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I am helping a friend raise $ 1000, so he could buy some beds and necessary equipment for this school. His name is Leon and this is his story
“Papua is one of the richest provinces in Indonesia. However, the native tribes and people there live below the poverty line. They cannot compete well with the immigrants from other provinces and recently, the death rate has been increasing at an alarming pace. I believe there are 2 factors contributing to these facts.
The geographic location is the first contributing factor. In Papua, there are still a lot of isolated and unreached locations. These locations are beyond the helping reach of the central government and it deters qualified workers (such as medical doctors, teachers, security, etc) to venture to where they live. Venturing out to these people would take them away from their job and lives that they have built up in the city.
Second, is the serious lack of education. The majority of the population is still illiterate and uneducated. This then contributes to the high unemployment rate, lack of general personal care or disease prevention, low morality, and other issues.
Answering these challenges, GBI Papua Centrum, is called to bring revival and reformation by founding a non-profit organization named ‘Yayasan Peduli Papua Baru” (Care for New Papua Foundation). The vision of this foundation is “Generating Godly Leaders” with the mission to reach children in Papua and raise them to be leaders and reformers of their community.
This foundation built a boarding school for the native children of Papua who lives in the isolated and unreached areas, giving these children an opportunity to be educated and prepared to be Godly leaders to be sent back to build and reform their communities.
Currently, the school houses 15 students. On average, their home tribe is about a 25 hour trip by traditional speed boat from the school. The number of the students keep increasing each month and the foundation is currently relying only on outside support to continue to provide this much education for free.
Right now, the foundation has a technical school, specializing in Pharmacy. The school is taught by unpaid volunteers, who are specialized in the subjects they teach, for an example, the Human Anatomy course is taught by a Medical Surgeon. Thus, the quality of the education from this school attracts many more students (native or migrants).
The school continues to have financial needs as they continue to provide this valuable education to these children for free. The school solely depends on the donations by the staff and the congregation of GBI Papua Centrum, who are inspired by the life of the early church of generous life. By the grace of God, the school work still continue.
At this time, our current needs are providing the students with sleeping beds and building a computer and pharmacy lab.
In Papua, I see a lot of Papua children fall into drugs and alcohol addiction, criminal life, poverty and many are left behind. Initially, I felt it was the fault of the the church and the government, until one day I was challenged by a leader, Andre, “WHY DON’T YOU DO SOMETHING!”. At that moment, I began to grow the desire to help them teach. I believe God put that desire in me. Two weeks after that, I met a man named Bondi Patoh. We discussed these problems, politics, and business. I expressed my frustration and my desire to teach and he asked for my contact information. It turned out that he was the pastor and the Head of the foundation.
I started teaching 4 days a week, 3 days in the afternoon and 1 day in the morning. Most of the time, I hang out with the students and the staffs there. Deep inside my heart, I feel they teach me as much as I teach them, sometimes even more.
I learn so much. God has opened my eyes to so many things. Those students literally sleep on hardwood boards, and only have 1 uniform and a change of 2 clothes, they live very simple lives but yet they have unexplainable joy. They live gratefully. I resolve to be like them joyful and always thankful despite the condition.
God has even used the staff of this foundation to change my life. Many of them teach in other schools and some of them are medical doctors, and instead of having time to relax or make more money, they volunteer their time to teach, sometimes, even having to pay for some of the materials and equipment. I guess now I understand that love is not selfish, it is selfless.
God uses Bondi Patoh mightily. He is INSANELY FAITHFULL. He has a lot of to take care. He doesn’t make any money. He has the responsibility for his family (a wife and 2 kids, 1 cousin) and the school (15 students, house rental, the foundation money, etc), but he never worries and he truly believes God will provide. I thought he was insane, but yet time to time God proves me wrong. He always provides.”
Currently, we are raising money to buy sleeping beds for the students. We need to raise at least $ 800 to buy 15 beds for them. I want to raise $ 1000, so they could use the rest of the money to buy some school equipment. Lifebox Studio is donating a laptop to the school.
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