ASI Media Tobago "Celebrating Our Elders"

[Music] [Applause] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] so so [Music] good afternoon ladies and gentlemen and welcome back to this afternoon's program asi tobago is proud to present this afternoon's program where we will be dealing with celebrating or emancipation celebrating our heritage and this afternoon we'll be taking a look back at emancipation and what it really meant for us as a society in tobago now whether you believe that emancipation was a capitalist program like dr eric williams a humanitarian one as believed by the baptist or that it was the africans themselves whose acts of resistance force the white people to give them their freedom the undisputable fact is that emancipation has changed the entire world and especially the landscape of the caribbean for the leaders of our young nation emancipation held a very special significance after all it was the honorable george chambers who was then the successor to dr eric williams who was then prime minister of trinidad and tobago who said that it commemorated the abolition of slavery on the 1st of august 1985 some 150 years after we were actually emancipated so ladies and gentlemen this afternoon as you listen and as you view from all around the world let us just go back a little bit and imagine the rejoicing that followed this proclamation as our ancestors saw for the first time that their fra their cry for freedom was finally answered after all would you be overjoyed being emancipated from a situation in which you did not have any desire to be well ladies and gentlemen that is what we will explore this evening so stay tuned as we explore the topic of our emancipation celebrating our heritage and after our song service we will indeed go deeper into this topic but before we begin let us bow ahead to pray and acknowledge our lord and savior jesus christ father in jesus name we come before you this evening acknowledging their god that you are indeed a supreme ruler that you are indeed a great emancipator their father and that with you we can do all things with you alone we have real freedom and with you alone we can indeed say that we have been blessed because when you free us we are truly free indeed so dear god may all our hearts be blessed and may we understand that emancipation is a total package as we go through a program this afternoon be with us allow your holy spirit to speak to hearts and minds today we pray in jesus name amen hallelujah god is good this little light of mine i'm gonna let it shine this little light of mine i'm gonna let it shine this little light of mine i'm gonna let it shine let it shine let it shine let it shine hide it under a bushel i'm gonna let it shine hide it under a bushel i'm gonna let it shine hide it under a bushel i'm gonna let it shine let it shine let it shine let it shine don't let satan blow it off i'm gonna let it shatter don't let's sit and blow it out i'm gonna let it shine don't let it blow it out i'm gonna let it shine let it shine let it shine let it shine [Music] to remember me [Music] [Applause] i've got a home in glory land i've got a home in glory land that outshines the sun i've got a home in glory land that outshines the sun i've got a home in glory land that i'll shine away [Music] [Music] [Music] i took jesus as my savior [Music] i took jesus for my savior you take him to a way beyond the blue swing low sweet chariot [Music] [Music] [Music] coming for to carry me [Music] swing [Music] switch [Music] [Music] down by the riverside [Music] down by the riverside [Music] [Music] no more [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] it's me it's me a lord standing in the need of [Music] not my mother not my father it's me it's me o lord standing in [Music] [Applause] is [Applause] [Music] i'll fly [Music] glory i'll fly away [Music] just a few more weary days [Music] [Music] [Music] hallelujah amazing grace how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me amazing grace how sweet the songs [Music] [Applause] [Music] but now [Music] [Music] amen praise [Music] precious lord take my hand lead me on let me stand i am tired i'm weak i am through the start through the night lead me on to the light take my hand precious love and lead me home [Music] [Music] steel away still away to jesus my lord he calls me he calls me by the thunder the trumpet songs within my soul [Music] still jesus [Music] steal away [Music] to stay amen my name is hezekiah wood i was born and i grew up in the village of lakatu i received my primary education at the franklin medical school and my secondary education at harmon school of sd while i was growing up i used to do the voice of prophecy correspondence course and through that course i learned very much of the bible and there were certain things that they used to teach us in sunday school that are not so true so the voice of prophecy course enlightened me i learned more of the ten commandments and the more so of the sabbath which is saturday there was a time when some brethren from miss from mariah came to lakato to keep her crusade among them was brother joseph brother benjamin and a short gentleman name who is we used to call bobot wright and i started attending the crusade as a young man i was 14 15 or only and it was very interesting the the slide shows with the pictures of jesus and other things caught my attention and the lovely singing the preaching was very good there was a particular night when the preacher said tomorrow night i'm going to point out to you which is the true church of god how can you identify the true church of god so that caught my attention so i said i must go that particular night to here and after this sermon i was convinced that the adventist church is the true church of god we put over the sermon and illustrated from the scriptures i was convinced that the adventist church is the true church of god so i decided that sooner or later i would become an adventist i used to attend the methodist church now my conviction became more cemented when i went to harmon school the teachers there were very christian like especially the bible teacher and i learned much more of the bible we had a form teacher whose name is mr nathaniel moore he's still alive he used to keep bible class with us twice per week after school i used to stay back for those classes and that also enhanced my knowledge of the scriptures often only used to invite us to sub at school in scarborough church so i used to attend not every week but as regularly as i can so i begin i began to become more and more uh more and more inclined to be an adventist but the people i grew with my grandparents didn't like adventists at all so i said to myself as soon as i began to work i would begin to go to church regularly and join the church after graduation from harmons i started to work as a teacher and from then i began to go to church i was baptized and became a full-fledged member of the church when i started to go to church i had some challenges one of the challenges was as a teacher in the government school you had to go to saturday morning classes for for training to manage your class and other things i never used to attend and so the school supervisor whenever he came to visit the school used to always want to find out why are you not coming to class i told him well i'm going to the adventist church and i cannot come on a saturday he pointed out that if you don't attend class it would keep you back from going to college but i didn't i didn't bother about that so i continued i also uh lost some of my good friends because the things we used to do places we used to go i couldn't go there again so i parted company with them we were still friends but not as as good as before i made some new friends in the church so i didn't miss out on anything i also had to give up some of the things i love to eat and drink i still love to drink wine especially a little bit alcohol rum sometimes if you go to our wedding also and well pork was sweet i used to enjoy eating the pork and bush meat but all these things are to give up but it was for my good for my health so i didn't mind doing that if i want to be a true follower of jesus now i'm still in the church i hold several several many offices i was fulfilled for many years and i work in actually all the departments of the church i am and i'm still there doing my best my hope is to be ready for when jesus comes because i'm looking forward to that day if i'm alive i want to see him descend these clouds if i'm not alive i want to be in the first resurrection there are some people i would like to see when i go to heaven jesus himself i want to see the near prince in his hands and feet i want to see peter and job and the three hebrew boys and daniel all those outstanding people in the bible i want to meet them and chat with them to get some more in-depth information of how they survive their christianity down here and most of all i want to be with me new to take care of the plants and see the lovely flowers and fruits and so on because i love agriculture and i would want to travel to the other worlds where there are unfallen beings to enjoy the scenery over there and live forever with jesus in eternity welcome back ladies and gentlemen and as we continue this afternoon please say thank you with me to sister olga and her daughters for that excellent song service now ladies and gentlemen those of us who know any of the history or for enslave forbears we will know that those negro spirituals were the songs that they sung to give them strength while they were under the task masters whip and those are the same songs that even now we should be meditating upon as we prepare to get out of here because it sometimes almost feel as though we are trapped on this this earth and we can't get outside and won't let us get off this planet but by god's grace one of these days just like our four beers we will be emancipated amen and then we thank you very much again to brother wood for that interview but i would i remember working with brother wood and one of the things he we always reminded us of that he was one of the first students of harmon back in 1952 do you know that harmony is a great part of the history of tobago in 1952 and that he always remembers that his grandmother said to him you see that school le belinda when they finish it you going right day and he did indeed come to harmon and spend his time there as a student so brethren we all have a purpose here as we seek to emancipate others now the cry for freedom