The South Pacific Division (SPD) contains four unions. Adventist Record recorded interviews with all four union presidents during the South Pacific for Christ program in Brisbane, Queensland. Here is our chat with Pastor Charlie Jimmy, president of the church for the Trans Pacific Union Mission (TPUM).
Juliana Muniz (JM): How did you feel about the South Pacific for Christ program?
Charlie Jimmy: This is a timely program for the South Pacific Division. Especially for the TPUM territory, where we will be having TPUM for Christ this year. We’ve got delegates—church leaders from around the union who are here for this meeting because it actually helps, empowers and motivates them to continue to plan and prepare for TPUM for Christ in the middle of this year.
JM: TPUM comprises 11 Pacific nations, and is the first of the “for Christ” events during South Pacific for Christ, from July to August this year, is that correct?
Charlie Jimmy: We’ve got 11 nations—seven missions and three attached fields—and we’ve divided those countries into two dates. We’ll be running the first group of TPUM for Christ meetings during the month of July, and then the next lot will be in the month of August.
JM: Could you give us an idea of what things look like in your region? What are some of the challenges in the Trans Pacific?
Charlie Jimmy: As we prepare for TPUM for Christ, in terms of our plans, one of the obvious challenges that we continue to face is in regard to the remoteness of our islands. The isolation poses challenges in terms of resources, especially distributing resources to all the local churches in remote places to help them in the discipleship process of “prepare the soil, sow the seed, cultivate the plant, harvest” and so forth. So we need to be very proactive in terms of planning so resources are dispatched on time and reach the local church before the meetings come.
JM: You were elected TPUM president in late 2025. So, you have most of the quinquennium still ahead of you. Can you share your goals and strategies for this quinquennium?
Charlie Jimmy: Obviously, we want to ensure that we align with the General Conference strategic plan and the SPD strategic plan.
We have embraced it—the four strategic focuses for us in the TPUM to implement for the next five years. We have also revised our vision statement: living a Christ-like life and making disciples. We would like to continue to encourage our members to create a movement of disciple-making around the Trans Pacific.
More than that, our focus for this quinquennium is we would like to see each local church come up with a church planting project for this next five years.
JM: Now let’s talk about Trans Pacific for Christ. What is it going to look like? What can we expect? What’s the planning looking like?
Charlie Jimmy: The preparations are going well. We have worked with the Institute of Public Evangelism, with Pastor Lyle Southwell and the team here at SPD in ensuring that the international speakers are confirmed, and we’ve achieved 99 per cent in terms of confirming and allocating international preachers to different sites across TPUM.
We have also confirmed the series that we will be using from It Is Written. They have developed the resources. And also at the local missions and at the local church, preparations are already in place. The evangelism steering committees are in place to ensure that when international preachers arrive, they’ve received them, catered for them and provided accommodation for them for the time that they will be spending here.
More than that—not only investing in preparation for the harvest program, we would like to strengthen the nurturing part. So we are working with Adventist Technology—and also with Pastor Adrian Raethel, project manager of the Adventist Church Management System—so that interests and new believers who come for the meeting are recorded in the system so there is proper nurturing and follow-up for those new believers who have joined us.
JM: I know that you probably already have most of the preachers, but how can people support it?
Charlie Jimmy: So we are working closely with SPD in terms of the speakers, but we welcome any other support that anyone—individuals or churches around the SPD—would like to give to support Trans Pacific for Christ.
You can work with SPD, or you can work with the Trans Pacific Union Mission if you would like to support, not only in terms of preaching, but any other involvement. It might be that you want to come and support a prayer program or singing [ministry] or any other areas. We welcome anyone —small groups or individuals around the South Pacific—to come and help us for Trans Pacific for Christ.
JM: And do you have any specific goals that you want to achieve with Trans Pacific for Christ?
Charlie Jimmy: By God’s grace, at the end of Trans Pacific for Christ we would like to see new church plants in unentered areas and in some of the non-Adventist communities. That is one of our big goals.
Also, we would like to see total member involvement. Church members, leaders, everyone finding their space, using their gifts in the mission of the Church.
JM: I’m very excited because I am coming to Kiribati. Well, I’ll be covering the event for Record, not preaching, but I’m excited. Before we close, in addition to Trans Pacific for Christ, what should church members be aware of in terms of mission in this next quinquennium?
Charlie Jimmy: So for TPUM, it is not just this year that’s Trans Pacific for Christ.
We have laid out our missional plans also for these five years. So next year our focus will be “I will go to my church”. While we will also be on board with OneVoice27, our focus will be on church members. We will be focusing on retention and reclaiming missing members, and for next year we will be putting emphasis into a membership audit. So the focus is on the church.
That is just 2027. In 2028 our theme is “I will go to my school”. Our focus in mission will be our schools. And then in 2029 [the theme] is “I will go to my community”—focusing on all the communities around different islands or missions in TPUM. In 2030 [the plan] is to support SPD with “I will go to SSD” (Southern-Asia Pacific Division). And we would also like to encourage local missionaries to be sent to the remote parts and different places around TPUM. So, “I will go to the ends of the earth”—that’s the focus for 2030.
This interview was recorded and published as a recent episode of Record Live. Watch it below:
