Episode Transcript
G'day. It is all too often said that there are no miracles performed these days. Well, I'd like to challenge that idea with my story, From Drugs to God, Part 3. So welcome to Miracles in the 21st Century. I'm Sau Finau. Just recapping, if you, if if you missed the previous 2 episodes, the first one focused more on when I first came to Australia and how I prayed to God for the first time. And with the second episode is when I get really involved and hooked on drugs and participated, and then God freed me from that. But he not only, he gave me that freedom me from that addiction, but he reveals to me that he has a purpose for my life. And with this third episode, we will look at where God has been leading me ever since. And I've been working with my uncle, serving in his church. It was a Sunday church, and he was taking me to all these different different meetings within the Tongan community. And not only that, his church was affiliated with Hillsong Church. And from there I get to meet all different people who are running different types of ministries. And now just reflecting back, I know that this is where God has been taking me and training me. Because one thing I always believed in, people only think to the level that they are exposed to. So God has exposed me to all these different types of ministries. But after 2 years, I start noticing that as I was working with my uncle, every time I translate, and when he start preaching about speaking in tongues— remember, he's a Pentecostal pastor— I struggle with my translation. When he started preaching about the Sabbath and how the Sabbath is already done with, I struggled with my translation. When he started preaching about the state of the dead, I couldn't translate. And even my wife, who is not a Tongan, but she can sit in the audience, and when we get home she said, "You were struggling with your translation today." 'Something's going on,' I said. 'I feel that the Holy Spirit is shutting my mouth from speaking and teaching something that is not biblical.' And she goes, 'How do you know that?' I said, 'I remember growing up back at home, we always studied the Bible. I always go to evangelistic seminars and I always hear the message and it is straight from the Word of God.' But when, you know, but now I'm starting to feel like when my uncle preach about other subjects like the gospel, like salvation and Calvary and all, that my translation just flows. But when it comes to biblical doctrines and things like that, I struggle with the translation. And I feel it's not me struggling, it's the Holy Spirit. Stopping me from translating. But then came to a time where my uncle invited me. This is after 2 years. And he says, "I noticed that you were struggling with your translation, and I knew that this day will come." And I said, "What day?" He said, "That there will be a day, there will be a time," that you and I will have to go our separate ways. So I said, so you knew all this from the beginning? And he says, I knew. I knew that you were Seventh-day Adventist and you will always be a Seventh-day Adventist. I said, but I left. And he said, what you left, you left an ideology of what you think Seventh-day Adventists was. But now you have experienced that God is real. You have experienced that God has a purpose for your life. You have now discovered that. You have my blessing. Go ahead and move on and let God lead you and guide you. And this is from my uncle. And that was it. I went back to the— by this time, my wife has some Adventist friends who were going to the open church and they were always inviting my wife along. Then my wife turned around and said to me, "Why don't you come with us?" So here I am, have to swallow my pride and go with my wife. Do the Adventist church on a Saturday. But the good thing was that my uncle says, "Our radio program is at 1 o'clock. You think that you can still make it to our radio program?" I said, "I would love to continue with the radio program." So we went to church at Auburn Church in the morning, then the afternoon I committed to go with my uncle to do our radio program. But after a while there, my daughter was at high school. By this time she was in high school, we were already start going to church. We were going to the Sunday church first, but now we are going to the Saturday, to the Sabbath church. And when my daughter finished Year 12 and she was going to university, my wife and I— this was about 2011— my wife and I, we We've taken, but just pause there for a second. Pause there for a second. I haven't tell you the miracle of me becoming an Australian citizen. Remember, I was an overstayer before. I was an overstayer because some of you might be thinking, oh yeah, but you were still an overstayer. Yes, until 2004 when I leave the country. I gave my life to Christ in 1999. By 2004, I tried everything, every other avenue in order for me to become, you know, to remain here legally in Australia. But the government says, immigration says I have to put my application in offshore because I have been an illegal immigrant here in Australia for too long. So that's why I have to leave the country. I went back to Tonga. I went back to Tonga. That's after 16 years of being an illegal immigrant here, overstayer here in Australia. And by the time I went back to Tonga, my mother was so excited. She was so happy. She was more happier that I have given my life to Christ. And she says, "Son, you are an answer to my prayer. Now I'm just praying that God will send you to become a pastor, to study to be a pastor. But this time I had no intention of becoming leading in the church or anything like that. So anyway, I was in Tonga putting my application in. First, it first rejected. I have to stay back and put an appeal in because the reason why was my police record, of course. And I have been to prison. So they don't want to bring people like that here into Australia. And unfortunately, I had to stay back in Tonga while my wife, who is a non-Tongan, who is an Australian citizen, and also my daughter were here. So we were separated for 18 months, a year and a half, before I finally get approved to come in, come back to Australia. So I came back to Australia close to the end of 2005 with the promise I said to my mom, "When I go back to Australia, I will go and study, but I'll see because I wanna make sure that it is a real calling into my life to be a pastor." I came back to Australia, I get a job. The good thing now, because I'm here legally, I can get any job I want. Right? But the problem was most jobs that I want, you need qualifications, you need a diploma, you need a degree in order to be able to be employed. But I was just taking my time, enjoying. But for some reason my wife says, there's something about you that you really— that you become a different person when you serve at church. And I said, really? And I said, okay, that's good to