and the fight for emancipation was from physical mental spiritual enslavement and this has always been a struggle for the human race because ever since adam and eve were deceived in the garden of eden we have been faced with this situation where we are placed under the bondage and the yoke of sin and it was the very evening of that same day when jesus began to deal with that yoke when he sought to emancipate them in a way that nobody else can now of course the bible contains the record of god's deliverance of a young israelite nation from egyptian slavery as well and where he sought to set up a system where they could now be with him and he with them as he dwelt among them brethren let us remember that after the israelites even they had servants slash slaves there was a period of freedom that came after seven years known as the jubilee we don't see that practiced much anymore now as we go down in the context of freedom we must first acknowledge our heritage let us not ever lie about where we came from and learning from our past this afternoon is what we will endeavor to do to take a closer look at how the early advent pioneers moved by the holy spirit brightened and lightened up the island of tobago with the three angels message which really birthed the seventh-day adventist movement on this small island now of course i cannot do this alone because i can only talk from when i was born to know so to help me do this i have brought with me this afternoon two gentlemen that are no strangers to you but who have the wealth of experience in the seventh day adventist movement in tobago and as i chat with them this afternoon as we learn about the history of this very advent movement in tobago please help me welcome this afternoon ladies and gentlemen on my extreme extreme right pastor irwin scott and then in the middle of the screen um brother vernon simon an excellent elder and move on shake up for god so help me welcome them now gentlemen let's go quickly into it and we will start to talk together this afternoon i know that you alone are not strangers to the sda community in tobago but of course asi is not viewed by only tobago persons so we want to let the people in the worldwide audience know who you are so pastor scott let's start with you who are you what are you doing here this afternoon tell us a little about yourself you just said who i am i was born owen scott scott and i think i still have that name right i have been a pastor in tobago for from 1984 until i retired in at the end of 2017. wow that's a long haul that i served two years in grenada and eight years in trinidad okay wow so you have basically been a pastor for almost your whole life well no my whole life is much longer than that but i spent 44 years in the ministry wow wow wow wow that's a lot of years of service and we are indeed thankful for it pastor scott we are indeed thankful for it but simon who are you who am i well um brother say commonly known as brothers i i am vernon simon i heal originally from a little village called kendall and tobago okay that's a village between belgaarden and roxborough right i grew up of course knowing the only religion i knew as a young man was roman catholicism okay right so i of course used to go to the catholic church roxburgh delhi ford and goodwood yes and i went to the anglican school at bell garden and then to secondary school at roxboro um i did my other studies in trinidad and elsewhere but um i've been well should i see what am i we don't know okay smiley for almost 39 years wow i lost my wife this about two and a half years ago wow so i'm a widower as as i stand i have two daughters and three granddaughters four granddaughters wow and um right now i'm enjoying my well retirement age yes but at least retire as far as age is concerned and work is concerned but my work as a seventh adventist as an elder in the seminary adventist church for over 50 years wow i i'm still enjoying it because only this morning i had i was on zoom yes talking to my brothers and sisters amen at the good news same adventist church very good right so here i am yes and indeed welcome gentlemen again and thank you for taking of your time to be here with us now brother simon you would have already alluded to the fact that you grew up in a different um situation yes catholic you were exposed to other religions and so on yes how did you come to know about seventh-day adventism you know pastor scott you know we always say that of course we must not be unequally yoke right but i came out of that kind of experience my father was catholic and i imagine that my mother was seven year adventist wow okay right again she grew up as well she's born bred seven adventists she was actually snatched out of the choir so to speak um what happened i think since we were talking about slavery yes her mother and father died at a very early i know and tender age and she had to live from aunt to aunt right and within those kind of environment she was like a slave wow because she had to do all the washing and cooking and everything at home right um it paid off anyhow yes but of course she suffered immensely you know having to do all this thing yeah so that at age of 17 18 when a young handsome gentleman by the name of peter simon approached her she couldn't care that's whether he was seven adventists at a catholic or whatever she just wanted to get out of the place correct right and that's how she really got in contact you know she got mixed up but yeah with cat room catholicism so we grew up actually as catholic going to catholic church right it was not an easy experience for my mom having to transit you know the transition from same adventism to things so that of course and not too long having gotten married to my father that of course she's well she stopped going to church because of course he would not have problem he would not permit her yes she had a time of her life you know and in those days he used to smoke used to drink and uh when a little ladies here and there yes the normal thing i did run at the mill in those days but um she still stuck it out right stuck it out and out of that union nine children i'm the first of nine wow right seven boys and two girls right um pastor scott only two weeks ago no no two weeks one week ago one of my brother got re-baptized in the same adventism again he got himself mixed up but he was not mixed up but he he was in and out of church right so he got married to somebody he was not a same adventist and after 16 years last sabbat she got baptized you know and it was a glorious day for us amen it was a glorious day i mean i'm saying that if my mom was alive yes and if my wife was alive because my wife and my mom they are the ones who used to be behind her to give her life to the lord but she actually it was not until pastor morgan's crusade recently online that she heard for the first time the sabbath experience and she became fascinated immediately she was convicted yes and i was elated when she called me that night and told me v i'm convinced amen and from that moment you know i was well she lives in richmond virgin virginia that's in the states and that's where they live in now but every night from that experience we used to have discussions right and i was happy to be part of the experience to to indoctrinate her to get her you know and and so on and um so i'm still working with the lord and for the lord right because even as i speak i know just this morning we had this we talk tonight we're going to be having some discussions again and this is where the lord has brought me yes right yes i'm retired from work but of course i'm still in the winner of the lord praise god thank you brother simon now pastor scott where you are born on birth certainly adventists or did you come into this thing i was born in the seventies twenties tomb raider i don't think anybody is born a certainly adventist okay so i was born in the seventh year at this room and i never left the church wonderful that didn't that doesn't mean i never did a lot of nonsense right but i always love the lord praise god and wanted to stay with him yes so that i am here i am okay very good now of course you would have mentioned that um as you said you you did some funny things yeah you did things that the lord of course did not agree with and we want people to understand that while we are saying this we understand that people make mistakes because sometimes we want to make it sound as if this journey is very smooth as if nothing is going to happen but that's the only way i did not grow up in a seven day adventist home in my home still my parents are not seven day adventist but that doesn't stop my love for the lord and my determination to stay wherever he leads me so that is our desire this afternoon as we talk about emancipation really celebrating our heritage our seventh the adventist we come to realize that dory road may sometimes be rocky once we allow jesus to be lord and savior for our lives then he will smooth out the pathways and make things oh yes yes amen okay so let me ask but aside you will join this up in the adventist church yes and what was the first office that you were given when you came into this faith the first office as far as i can remember was a cyber school secretary very good and the ey secretary yes right they they tell me they told me of course i had well a very good you know twin manship i was good at that you know i liked writing yes and uh you know and the very earlier clock you know i got baptized on the 30th of april i won't say what year he doesn't want to go too far yes and i came in the message of course and i attended the designer sdh right uh let me go back a bit i got baptized at the cruciate was held right under our house oh lovely and it was not an easy experience i remember my father leaving home every night you know for the first week until of course he stuck by the second week you know well the prayers were going up for him yes by the second week of course he he decided to stay and he never turned back from that time god yes we got baptized by pastor scott not this court here yes john scott yes right we got baptized by pastor john scott who said hell right on the house right before that occasionally my mom used to invite my brother and i to go to the roxborough same adventist church because that was nearer to us but my father who was mocking the people from zion hillary guardian and the environment he preferred to go to belgium okay because of the design that's the achievement right so very well that's where we started and by