’ He said.
So he went with me back to the mission home and stayed there with me about two weeks, until I went back to the mountains. I took him to Sinipsip and he became a different boy. All he needed was someone to be interested in him. Unfortunately he didn’t stay with us long. He had fallen in love with a girl and so he decided to go back to the area where he came from. He is living in a coconut plantation with his uncle. He occasionally writes me. I believe his life has turned out for the better. He at least has learned to know the lord Jesus.
And we don’t know how far he may go, I said. ‘The lord may lead someone across his path and he will be able to help them as you helped him, He had a start under your care.
“If my life has worked out like it has, I had no reason why his life shouldn’t be fruitful too”. Said John. We trust the lord to keep him. There are certainly many more like him who needs help.
“Yes, in our mountain area I believe there are very few families where there isn’t a problem. One problem is education. These families cannot afford to educate their children; there is a great need, especially in the area of education. I felt that there the Christian
Church has an obligation not only to look after the souls of the people but their minds too.
Well, I stated, The Christian Church has always looked after the educational needs. When America was founded, for religious reasons, one of the first things to receive attention was the establishment of schools. That was also one of Martin Luther’s achievements-the emphasis on elementary education.
“Tell me a little bit about your mountain school.”
“In the beginning we sent our children to the public school in Sinipsip. This worked out fine for a while. But one day some of the kids came home and they were drunk. Some of the boys had decided that they would get the Wesleyan kids drunk. So they did. That one incident may not have been so bad, but it made us think. I had not wanted to make a “hot-house” out of the situation, for they were going to have to live in the world.
We had a visitor one day, a former missionary. He told me he was sending his children to a school called the Accelerated Christian Education (ACE) in the states. ‘You have the same system in the Philippines.’ He said. ‘Why not look into it?’ So I did look into it and very quickly we were ready to form our own school.”
“Didn’t you win some kind of award recently?”
“Yes, we had a contest for the cleanest school. We won that award. We were asked to have a formal inspection and we won first prize. At the same time there was a cooking contest between pupils of different schools. We were allowed to send one pupil from the high school and one from the elementary school. Both of them came home with first prize. We were very happy about that.”
“What are your future plans for the school?” I wanted to know, the Lord isn’t through working with you yet.”
“How are financing the work in Sinipsip?” was the next question I asked.
“We live by faith in Sinipsip and try to make our children follow the same principle.
One day two years ago Jose (pronounce Hosay) one of our teenagers came to me and said, “Brother John, October six is my birthday. Can we have chicken on that day?’(He lives with me at the mission home) I replied, ‘Jose, you pray about it.’ I went to the calendar and underlined the date and wrote ‘Chicken’ under it, at the same time asking the Lord to provide the chicken. A few days later I noticed the word chicken crossed out. I asked Jose ‘Did you do that?’ ‘Yes’ he said. ‘I don’t think we will have chicken on my birthday.’ Chickens are scarce in our mountain top area and our money supply was such that only the bare necessities could be purchased at that time. That did not include chicken.
A few days later I went to the lowlands to speak at chapel in Rosales, Wesleyan Bible College. After the service we sat on the porch of the mission home. Across the lawn came one of the students with a wet chicken under his arm, asking, ‘Ma’am Grace, is this your chicken?’ (Grace is a missionary from Japan at the Bible School) ‘Yes, this chicken is a bother to me’ Pak John, will you take it to Sinipsip with you?’ ‘Sure’ I said. Then behind the house is another one too. I then realized that God was answering our prayers. I took Grace aside and told her about Jose’s request and our prayers. We rejoiced and the chickens were properly packed in a carton and went to the mountain. On Jose’s birthday we had chickens on the table. That’s how the Lord cares for us. He does so in many large and small ways. He honors the faith of those kids who trust in him and rely on him for their every need.
In the first place there is a great need for Christian education where we are. Our area is still two-thirds pagan. So there is an educational need there, as well as a need for evangelism.”
Do you think your school in Sinipsip will ever be self-sufficient so that you can leave? We don’t want you to go, but..”
“It would be staffed by Filipinos, of course. We may have to oversee the program but the leadership should come from the Filipinos. We think that some of our young people will be able to take the leadership but that will take several years yet. We should like to go into the surrounding villages to start small A C E school community, school where they can send their children.
I’ve been back to Indonesia, talking to the Wesleyan people there and there is a desire that our work there be revived. The church has made the decision that it shall be. They will take the responsibility for all the legal ends. Then we expect to start in Nedan or East Timor where there are five thousand orphans with no place to go. That is one good way of entering the territory, as missionary work is not allowed. An appeal has been made to the churches to start social work.”
“Who will help in an institution like that?” I asked.
“For the Indonesian project we have some trained people. Brother Bangun and lately his wife have been with me here in Sinipsip. At present he is studying to get his masters degree in Administration. Then they will go back to their country and be connected with our work there in s supervisory capacity.