know. But 2011, our daughter finished high school. She was accepted to Canberra University. So we went and dropped our daughter back to Canberra, I mean to get her enrolled and went to Canberra. Then on our way home, my wife said to me, now you can go and study. And I said, "What do you mean I can go and study?" "You can go and study to become a pastor." I said, "Where did that come from? First of all, I have no money in my account. I have minus in my account. If God wants me to be a pastor, God will have to pay me, pay for my tuition, because right now I don't know how am I going to pay my tuition at Avondale College at the time." And she says, "I think God will provide." Anyway, long story short, Avondale had already started. It was already the second week of the semester has already begun. I went back to my job and I said to my job, I said to my boss, "I resign." My boss says, "What do you mean you resign?" I said, "I'm going to be a pastor." He goes, "What's a pastor?" You know, he doesn't even know what a pastor is. The closest thing that I can think of, similar to a priest. Then he goes, "But you have a wife. How can you be a priest if you already have a wife?" And I said, "Similar kind of work, you know, work in the church." Then he goes, "What are you gonna do for money?" You know, like he thinks that those kind of work People get, you know, you volunteer, do it, and that's it. I have no idea, but I think, I feel this is the direction my wife tells me that I should be doing. You know, anyway, long story short, I put in my application to Avondale. They told me I need to come in for an interview, then I need to, they have a little test that I have to sit at. Then when I came in to Avondale, they couldn't find my name on the list, on the enrollment list. And I said, yes! Well, inside, I'm so happy that now my wife can shut up and doesn't have to bother me anymore. I said, oh, that's good. But they said, how? I said, how was my exam? The little test that I had to sit. They said, oh, you passed, but your name is not in the enrollment. So if you want to enroll, you have to come in the second semester. And I said, "No, no, no, no, no. If I'm not in this list for this semester, I'm not coming in to study anymore." She said, "Oh, I'm sorry. We are sorry, but we couldn't find your name." I said, "Okay, thank you." So I was happy inside that I don't have to worry about the study. I don't have to worry about that. I can go back to my boss and say my plan has canceled. I can continue with work. Just before I get into my car, my phone rang. And I look at it, it's the reception at Amundale University College. And she said, "Oh, Mr. Finau, sorry to bother you again, but we've just found your name. We just found your name in the enrollment." And that's when I said, "What? You said before that it wasn't there." And she said, 'We don't know how your name has come up, but your name is here. If you want to start, you can start tomorrow.' Um, okay. So that's when it finally sink into me that this is where God wanted me to be. And I tell you, it wasn't, it wasn't a smooth journey. I thought that my life before was hard. This was even harder. Because at the time I had to travel from Sydney. I didn't have a place here, and school has already— university has already started for 2 weeks already. And by the time I came in, I knew nothing because the last time I was in the classroom was over 23 years before. And I remember that everything that we have to do, the teacher will have to come up, write it down on the board, this is our plans for this week. I didn't know that university or higher education, they have things like unit outline or unit information that gives you the whole program for— I didn't know anything about it. I would rock up to the class, I mean, rock up to the class, the next day one of my friends will say, are you ready for the test? I said, what test? He said, are you ready for the Greek test? Or the Hebrew text. I didn't know that. I didn't know all of that. But you know, God continued to provide. God continued to lead me to the right people that will help me prepare for what He has for me. Remember, He promised. He said, "I know the purpose I have for you." And He will make sure, and if He can, He will make sure that I achieve and reach that purpose. And if He can do that, to a person like me, I believe he can do that to you. And God helped me achieve the purpose why he has called me to Avondale. And, you know, despite all the challenges that I had to go through, he makes sure that the opportunity is there, the right people is there. But while I was at the university, I sensed that one of our— one of the things that actually happened was on the third and fourth year students, they will have to have the presidents from the conference come in and they interview them to see what they want to do when they finish their study, what sort of churches they wanted to study. I mean, they wanted to go and serve in. But when the interview came to me, I said, "I didn't want to go to any church. I wanted to plant churches." And they said, "Oh, okay. What kind of church do you want?" The first thing that came to my mind was the people that I was exposed to. Years before when I was on the street. I wanted to reach them. I wanted to start a ministry that not only reached them, but reached their families. I'm talking about people who lost their homes, who have lost their families, who have lost their livelihoods, ended up being on the street. People who goes to bed hungry. Families that don't know where the next meal will be coming from. That's the kind of church that I want to be a part of. It's a church that meets the needs of the people and makes a difference into the society. And during my fourth year, during my fourth year at Avondale University, this was 2014, I started a little food pantry. I call it a little food pantry ministry serving the people in the community of Bonospe. And by the time we get to 2015, was my last year, I got graduated. The conference heard about what we are doing and how we were mentoring some other churches to run a food ministry and to meet the needs of their community. Then they employed me and gave me the— and they said, "You know what? Continue to do what you're doing because we need that. We need that ministry in our churches." And hence the beginning of the Bay Community, Bay Community Church, and the Bay Community Food Pantry. And what an honor and a privilege for someone like me. Who would have known that I would have the blessing of being the pastor of the church? And I can, you know, and just like I said before, You might not believe in miracles, but if that's what you think, can I just say you are looking at one right now? Because for myself, I am a walking miracle. I am a walking testimony of who God is and what He can do through you if you allow Him to do that through your life. May God bless you.