january the next year i was actually elected into office as sabbath school secretary and the eoi secretary very good okay and you serve to the best of your ability well to the best of my ability to the extent that by the following year i was just well i was still a secondary school or just coming out of secondary school when of course i was elected as an elder earlier clock passes i was thrust because of the kind of messages the kind of uh reports i used to to to to present and think on a sabbath morning and evening right by the following year as i said before i was elected as you know an elder in those days it is men in their 60s and 70s were elders i can remember the late george george a reed philip decoto robert sylvester these were men with with children who were older than me wow right and you know i was elected to serve among these men right but i think i i did it faithfully and well yes because the thing about it is that having elected as an elder i have i was never ever there was never a year that i did not sleep with an elder thereafter right i got ordinary about a year or two after right so i did my service in zan hill until i got married in 1979 yes and i was transferred to mariah where even before i got to mariah my name was there and even before my membership got to mariah of course they were they were they were actually you know ready to take me into into something so i started right off the bat and as an elder at um mariah sdh i i lived there for about five and a half years and then we built our home at signal hill and so we transferred from yeah by the way it was a july july 1985 right when we left mariah to come to signal hill right and again well of course my theme went before me so i was thrust into office right away interesting into the signaling state church yes and i served from 1985 until 2008. wow right when um until that's when morgan cruz said in 2008 but i must say that within those years between 1985 to the 2008 which is about what 15 23 years i have served 11 years consecutively as fusela in that church wow at zion hill sorry at signal hill right but all in all i was there for 23 years right right in 2008 after the morgan's crusade i was accessive you know that's where i am presently very good and of course i've held offices as i said before um have served of course in mariah and these businesses as ey leader yes i may also tell you i was youth leader of the east district in those days pastor there were only two districts right eastern west can you imagine that in tobago there were two districts tobago eastern tobago west right and i was you leader but haven't been a y leader for many years i i served as youth leader for the tobago east district that's from goodwood up to charlottesville wow in those days i think um paletuvera and lanswamy were part of that instance eastern bloc right so that i served as an ey leader there and the youth leader yes and uh of course i continue to serve even up to this present time very good very good i'm glad to hear that that your service continued to god now pastor scott i'm going to start to ask you the same question what was the first office you held when you joined well when you became old enough if i should put it that way because it's not really joining nothing like brother simon my first office was able to school secretary yes and what made you pass that's got one to become a pastor um we often talk about the call to the ministry so that from very early in my life i felt that i was called to the ministry right to say i wanted to become a pastor um i think the call came long before i really wanted yeah to become a person and even when i was coming up to the point where i was making up my mind whether i should become a pastor or not because i was kind of fighting the call right but an incident happened that i believe actually drew me into it my um my brother-in-law who i was very close to suddenly died in an accident and i was so upset that i had to be carried to the hospital and on my way to the hospital the lord spoke to me and i didn't hear any voice but the impression came on me so strongly they said you will see your brother you know again okay but you have to become a minister first wow so i believe the lord called me into the ministry to save me okay more than disable the other people because the the impression came to me that the only way i was going to see him again is if i make it to the kingdom and the lord said if you to make it to the kingdom you have to be you have to go into the ministry so on the way to the hospital i made up my mind to go into the minute i went to that that was january and by september i was in college studying for the division oh yes wow have you had any day of regret since making that choice no no no good i don't have any day of regret some people say well like the only regret i have is that i didn't do it before but i couldn't do it before right so i have any regrets yes very good and i'm glad to hear that because young people older folks listening and viewing online one of the things that sometimes people say is that they regret joining the seventh-day adventist church now i can't give their reasons why and i can't clarify that but my advice is to anyone who thinks that they have regrets of allowing jesus to be their savior is to get to know him get to know who he is get to know what he stands for and you will come to realize that you will never have any regrets where he is concerned if you honestly open yourselves to him because the thing is he desires so much to love you to emancipate you from the burdens that all of us carry that he will do anything to save you i mean just think about it for one minute as we go into our first break to look at that video that jesus left heaven and would have left heaven if it was just you alone that was um in need of a savior and when you think about that you realize how important you are and therefore you should really and truly have no regrets about allowing jesus to be your lord and savior young people older folks the devil is making up numbers for his kingdom the question is are you allowing yourself to be in the number when jesus calls and that's the answer that's your emancipation that's your freedom from this slavery of sin excellence as we take this first break and we come back to continue talking about slavery in the context of christianity i want you to think about the fact that when jesus frees you he frees you indeed it is your freedom you cannot give true and it's a peace brethren that is unbelievable and all it does is make you smile and your face grows yeah and ready so give jesus a chance today let's go to our first break at this time as we allow ourselves to see what god has done for others even in the years gone by and the years to come okay amen ladies and gentlemen pleasant good evening to every one of you my name is colleen gray hislop i grew up in the village of mason hall and spent most of my years in mason hall as a teenager there were visits by the seventh-day adventists of the community to our home they would come sharing bible studies inviting us to vacation bible school and also conducting branch civil schools then there were also the jehovah witnesses coming around at the same time fortunately or unfortunately your humble servant at that time attended the saint joseph's convent previously assumption college and then saint joseph's convict do you want to know what happened to me i wanted to become a nun because the roman catholic doctrines was so very strong in my life as i attended that school and that shows me how much depth the religious affiliation can have upon children in their education so i wanted to become a nun and the sister jacqueline who was the principal at the time visited with my father to let him know that this is what i wanted to be of course that he would see none of it that is not going to take place at all so being disheartened with many of the beliefs of the anglican church at that time both mama and real children were looking for alternatives in our teen age years it happened that around that time there was a crusade being conducted by the then pastor glenn ferdinand at the seventh-day adventist church in mason hall nothing at this point in time will make me leave my relationship with jesus nothing through god's words be not conformed to this world i beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of god that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto god which is your reasonable service and be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that ye may prove what is that perfect and acceptable will of god any thought of leaving my savior certainly not now what am i looking forward to when i shall spend eternity with jesus i'm looking forward to meeting jesus myself i want to meet this person who loved me so much who thought about me even before i was born even before i was conceived and who decided i love her so much so that even though it is she alone i will come to this world to give my life for her i want to meet jesus i want to meet the patriarchs who have gone on before who have been faithful to god i want to spend eternity with jesus where there'll be no more sorrow no more pain no more sickness no more death no more covet 19 no more loss of jobs i want to spend eternity with jesus and i love gardening so i can't wait i cannot wait to be there tilling my own like a piece of my own little plot of land cooperating and meeting and uniting with all the faithful who have gone before i want to be faithful until that day i want to spend eternity with jesus i thank you very much for this opportunity this evening thank you for staying with us viewers and welcome back now sister colleen has a very interesting story to tell but of course because of our time restrictions this afternoon we would not be able to play the entire video so as of now as soon as this program is finished you can go online and check the asi youtube channel and there you will see all the videos that we play this afternoon all the testimonials will be right online there for you to view them in their entirety and these stories are riveting ones because what we have come to realize is that most people did not have it easy joining the seventh-day adventist church but by god's grace they persevered because if you have a good thing and it's worth fighting for you will fight for it oh yes well many people will be in scarborough thank god we do not do that anymore fighting over ladies and gentlemen we don't have to do that but we fight for god we