Captain’s Blog

Captain’s Blog #82

January 17, 2009 on 5:44 pm | In Uncategorized | No Comments

THE FIJIBoat PROJECT / NAZARENE MARITIME MINISTRIES

PAST – PRESENT – FUTURE – WOW!

SURFING STORMS

‘Slightly sloppy seas?’ What a joke! Where did that forecast for these ocean conditions come from anyway? This is like surfing an 8 ton aluminum surfboard on the shear cliffs of animated massive angry mountains that are throwing themselves at you like dominoes… our ‘moderate’ ocean long ago exceeded ‘gale force’ and she’s working herself into full ‘tropical storm’ conditions. Otherwise known as ‘blowing like a hurricane’ with 25 feet high walls of indigo saltwater coming down on us at speeds I can’t outrun even with my 450 horses. And we are a very long ways out of sight of land. This is the stuff of nightmares. Nothing… nothing romantic about this – that would only be in the movies viewed from the dry safety of an armchair in the den. Five of the most harrowing, worst, nastiest, hours of my life…

LOVING WHAT I HATE

I thought back on it after enough days had gone by for the adrenalin to work itself out of the marrow of my bones and out of my hair… what’s left of my hair. God used even that trip. Actually He met me out there in such a real way in the midst of it, that as much as I HATED the experience… I could never say that I wish it hadn’t happened to me. Occasionally during these last 10 years, things have fallen into that category.

CAPTAIN

It was almost a decade ago that the call came in from James Johnson in the middle of the night. His burden to reach people on unreachable islands of the South Pacific, was contagious. From where he was, he needed a vessel and he needed a captain. For 2 & ½ years God had already been specifically preparing Cindy and I for that call. I held a USCG Captain’s license in my hand. Individuals like Dr. Bustle and Dr. Helstrom and many other brave people climbed on board. What was God thinking? What would this look like a decade from now?

FIJIBOAT BORN

For many of you it was somewhere in there that we began to share this with you and you began to pray for us and for God’s wild ideas of this mission work on the other side of the equator in the largest body of water known to man. You also gave of your money and sacrificed for this. Your prayers and your faith were to blame and Nazarene Maritime Ministries with its FIJIBoat Project was born.

A DECADE

As I think back over these last 10 years… wow!

It certainly was in many ways an invitation to war. Many of the battles and storms that have waged have been spiritual. The victory has never been questioned.

How many cyclones diverted by the power of prayer?

How many incredible stories unfolded as you’ve prayed down through these years?

How many long nights on an inky black ocean with the diamond speckled canopy of the Milky Way above us?

How many people transported? My logbooks show well into the thousands.

How many tons of cargo and building material and disaster relief supplies or hospital equipment? My logbooks show hundreds of thousands of metric tones transported.

How many un-forecast violent tropical storms did we find ourselves in? …too many but we always came home and the safety record still shows… ‘zero incident’ – amazing.

How many trips heading away from land out toward that bare horizon? My logbooks show over 500 ocean voyages to date since you started praying with me about this.

How many people won to the Kingdom? I have no idea… we’ll have to ask God someday but in God’s economy, He gave His son for one and this has been a very good investment of people and resources, so far.

The Schmelzenbachs in 2000

THE VISION

God gave us a vision for NMM/FIJIBoat in the beginning for two things:

1. Do what you can to help address the transportation barriers across the islands of the South Pacific.

2. Do whatever else you can to be a catalyst for genuine advancement of the Kingdom.

GOD’S BLESSING

How great has God met us at the point of our faith down through these years and history will show what eternally significant things He has been about. Somewhere around 3 & ½ years ago, God’s vision for NMM began to really pick up speed.

EXPANSION

James Johnson asked me to be his Administrative Assistant and my involvement from the Kingdom of Tonga in the east expanded across six island countries all the way to Papua New Guinea in the west.

NAZARENE MARITIME MINISTRIES

The project that began as ‘FIJIBoat’, involving a boat in Fiji with the JESUS Film, now expanded way beyond just the Republic of Fiji Islands and more and more we were referring to it as NMM (Nazarene Maritime Ministries).

EXPLODING MINISTRY

NMM has been absolutely amazing! As a tool in God’s hands, God has used you, as you have prayed for and given to NMM, to do what otherwise wouldn’t have been done out here. Including things like providing another boat, this time for ‘Community Based Health Care’, a Nazarene ministry way up the primitive Sepik River Delta of Papua New Guinea, charter and regular flights across this vast field of islands separated by ocean barriers, life jackets for missionaries, remote area communication, cargo boat charters, island pastor training, computers, national missionary support… and about anything else you can think of that would innovatively help God’s church and be a Kingdom building catalyst across these six island nations.

Lighthouse Church of the Nazarene, Kadavu Koro, Fiji

JOHNSON’S LEAVING

After 28 years pouring themselves out on this mission field, James and Joy Johnson are moving back to the States following God’s lead after the death of James’ mom. Please pray for these great warriors of the faith. The race they have run on this mission field has not been casual – it has been a lifetime of walking and living and working by faith - they have run a good race. The mission field will look different for them now and maybe it will sound like Montana. They are looking at culture shock as they settle into that strange land after being away so very long. Pray that God will continue to bless their lives and ministries as they keep living out their faith.

FIELD STRATEGY COORDINATOR

Tonight I leave for Australia and Papua New Guinea. Cindy, Danielle and Quinton will catch up with me in a couple weeks. This is a new chapter of our lives and also for Nazarene Maritime Ministries. Cindy and I and the kids need your prayers like never before. After very much prayer and certainty that God was leading our church leaders in their decision, I accepted the appointment as ‘Field Strategy Coordinator’ for the Melanesia and for the South Pacific Fields for the Church of the Nazarene. Pray for us as we take Nazarene Maritime Ministries to the next level as one of God’s great ministry tools for continuing to aggressively build His Kingdom and expand His eternal FAMILY across these island nations during these critical hours of the worlds history!

THE VISION

Ten years later God has done impossible things! What began as one boat in one nation has grown to become the channel through which God is breaking down barriers and His Kingdom marches forward…. Will Nazarene Maritime Ministries continue? Absolutely! And remarkably, God’s vision to us for the future of Nazarene Maritime Ministries remains the same as it was in the beginning:

1) Do what you can to help address the transportation barriers across the islands of the South Pacific.

2) Do whatever else you can to be a catalyst for genuine advancement of the Kingdom.

You’ve been given an invitation: God has seen what you have done with the talents he entrusted to you – you’ve invested faithfully and those talents have resulted in much fruit for the Kingdom. Now, God is entrusting all of us with more… more souls that need to know Him, and more barriers to be overcome, more opportunities to share His heartbeat. The only limit is time.

Radical… Effective… Eternally Significant! Thank you for your prayers and for your giving! Let’s go!

-The Schmelzenbach’s

Meet your expanded family at our web site: www.southpacificfamily.org and also, look for us at the Asia-Pacific exhibit at General Assembly.