There’s another Indonesian here studying Education, for the same purpose. These two are friends and would like to set out together. The Wesleyan in Indonesia have arranged to send one of their pastors here. He arrives this month. He will work closely with us. Then he will return, to be a person who can look after the spiritual needs of the project. He will also work outside of it. The buildings that are purchased or rented will then be for children. He will be pastor and chaplain at the same time. And that’s the only way for the church to get in there, if they are willing to take the social obligation as well. We foreigners will stay in the background, in an advisory. I will have to travel between the Philippines and Indonesia a little, but I will work there only as an advisory.”
“These two young men who have been working with you, trained by you, ought to know what they are about. So with your supervision the work ought to do well.”
“One of the above mentioned young men, John said, has been with us for about eight years. He came to us when he was eleven or twelve years old.”
“Was that Yanto?’
“That was Yanto. He has quite a bit of experience behind him. He has seen how things operate, and from the child’s angle as well. He should be valuable help.”
“Is he the Muslim boy you spoke of- who was told not to talk to you?”
“Yes, that’s right. When we first came to Indonesia, the first institution we operated, he was told not to talk to those Christians. He was the only normal child in the group of mentally handicapped. He was a kind of junior worker there. He continued for sometime, never talking to us. We thought it strange. Perhaps it was because of the language.
One day I said to my colleague. I’m going to call him in because we need someone to clean up the house. When he came from the school I went out and said, ‘Yanto, would you like to clean up our house?’ So he came in and cleaned for us. And after that he left our house only to sleep. He spent the night in the dorm. He ate with us too. One day we were seated in the dining room and he was standing in the corner. ‘I want to be a Christian’ he said. It was so unexpected that we didn’t react promptly. I guess I had told the Lord that I thought it would be impossible for him to convert, as he was a strong Muslim. He prayed faithfully five times a day. I used to see him as I walked by his door. I said to myself that will never happen.
Almost immediately he went to Canada for three months with a friend of mine to study English. He was with a Christian family there and they sent him to a Bible Camp. That was where he was actually converted. When he came back to Jakarta I expected him to say, ‘Halo Pak, how are you?’ But he said instead. ‘I’m a Christian now’. I replied, ‘Yes, so I see.’
So here was a joyful little Christian-someone we never thought would become a Christian because of his Muslim background.
Shortly after his return from Canada he asked to be baptized. We went to a Baptist pastor and he agreed to baptize Yanto. The Sunday the baptism was to take place, all candidates were gathered behind the baptistry, each one with a slip of paper with his name on it. Yanto’s actual name is Sudaryanto and the pastor asked him to select a Christian name, besides. So Yanto came down into the church where I was sitting. ‘Pak’ he said. ‘What shall be my Christian name, Luke or Stephen?’ I whispered in his ear “Stephen”. So he was baptized under the name Stevanus Sudaryanto. Stevanus is Indonesian for Stephen. We praised the Lord that day. At a later date he joined the Wesleyan Church.
When I had to leave Indonesia, he was one of those that remained with Brother Smith. Mr. Smith taught him the carpenter trade while he was there. So besides being a good Christian, he is a good carpenter. He is now at the university to prepare him for an educational career. He will really be an asset to the work. I am thankful for this young man.”
“Well, now, how about Robert?” I asked.
“I’ve met him and been very much impressed by his personality and his goals.
Since his return to Indonesia he has been teaching in our Bible School. I believe that at annual conference time this year he was ordained. He is now the assistant General Superintendent. I think the next step will be that he will become the General Superintendent and take the Place of Brother Smith.”
I had another question. “How many churches have in Indonesia?”
“I think we have about twenty churches. That is quite good for the short time we have been there. We have some very active churches and some real good young pastors.”
“I’ve met Robert and had some conversation with him. I think he will be a very strong, capable national leader. That’s what the church needs.”
John said. “I personally like Robert Very much. He’s that young fellow I sent away with some news magazines to get rid of him-remember I told you?”
“What degree does he have?”
“He is well qualified with a Doctor of Theology degree.”
“Well, the end is not yet,” I stated. You have much ahead, do you?”
“Yes. I thought Sinipsip would be the end, but now there is something else. This work in Medan will be a challenge and an opportunity, both to establish the gospel there and to provide care and a Christian home and training for some of those many orphans.”
“The Lord has led you, even against your will, from the Netherlands to Canada, to Indonesia, the Philippines and now back to work in Indonesia. There will be others to train for service in the church in its many departments.”
“Yes, my life has proved that it is true that the lord can use a person. This person may not be aware or even willing to be used as an instrument to carry out His will. When that person fully yields and fully surrenders, he can see that the Lord has been about His business in His life all along. He may also by fully surrendering, experiences the fact that he can live victorious in all circumstances and trust the Lord fully for the reminder of his life and service. This has been true in my life.”
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