fight to stay in his presence because we realize that in his presence is fullness of joy so that no matter what the world throws at you no matter what the world try to beat you down with once you are in the presence of god you find joy and a peace as i said that cannot be surpassed so brethren whether or not you want to just stay in god's presence try him out and see how he works for you oh yeah so let's continue with the questions to these two gentlemen this afternoon but before i do that i want to read from this book some of the statistics on the chronology of events um in trinidad and tobago but we'll focus more on tobago do you know when the scarborough church was organized and was scarborough church the first church in tobago the next question i want to ask do you know when the glamorgan church was organized where was it organized and what was the membership when that church was organized do you know that there were only 15 members in that church oh yes now and next thing that i want to ask you do you know who is john roberts and do you know what he has to do with the history of the seventh adventist church in tobago do you know when moriah was organized moral church on the north side that voted all of those churches going up and down the north side do you know about that what about rocks bro when roxbury church was organized what about charlotte villa lovely church by the seaside that makes you want to walk straight out of the church and onto the beach brethren what about that one and do you know that blackrock church karanath church and paralyzed church in trinidad were all begun at the same time and received into the sisterhood of churches at the same date on september 15 1941 what about harmon school now i would have told you how many school began in 1952 and i remember it so well because so pip always says the school was born when he was born so we have some history there as well so is harm on school and that was in january 1952. now let's go ahead do you know that cassara's coming to bean for those of you from the countryside was not under the normal um course of things do you know that casara begun because there was something called the provisions of the churches into the new regions program so there was a program called into new regions and that is how kasara came to be so that is how i was able to join that church by god's grace yes out of that i was part of it that's right um brother simon is saying he was part of that as well so it wasn't a normal thing do you know when lakota was um organized march the fourth but in what year and if you think you know all of those things then make sure that you stay tuned now gentlemen let me come back to you i have talked enough let me ask questions now right now of course when we look at our society we are seeing all these movements the me too movement black lives matter and all of these things and the one thing they are fighting for is really emancipation because for many people they say that the blacks are not free and when we look around the world we realize that many blacks are placed on the suspicion for crime as the first person we realize also that some of the the um benefits that they should get at work they are not getting because of the color of their skin so to you i ask have you all ever faced in the work of god any form of racism or have you been treated badly because let's say of the fact that you are who you are in terms of you're not in the upper classes have you all experienced that no i have not experienced that i thank god for being born in the west india exactly yeah yeah being born in tobago yes i have always felt very free and emancipated yes but i know of my brothers and sisters in other places even trinidad that i felt the brunt of of racism yes but in tobago i haven't felt that and the kind of person i am it's very hard for me to to be affected yes by by certain things right so i thank god for the kind of person i am also right very good yeah i think we are blessed to be in this this part of the world yes i think the only thing nearest to that is the fact that when we were growing up the estate plantations you know the coconut plantation the cocoa and coffee and banana and these things they were owned by white people you know yes and people from scotland from england where they came from so that as black people we had to work for them right i know my father for example that's where he grew up and and worked but at my when i when i became an at least when i was a young man as far as like as far back i could tell i know my father was an overseer right at the candela state okay it was coconut coffee and the old works yes right those days we used to ship truckloads of of of coconut you know um and coffee and cocoa to trinidad banana and all these ground provisions yes this is what it is my father of course and well you know they used to look up to these people yes it was like i seem like a massacre kind of thing you know because these so-called white people you know we had to pay or be sent to them to a certain extent we were they were our parents were like slaves to them yes right i think that's about the closest that we could have come to that kind of a a thing but those people they were nice people do right those those are those plantation owners they were nice nice people right because they used to treat us well you know as i don't know because of the fact that my father was part of you know but um they treated us nicely and and so on so i don't think we had that kind of this discus in the true center of the world yes racism and in this part of the world correct yes and we thank god for that yeah so being born in the west indies though some cities are blight is indeed a blessing exactly right now the bible talks a lot about slavery um and jesus may i was it jesus or paul but basically there was some edicts or should i say some guidelines given um in the way you treated slaves and so on as i said before slavery is seen as bondage paul yes he spent a lot of time expanding on that slavery is seen as bondage now presently we do not have slavery in the true sense of the word meaning you don't have to report on all for lord or massa but tell me what ways may our young people be under bondage now and what would you say to the young people to help them to understand that they need to to free themselves from the bondage that they are under well the truth is there is actual slavery going on in the world today in our country you hear whispers yeah about it and of course it's illegal yes but there is human traffic and so on going on and in every country now slavery is illegal yes but in a lot of countries slavery is going on people are being snatched and sold and so on and so on yes um i think the adventist church is a great emancipating church exactly amen because a lot of people in tobago are enslaved yes to drugs to crime to a lot of things yeah being a seventh-day adventist has saved me at least yes from this kind of thing yeah um because the kind of person i am i wouldn't mind experimenting with all kinds of things yes but because i learned to love the lord yes amen i know that my body is the temple of the lord and so on i never experimented with tobacco or alcohol never was tempted to go the way of drugs and so on and all this is because of growing up in an adventist home so i didn't even become addicted to unclean meats meat is one of the hardest that was wonderful that was one of my problems yes tell us about it brother silence yeah i mean no seriously the thing is people feel as if it's only people who take drugs and maybe one woman yeah are addicted to stuff but there are other things and food is one of them addiction is one of the greatest forms of slavery yeah if if i could tell you well as i said before i grew up in the world and i grew up with a wool you could have eaten anything at all right right the monaco the tattoo the iguana whatever it is you know we grew up eating those things in fact we used to go hunting hunt those things out the crab right the lobster the the the shims yes everything we we those all come unto us yes right we were part of that whole thing as a matter of fact i grew i i grew up mining pigs right right always tell people that my first investment wasn't a pig right [Laughter] i won i want a jackpot in a bingo right for 25 in those days right and i paid ten dollars for the pig a little piglet and i started wearing that and that's what i used to see me through life to a great extent um so that we were free as we think we were free but we were slaves to eating all these kind of crazy things no it it it it thickens my stomach when i see people eating these things and people going off on these and then i'm thinking i used to eat that yes you know i used to be part of that so that um i we were slaves to these things it was the order of the day yes um one good thing is that i was not addicted at any time to any of those drugs at least would have taken you know as little boys because my father was a smoker when they when they threw away that little end of the butt you call the butt when behind your back we're going to take up that buck and we're going to try to get what is it you go take a little pull right we take a little and you know they used to encourage us even into drinking yes because on our weekends when my mother well not my mother but my father and his friends yeah when they meet the drink yeah when we come around them they'll say boy take a little before they take a thing for their right and they'll give you a little glass and then you'll take a little glass and then you're going to play drunk because we see how they behave when they when they get when they when these men get drunk so we're going to pray that we are drunk and do some crazy things yes not knowing of course that we were slaves yes to these things um slave of course even brother pastor the day that i got baptized was a day i was supposed to go horse recently right yeah you know we i was you know so i was telling my mother wanted us to but today she said well tomorrow's the baptism and i was crying because i didn't want to get baptized because the fact that i want to go to the horse race and i was at schuvan road right in those days travel in tobago and um i my mom said well you could think i would think i will talk about it after right and you know strange enough pastor we we got baptized at the richmond river my under that baptism from pastor john scott my my brother my father and i were among the foods that people got baptized my father stopped smoking