Mennonite
Central
Committee

Indonesian Mennonite delegation visits the U.S.

Tim Shenk
November 16, 2006

A delegation from Evangelical Church of Java, an Indonesian Mennonite conference, is visiting the United States to build links with U.S. Mennonite communities and institutions.

Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) is sponsoring the five-person delegation from Evangelical Church of Java, which is called Gereja Injili di Tanah Jawa (GITJ) in Javanese. The delegation is visiting Mennonites in Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and Kansas from Oct. 27 to Nov. 19.

Zefanya Adi Walujo, the conference's general secretary, is part of the delegation and says he hopes that U.S. Mennonites will work more closely with his conference.

"The main purpose to be here is to make a link," he said. "We can learn and we can share and we can do our work together to fulfill God's work as brothers and sisters in Christ."

Walujo said he hopes to strengthen the relationship between his conference and U.S. Mennonites after two decades of little interaction other than through MCC. According to Walujo, missionaries from Europe and North America stopped working with his conference in the 1980s.

"We need (the U.S.) Mennonite church to work together with us to do the ministry, like years ago, we worked together," Walujo says. "The North American church, the Indonesian church, we did great things."

Currently, GITJ churches serve their communities by operating hospitals, schools and a goat-raising program for poor families. Members of the delegation say they focus on community development to build relationships with their neighbors, adding that evangelization is restricted by law.

"Through this kind of ministry that we do, the people will know who Jesus is," says Suprijadi, a GITJ lay leader who is part of the delegation.

 

 

Tim Shenk is a writer for MCC communications.