he stopped drinking from that moment on so we never got after that time and we were never you know people used to laugh at us when we stopped eating and doing these things yes but you know they told me that there are two kinds of freedom freedom to do as you please and freedom to do as you ought to yes a lot of us believe that freedom to do as you please you know that is freedom not realizing that that is slavery of the highest order because we come deeply addicted to these to these habits and these traits and these vices all right right but when you are free my friends and jesus then you are free indeed correct i remember when i was working i started working at um when i started working but one of my bigger work was when i started to work for telco right now tstt yes right and in those days on a friday evening when those guys when they when we get extra duty monies and so on they're gonna buy the the drinks and so on and come in and and drink and i i was i was the only seven adventists in the exchange i was working in the in the in the in um i was an exchange technician and um when they drink and they would offer me because they know i was an adventist and what i will do is that i say no but when they do that when they go to buy they will buy the they'll buy some peer jacks right and they buy some but thing about it is that in the middle of the thing they're going to use some of those things same thing as tracer right so my drink is is lessened yes right they even sometimes in an effort to to embarrass me they'll throw perhaps the drink on my on my on my head and then you go and tell your wife that you were drinking you know you know you know and they used to try all these kind of things at me but thank god i've never one day yielded to their temptations right and i've stood out you know i worked for 25 29 years at at tstt and never one day did they get me to yield to that kind of thing so that my freedom i believe my freedom came when i accept jesus christ as my personal savior yes because i was no longer a slave to these to these drugs and whatever but i was not ever into it but i was not exposed to it any any longer temptations were there people try to offer you yeah try to put these things in and and and drink or whatever it is but i had an instinct if you put any kind of alcoholic thing in any anything if you mix i remember going to our wedding once and they mix the pork with with with other things okay right and as if when i got there like something the spirit was there with me yes you know which telling me no don't interfere with that yes and it happened at one wedding i went to and uh i realized something was wrong and when i asked this the silvers you know one of these was what was in that thing they tell me pork yes i know yes and we never knew before but i guess the spirit was at work yeah i think all right right and whoever was sending adventists at that wedding you know we have to pass a message on don't don't partake in that i told i told that at all so that i think these people are more enslaved yes then we who they think are because we we we we do not do this like them we don't play the game we don't do you know live as they as they well please no yeah your greatest freedom is when you accept jesus christ as your prisoners amen amen and pastor scott the church in tobago still has a great work to do oh yes um tell us what are what are some of the things that we still have to work with because we know we have a lot of enslaved people in tobago still i mean in in spite of the fact that i think one in our numbers are probably one in eight persons in tobago claim 7-day adventism um what work do you think we honestly have to do now especially in these coverage times where we see we are losing many people um what work do we still have to do our seven day adventists on this island we have to continue doing the work that god has called us to do to preach the gospel but even more than that to live their life to live the air to live the same life in this life and talking about emancipation i grew up um we had the germans the scots the amids these were the adventists in my village right in the middle east and everybody else was not an adventist and they used to look down on adventists yeah i'd call you seven devil yeah i know this kind of thing yeah what um it was never a problem with me because my personality yes i i could take that yeah yeah but i always looked at my friends and thought they were really in slavery yes because they would be afraid to pass by a cemetery yes yes yes yes in my time if by chance they point at the cemetery they have to buy the temperature yes correct yeah we would i know me going home my friends would have to go in backwards yeah correct yeah because the food will follow them inside yes and they had all these horses superstitious yeah yes and they were literally afraid of these things yes and i always look back and say praise god for my adventist everything i never was influenced by any of these superstitions yes and so as you say the work we have to do we really have to help free people yes from this kind of bondage yeah because the worst kind of slavery you could be in is to be a slave and don't know that you're right exactly yeah those people are slaves and they don't know that the uh slaves but i want to say one thing else sure as i said i was born in an adventist home but that doesn't mean i was born an adventist okay okay go ahead my inquisitive mind caused me to look at all of the religions go to all of their churches i even went and take communion in the catholic church one [Laughter] [Laughter] but i really try to see if adventism really had the the truth right yes yes yes and when i looked at all the other churches and i studied my bible i realized that adventism teaches what the bible teaches yes we are we are we are yeah and to me jesus says you shall know the truth yes and the truth will make you free correct and i have proved that yes very good as well said people think that freedom is doing what you please but the only person who is really freezing possibly a christian yes because freedom is the ability to do what you really want to do yes and as a christian the real thing you want to do is to serve the lord amen are you free to do that yes going to paul again such there is no law so that i'm free to do anything i want to do correct because all i want to do is to do what the lord wants me amen and i'm free to do that yes god itself can't stop i meant because you know as i told you i grew up in the village in kendall and uh i had to go to school secondary school at roxbury in those days you had to walk to school yeah right and we have to pass the agile cemetery and sometimes we'll rather walk on the beach especially if we know there's a funeral or somebody just got buried will prefer to walk on the sea coast to go up to roxbury rather than walk on that main road and they're going there we dare not yes look look look how gross all right and you know it was not until i became a 70 adventist but they taught me death yeah you know and you know you know it it told me that dust plus breaths equal living it's called living soul that's right so that when the breath is taken away what happened thus remains right so that the dead can do nothing right and it takes an adventist to really understand that yes right and it was not a you know and i hear people today talking about he is in the arms of jesus or she is up there looking down at us and these kind of crazy things that's what the devil told mm-hmm that's what it is upon to leave you shall not surely die yes so you believe that the dead lives on yeah but same adventists would have taught you otherwise correct right and i think i got that kind of freedom so i no longer afraid yeah i walked alone already from goodwood to kendall yeah on a night night you know yeah and we used to walk from from from zion hill in the night coming along bad rock in the night in those days there were no street lights right but we had to come when you go to church and started we stayed all whole day sometime for a y and after ay or sometimes we have social and we have to walk all up those dark corners to get back home but because of the the the freedom that we know enjoy no jumping no jumping there was no such thing as i think such thing right so that um i i i want to thank god for the work of this adventism and uh you know but then we still have a lot of people out there who need to know right that we need to free free up and let them come to jesus christ you know for whatever form we have to use to get these people there yeah we have to do it and do it quickly because time is really yes that's right and so viewers at this time we are just about to go into a second break and we just want to you know but a cyan person scott made some excellent points there you know freedom is not about really being able to do what you want and when i wrap up i'll use some of the quotes that they use because i'm writing here i am maybe half the age but i'm learning so much this afternoon that is helping me to realize this thing that we think is freedom and we take for granted yeah is not what we think it is so freedom is not being able to run away from your parents house and guam meet your lover done by the mango tree and we turn back before curfew these days um freedom is not being able to drink as much as you want because you think that makes you a man or a woman um freedom is not being able to engage in all the fleshly loss because it is what you like it is not that what it is is the freedom that christ gave you to understand that you can live a life free from all the madness of the world yes and still enjoy this world until jesus comes and work with him also i want to remind us of one thing as we go for this break ladies and gentlemen there is still a lot more work for us to do yes because we cannot allow our brothers our sisters our neighbors and our friends to be tied up in sin we have work to do so we'll take our second break and when we come back we'll just have a short segment and then we will start to wrap it up there at esi this afternoon let's take that break at this time to all our viewers in trinidad and tobago especially the church family i'm now in the church from 1963 i baptized in september 30th 1963 yeah so 37 because uh 58 years almost 58 years i've been striving by god's grace to follow him so discouragement become in my family at home um we had a discouragement because the family could not understand what's going on with me yeah and it it is difficult at times to deal with your family because at least i am making a new start and they're not accustomed to it they want to know what's going on in their life so that was a bit of discouragement but god worked it out nicely and i was able to stay at home until i got my own family my degrees are gone so um viewers discouragement will come in a family and a job and even in the church and it was kind of the worst kind of discouragement may come within the church family because it's there you you're in a new relationship and it can be heard much easily the coming of christ which is the team of the christian world if christ doesn't come we're all in a lot of trouble and this if christ will come we better get rid of the churches and go back and do what we used to do before we were converted but the bible is clear that christ will come christ will come again to save i believe every honest soul who in humility accepts him as their personal savior and allow him to walk with them and to guide them along this extension it's a beautiful journey wonderful journey with christ as our lord and our savior most of the prophecies have been fulfilled most of the biblical prophecies have been fulfilled when we are in some serious times it is said that probation is closing all the time allotted for us to make decisions for the lord jesus christ is fast clothing and we got to make sure that we are right humanly possible and let god do his part on our behalf so christ will come the bible says eyes have not seen no ears he has heard what he has prepared for with the lord i don't know what god have in mind i don't know what god have in mind but i expect some great things going to happen i expect some marvelous things that happen or the most marvelous thing that are going to happen to this world when jesus comes you're going to come and save his people save honest souls wherever it may be it's coming i know we're going to change our relationship relationships going to change so i'm looking forward to some new relationships with jesus himself that going to be amazing to see christ through yourself and they will talk with him and let him tell you what you went through this life and how you operated on your behalf to be an amazing long story so the key is samia i got to see jesus i want to tell him thanks for what he did for me and what he promised to do in the future i know i'm with great men like moses and elijah those are my favorite men moses elijah john the baptist those are my favorite barbary characters and i'm looking forward to have a dialogue with them too by the grace of mercy god and most of all the environment and with the environment will be exceptional a new heaven and a nude sinless pure beautiful seem gone and gone forever more even our greatest enemy death has gone completely and then the righteous redeemed would be able to live travel beautiful times wonderful experiences with christ of the whole lord and our savior ladies and gentlemen brethren i am happy to know that you all are engaging with us this afternoon yes the phone calls and the texts are very welcome yes and we thank you for knowing your history maybe even better than we do so we will talk a little bit more about the history now of course we know that there were many pioneers who came to tobago and i must tell you we did advertise a quiz but because of technical difficulties for this afternoon we will forego it because it does not make sense to do it and you will not enjoy it okay so let's talk a little about our history well we know of course that we were once um joined with the south caribbean conference then tobago of course became a mission and now we stand as a mission soon to be confronted by the god's grace the second thing we know is that we had a president when we started off and we still function under the caribbean union conference what we also do know is that previously in 1964 there were only 18 churches on the island and we had 1 300 members now we have um and then no sorry let me go back make sure give you the history then at that time it would be one in every 25 persons on the island would have been a seventh day adventist and that has changed so now i'm piggybacking off pastor scott's um statement that we still have work to do that has been brought down some so that ratio now as stated by the tobago mission website is that one in every eight persons on the island of tobago are 70 adventists now of course this is not a sign that we are to stop our work it is a sign that we could go to the point where one in every person on this island becomes a seventh-day adventist now and of course we have more than twenty-something churches and you will know the number and somebody can type it in the chat and tell us exactly how many churches we have on the island right and we have churches we have i think two companies one is in the south west side it's king of glory yes that's on the path of vishnu and then when we go up i think it's in the east we have the people that worship the new life new life they worship there i think they are still at faster cooks right in zion we continue to grow and we have come to the point now where almost every village in tobago has a seventh day adventures but that does not mean our work has ended because battle alone could take two seven day adventist churches right and let's remember that as we continue to work for god even during discovery times now brother simon are you aware that pastor scott is also a part of tobago's history i am also yes but what i'm talking about him specific for is is that that that new um program that he started on 92 um yeah that program there in the morning so pastor scott i i have been able to catch that program sometimes sometimes yes um can you tell us what what is it like working on that program and is it still going on how is it yes it's still going on um it might look so it's very hard work yes to prepare someone every every week yes but i enjoy doing it and when i'm tempted to to complain yes the lord always reminds me that if he doesn't have anything for me to do then it doesn't make sense my being around yeah correct and so many people my age and younger are not around anymore all right so the lord told me push your mouth and do the work correct because if you don't have anything to do then you don't need to be around all right so i was asked to do the program many years ago yes and by the grace of god i i have been doing it yes the lord has been very very good to me because sometimes i don't know what to say but the lord always yes comes and brings yes something for me to say amen yes and i must indeed say that you are blessing the hearings yes yes the listeners have been tuning in they are homes that i have been at and while i am having my devotion inside i am hearing their radio turned on and they are listening to your program okay so pastor you are continuing to impact the lives of tobagonians now i want us to zero in because you have talked a lot about you work in the east you said you came over to moriah and of course being from castera i wanted to talk about the caster experience because as a member of that church one of the things that i remember my uncles and other family members talking about is the fact that they as my family would tell the seventh-day adventists with eggs and so forth when they came in to spread the gospel in the village so brothers i know you would have had some um some impact with that as well you and brother diamond because i cannot forget brother diamond at all not at all that area um to start that that church there and tell us something about the work up there um as a where did it start which church really pioneered it and and how did it occur and all of that yeah i think the main church they are involved was the the mariah sdh when we went to mariah you know diamond and they came in this we came up on the same time right right because they got married in april of that year 1979 i got married in december right right and we all were attending the mariah church together uh there were two companies that came out initially from that um the castera company and the monk thomas company right the monk thomas was i think by sister joseph salandi yes i think there was their property her brother was next there and we we so what happened is that those companies well how um castera came into being was a crusader i think but a diamond here yes yes right a tent we we cleared this site lemon got and you know diamond was that but i'm not one of those people unlike the people who said who were stoned yeah they're coming into casara but the diamond was a very loved beloved guy in fact he was a brave guy yes right he would stand up to any challenge at all right and uh but the diamond i think the the people that house opposite i think the guy's deceased now um crooks cooks yes he was one of those guys who gave that him some challenges right but he became very good friends after because on his dying bed he had a diamond to come to his rescue yeah but he became an adventist he became an adventist eventually right because of the relationship that was when his wife and then yeah but accusate was held by that that opposite him yeah right yeah when he church is right yes and diamond just fresh as he too newly baptized member but he said he got a vision to do as accused or any such thing wow but he decided he must think there was a pastor at the time was pastor dory i've heard the name no way i think he's a guyanese right and when when when diamond termite you want to have you say you're you're mad man i'm on your mother what would you what's your auntie not at all and he tried to present but diamond was adamant yes and diamond went on there at times i would imagine joey had to be there pricking him to tell him you know some things and he might think that because he's going to make his mistakes and greening the message but he had he had that zeal to total i can't remember how many people got baptized out of that crusader but as a result of the cruciate was held there was 20 something or 30 something people were baptized and what happened we decided we're going to stay there right the tent and then we put up a little thing after and um what happened is that they used to roster us from mariah right to go to castera and to go to among thomas yes so the sunday night sabbath on wednesday night they roster us to go to those churches but it really started with a diamond yes and i think the company haven't started and after the crusade but the diamond and his family yes his wife and children yeah and his is his um mother-in-law yes sister ida yes they were the people who stood there yes right um so i only used to go in there when i'm roasted right right or otherwise you know but you know but he was there and they spent years yes yes yes yeah establishing and building yeah because he was the man who was behind and he was there until then they moved from i can't remember it was a tent they were we used to stay in or but a liquor structure was put up after and it was diamond who really yeah you know thought that he he was the man who who saw that he looked into the fact that you know a billion be established right we were there for mariah and other churches we used to go in and and build that thing until become what it is you know yes what it has been so bird diamond is right he created a very very very very important part in that in the history of that church and the same thing out of hmong thomas the same thing monk thomas is now colluding yes not very good indian churches today right but it started as monks right and then they went further into where they are correct so we were part of the diamond had had his crusade at casara i had a crusade at month thomas right right and um we from there we we continue from that kind of thing yeah so that history of the money yes telling that i i remember that at this that today as you said the money you said there were how many churches well 64. no in in in in 64 18 18 18 18. right now there are 23 33 well not necessarily congregations right congregations yeah because um the the um king of glory is it yes as a matter of fact it's only last sabbati yeah i was asked to do i preached there and zoom right yes i was there and of course you have the the life we call it new life yes right yes um we have you know since my after that you know we have well before that we had like louis dawg yeah came into bean good news came into being make hillary was before good news really right then you have places like even when i became a civil adventist i don't think um well when i became a senator i don't think bon accord was a was a church then yes was a result of that crusade that held by his pastor daniel by the answers yeah right right yeah and uh out of that company out of that came those two companies they can be yeah and the marquis hill yes again diamond by the diamond pita a very pivotal role in that in that marquis hill where in seven days time they were able to put up a structure and and and and right diamond was he under the lead but uh is it kadman murray is what is oversee that um that um that that um cardwell mori cardwell murray right i remember they started at an at this uh uh and some place upstairs the nib mall right in the mall right and then they had to pay a rent when diamond was saying look number one we don't even have money much and we have to put out money the pay aren't there and so they understand that there was this land that was owned by hormones or wherever there's something interesting about the landing there was something interesting it yes yes because um when harmon started expanding right yeah they realized that where it was it was too small yes and so the conference bought that land in marque hill four lots of land in 1958 for cheeto for three thousand dollars so much longer so much done up there yeah and um harmon was going through some financial difficulties the conference decided to sell the market inland wow and to put the money into her money right and so the onus was on myself and the principal mr islam at that time to negotiate the sale and he put it in the hand of one of the best real estate agents in tobago when he saw before he said that seller ready man he says if they don't sell in six months take back the contract but that that that sell already and when the six months pass he didn't get it soon he said i don't understand that because i'm selling all over and people won't learn there's a choice but and i can't get it still yeah so take back the contract and after that there was two brothers wanted to buy the property but because they couldn't agree among themselves they both gave up on it right and then one lady decided that she would go and look at the place and when she saw it she said yes this is the ideal place for me to live yeah and she saw the sea and the yeah she said this is the ideal place so she she went up there this sunday and she told us monday morning meet me at the bank and i'll you'll get the money for the property and when she was leaving the steel buns started to play yeah wow and she said now can i leave and therefore she didn't work and he was selling that place for four hundred thousand wow yeah but praise god god negotiated that you yes because even before that um attempts were made to sell market here yeah but nothing you do you couldn't get maki hill soon and now we know yeah praise god yes after that after accuracy yeah so the land was just there oh my goodness but a diamond always boasts you know is the only seventh day church and chicken tobago yeah right because that church was that structure was put up in seven days time you know you know something good news went up in about two or three two weeks right two or three weeks we started to to conjugate that good news in seventies i grew up in scarborough yes and there was one seventh-day adventist church one anglican church one catholic church one methodist church these were the churches in scarborough okay they still have one methodist church one anglican church one catholic church but it has three seventh-day adventist churches in scarborough yes yes yes and on the old schools yes we have monkeys yes yeah we have signal here we have lambo yes when when i was growing up it was one adventist church one methodist church one unicorn church one colleague church you still have one methodist one anglican one yeah yeah and so many adventist churches yeah that would be the glory that is so true because those people from lambo and from whoever making right now used to go to scarborough church yeah even if you're from here we still used to come to america used to come too well i don't know about the signal in history but i remember that signal hill marysel plymouth and scarborough was one district at that time yeah but there was no there was no marquee hill there was no lambo and and so on and don't forget that i have a part in the history of morale today because oh yes i came in 1984 as pastor in that district so you know the same one was one of my members shortly after the two starting caster yeah i was the person yeah okay okay yes so that's a good part of the history for us it was yes yes scott i know you would have done some extensive research so tell us some of the research you would have bounced upon well let me say that um let me just read something i have here adventism was briefly introduced to tobago in 1901 right yes when two foreign ministers based in trinidad pastor l m crowter and w.g nyland visited the island to begin the work here they both had to return to trinidad after only a few weeks however due to the fact that they contracted malaria yes ella crota died from the disease on august 25 of that year 1901 but then the world got started in earnest [Music] when in 1902 william porter and cnb dumps landed in tobago and began selling books all over the island correct they landed at pembroke yes from the coastal vessel yeah and walked up the hill to george street in glamorgan where they introduced their goods to the first house they were impressed to visit yes it was the home of the grandest family yeah it was my great grandfather that's right grandson that's my great grandfather and i don't know him but i was told mr grandison bought books and immediately became interested in the message and his home soon became a base for adventism that's correct yes among the first converts in the morgan were mr grandest family correct the roberts family the darlington family the little group started worshipping the grandson's home and started to evangelize the village and surrounding villages of pembroke goodwood and belgium the converts from these villages walked to the morgan three times weekly for sabbath and night services yes by 1913 they erected the first church building on a piece of land donated by the robert's family right so that's a little bit of the yes yes yes yes yes the history of how things started that is independent yeah i don't know him but i know that was my mother's grandfather yeah because my mother was grant was grandest before she right her mother was but the nurse was that was nurse but her father was a grandest girl so she became grandest and then she got married to simon right but my great grandfather is part of that whole yes excellent go ahead pastor scott anything else you want us to tell us there quickly let me just say something about mariah because it's interesting yes indeed um let's just hold on a bit as fast the finds his arm this information there yes make sure that we get it right somehow but i have an interesting story here concerning how the work started in mariah edmond bruce was the first person to accept the message in the village of moriah under the preaching of jd wood in 1919 right oh yeah in 1922 one sister macleod of from parrot hall in pirateview while on her way to scarborough stopped to rest at the home of philip franco and his mother in mariah philip was 14 years of age at that time oh yeah and he recalls how his mother's little pig came and started playing around the macleod lady she said get away from me you nasty thing mrs franco [Music] and her daughter-in-law her name was trouble trump troubled campbell was troubled campbell was visiting her mother-in-law mrs franco and she wanted to know why mrs macleod called the pig nasty wow she told them that according to the bible the pig is unclean and opening her bible she gave them a bible study on healthful eating right they became interested and that prompted her to give them a study on the sabbath also the following sunday mrs macleod's husband walked to mariah to continue the studies with them through these studies joanna franco trouble campbell and philip franco were baptized but the edmond bruce took them under his care because they said he was the first adventist in maryland and led them to mon grace where he had his membership that time when grace church was the only church um around the montgomery church was the first church that was built built yeah the morgan started early but yes they didn't have a church they used to worship in the grandest themselves yes so i think that was interesting of course trouble camera was not the lady's real name but she used to make some more trouble in the village that they called the trouble camera but when she became an adventist yes the same way she used to make trouble in the village right she went the wrong and spread the gospel all over the philippines i like it so bradley we are almost to the end um i have some some dates here and those of you who are historians you can check them out as well so now we are talking about the dedication of of buildings in the following place so scarborough's building was dedicated in 1938 june the 5th roxburgh was dedicated same year 1938 october 8th um glam morgan they say here their building was dedicated not built dedicated october the 9th 1938 mount pleasant was dedicated same year 19 no actually next year september the 10th 1939 so what really happened in tobago during 1938 to 1939 actually 1934 to 1939 was an explosion of the gospel and that is because god brought to tobago just the people that were needed right so that basically there was a group um in mount pleasant the the group there was raised up as i said in december um it was raised up in december 9 on christmas day actually 1932 but their church was not dedicated in until 1939 because of course they had to get a building lanzumi um would have seen seeing workers coming into to that village as well and so let's let's make sure of the deity in november in 19 to 1933 a church was organized that land swimming 1933 so landsmith has a lot of history on that north side yes right um mariah roxborough paula tuva black rock right all of these places in 1932 got touched by this evangelist which um was known as pastor warner afterwards that came to the big one really shook up the place of jesus so the history says wherever pastor warner went he attracted large audiences to his to his meetings right on the um and bethel what happened down at your place was that on the opening night of his evangelistic effort at bethel an estimated 1 000 people were present wow right people of all ages and from all over the island converged on battle to hear the evangelists many of them walking long distances among the supporters was sister dorinda wilson who thought well advancing age walked a distance of 10 miles every day to attend a meeting when you talk about pioneer spirit yes we talked about pioneer spirit and the church continued to grow and grow and grow till we had so much that new churches new companies had to be started all over the island so the place where we have come where we almost have a church in every village and betel as i said deserves maybe two by now because bethel is so huge right now what are we talking about all of this history to really do brethren it is the shorty pioneering spirit of the seventh-day adventist church now we are in call of duty times and we accept that but that doesn't stop us from doing the work that god has called us to do as far as as scott has said there is still work to do too many people are enslaved on this island and whatever the enslavement might be let us not find the time to judge but let us find the time to introduce them to god really so that they can give their lives to him before it is too late because we are losing people every day and we want to see these people when god comes when jesus bursts those clouds in glory don't you want to see your brothers don't you want to see your sisters your parents then why put that pioneer spirit to sleep let it awaken by the grace of god through his holy spirit so as we wrap up this afternoon gentlemen thank you for being with me and i'll ask you at this time to give your closing words as we um remind tobago that all emancipation really is the truth in christ so let's give them a few words at this time pastor scott i'll start with you then i'll come to your lsi and then we'll wrap up for this afternoon tobago is now a mission yes in my days we didn't dream about that no but the layman movement started in about 2000 and women started pushing for a mission and praise god went through all the channels and tobago is is now a mission and as you said soon to become a conference by the grace of god we can work towards that we have a small population in tobago of about 60 000 i believe that as a church we could work to see 60 000 members in tobago by the grace of god because we want everybody to be saved for the kingdom you know i think in spite of all the challenges the same adventist church has come a long way as i said before i remember we started with just about two districts in tobago pastors right and several pastors have come through tobago during those years you know i am glad that i accepted the lord at the time that i accepted the lord right the bible tells us remember now that they're created and the evil deeds come now i know i accepted the lord as a youth and i haven't regretted it one moment god pastor i almost come up i passed that one time because of my ability at the time but then they didn't have my parents didn't have the finance to send me to cuc yeah right so i decided of course yourself go for a second or two agreed that was of course becoming a businessman a teacher i didn't like teaching so much i tell myself i will try the technical feel but even when i got into the technical field i branched over to the business field right but the point is that um 70 adventists has made me what i am today yes right and i would ask i would tell anybody if you haven't tried it yet the best decision you can ever make in your life is to accept the same adventist movement give your life to jesus christ because ready or not he's coming again yes right we have the work to do yes but i think by god's grace remember the final movements are going to be rapid once yes and by lips and bone this message is going to reach throughout tobago yes right uh yes the intention of course is to have all sixty thousand yeah but you point out about it the bible says not for a conversion it's for a weakness right matthew 24 14 for a weakness and i'm sure that at the end of it all every person in tobago would at least have a knowledge of the surveillance movement right it's up to them to make the choice to decide to live not as they please yes but to live as the author amen may god help us we'll continue to do our work yes but pastor scott and i would have done orbit in our times yes but we are still working we would not i'm not giving up yes i tell people i'm retired from salary yes but not from service yes yes yes yes i am i tell people that i become i became more active yes upon retirement than when i was before because my wife you know she became a full-time call porter yes and we used to be troublesome the all of tobago yes with our books and whatever with the books and and so on so i think the gospel is going to get through yes right it's up to you what are you going to get through with it yes you want to ask tobago and whoever commented to beagle give jesus a chance yes yes right find a same adventist somewhere find a same adventure somewhere and you know get involved in the movement and give your heart to jesus christ before it is two years amen and and and viewers wherever you are in the world remember we no longer have to find a church in the true essence of the word no asa is on here they are on on sabbath morning sabbath evening they are here um sunday night they are here on tuesday because i have to learn to cook they are here on wednesday evening they are here on friday again with worship and then um talks you talked and then they are back on sabbath it's a packed week and all you have to do is take the time because most of us can't go anywhere just take the time to learn more about jesus there are series going on all over the world there are series going on in jamaica all of the islands all over the place and the truth is once you find the time to spend with jesus because he's always there he'll find the time to engage you so don't give up on him now the book that i was reading from is entitled the seventh-day adventist church in trinidad and tobago 1891 to 1981 and it focuses heavily on the history of the island it was written by eric john murray yeah that's the same um guy no he was the firm he was a former union president former union president very good so this was written by him it's what we used to study um youth department this is our guide and we use it for a lot of young elders as well to teach them the history because it's not just about knowing jesus but you must know where we come came from as well so you can check it out see if you could get a copy and finally as we close off brethren because as we wind up i want to remind you of these two quotes that i took from these two able gentlemen this afternoon one freedom is not freedom to do as you please but freedom to do as you ought to praise the lord that's one and then pastor scott's quote was the worst kind of savior to be in is to be a slave and not know it and the unfortunate truth is that many of us are safe so many different things there is a song that says i'm no longer a slave to sin i am a child of god and my question to you this afternoon as we close off seeing that we want to be fully emancipated as we celebrate emancipation day on the 1st of august tomorrow do you really want true emancipation which is the emancipation that comes from knowing jesus and having your life hidden in him amen and if that is your desire then by god's grace i pray that you will strive to be fully emancipated as you prepare to glide off this planet as your master comes through disguise so thank you again for viewing thank you for spending these few hours with us and i pray by god's grace that you will continue to bless as you go into this new week make of it not be your fear but may it be your only fear to die without knowing christ okay because the other fears don't matter if jesus doesn't matter at the end of the day okay so pastor scott as the statesman of tobago could you pray to close us off at this time thank you oh father in heaven we are thankful to thee for the opportunity that we've had this evening to share with tobago in this program we pray the forgiveness of our sins and we pray that they will take us home safely and help us dear god to rededicate our lives to seeing thy message spread and men and women saved in thy kingdom we pray in jesus name amen [Music] [Music] you

Channel: ASI MEDIA TOBAGO

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Length: 126min 30sec (7590 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 31 2021