Pastor Sean- Missionary to Ama people of Papua New Guinea

[Richard Myers]

We have created this topic to allow Pastor Sean to share information as he labors in Papua New Guinea. Here is some information as he begins this transition between Pastor in the Michigan Conference to Pastor to the Ama people in Papau New Guinea.

Sean Brizendine grew up in Modesto, California, in a Christian home with a praying, godly mother who led him to Christ at the age of five. She taught him about the biblical Sabbath and to look forward to the soon coming of Jesus, which led to his baptism in a river at the age of 10. Though his father died when Sean was 12, and his mother died when he was 15, it was while attending Pacific Union College that an email came to him about finding the top 20 reasons to be a student missionary. After learning more, Sean joined the Seventh-day Adventist Church in 2007 at the age of 20. Later that year, he experienced God’s call on his life to be a pastor, serving on various mission trips and gaining ministry experience through canvassing and, in the following years, non-profit ministry work.

It was around 2008 that Sean first sensed God putting Papua New Guinea on his heart, though he did not know if or when he would serve there. In 2015, he began serving as a pastor in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and was ordained to the gospel ministry in 2020. Having gladly served for over eight years, Sean has seen fruit from lives transformed by the gospel.

Already familiar with the work of Adventist Frontier Missions, Sean expressed more interest in AFM at the 2023 Michigan Conference Camp Meeting. After reading an email sent to him by Kyle Tumberg on August 24, 2023, Sean experienced a deep sense of conviction regarding the needs of the unreached and applied with AFM to become a missionary. On December 19, 2023, Sean was elated when AFM invited him to accept the call to minister to the animistic Ama people of Papua New Guinea. He sees this as God’s clear leading and looks forward to how God will open the way for each step in the journey to reach the unreached. Sean seeks to help hasten Christ’s return through prayer, giving, his personal effort and influence, and the joy of composing and singing songs to glorify God as he prepares to minister to the Ama people.


You can read Pastor Sean's posts in the Desire of Ages Forum where he posts daily.  here   Papua New Guinea will be blessed to have him as a missionary leading its people to Christ and His truth.  Let us support our dear brother as he makes this wonderful change in his ministry.   https://afmonline.org/missionaries/detail/9493
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[Pastor Sean Brizendine]

Praise God for the opportunity to launch into the mission field in Papau New Guinea where the need of the Ama tribe to understand the everlasting gospel in the light of the loveliness of Jesus is so great. I am thanking the Lord for His preparation in leading me to where He has called, and trusting His provision at each step! At present, I am still a full-time pastor in Michigan in the Upper Peninsula, prayerfully seeking God's will regarding the transition timing. Adventist Frontier Missions has its next training for career missionaries from September 2 to November 23, 2024. Lord willing, I will be able to launch to Papua New Guinea after that. However, the goals for partnership need to be at a certain place by July 22 for me to be able to attend the next Adventist Frontier Mission (AFM) training.

So far, the launching goal of $42,984 for me to go to the tribe has been 100% reached (that is covered by one-time gifts)! There are also partners who have committed to an ongoing gift (some annually, some quarterly, some monthly, and even some weekly) to go towards the ongoing monthly goal to support the mission for me to go and labor there. That total monthly goal is $7777 per month, and that is currently at 47% of the target, as of March 26, 2024, when I was given that update from AFM!  In a nutshell, if two partners gave $1000/month, if three partners gave $500/month, if five partners gave $250/month, if 10 partners gave $100/month, if 14 partners gave $75/month, and if 20 partners gave $50/month, then the entire monthly support would be fully reached! For example, a $3000/annual gift would be $250/month in ongoing support; a $50/month gift could be given every three months as $150, but it would still be helping the same as if it came every month. Some donors have chosen different amounts (such as $200/month), and that would basically mean they are helping with covering two of the "$100/month" goals! May you prayerfully give as the Holy Spirit leads! One-time gifts are still appreciated, too, as they will still go to this mission! If the monthly support is within $1500/month of the total target by July 22, then I can be in AFM training this year! I am praying for that if it is God's will! He is so faithful! God is providing and leading! Each person or family that partners is not just a donor or prayer warrior--you are a partner in helping reach the unreached! We get to do this together to the glory of God!

As the Holy Spirit moves upon your heart to pray, give, or go to help reach the unreached, as there are still another 7300 estimated unreached people groups, so the Lord is in the process of raising up and sending forth MANY more missionaries! May we carry the beautiful present truth God has entrusted to us to the ends of the earth, knowing that the gospel cannot fail, for Christ cannot fail. Looking to Him continually, we can go from strength to strength by His grace, abiding in the divine nature!

[Richard Myers]

[Dorine]

 Our prayers are with the mourning survivors. Does this include the area that Pastor Sean will be going to?

[Richard Myers]

I am not sure.  Here is a warning about how we spend our money:

Second Letter

I wish to remind my brethren of the cautions and warnings that have been given me in reference to constantly investing means in Battle Creek in order to make a little more room, or to make things more convenient. New fields are to be entered, the truth is to be proclaimed as a witness to all nations. The work is hindered, so that the banner of truth cannot be uplifted, as it should be, in these new fields. While our brethren in America feel at liberty to invest means in buildings which time will reveal that they would do just as well and even better without, thousands of dollars are thus absorbed that the Lord called for, to be used in “regions beyond.” I have presented the warnings and the caution, as the word of the Lord; but my heart has been made sad to see that, notwithstanding all these, means has been swallowed up to satisfy these supposed wants, building has been added to building, so that the money could not be used in places where they have no conveniences, no building for the public worship of God or to give character to the work, no place where the banner of truth could be uplifted. These things I have set before you, and yet you have gone on just the same, absorbing means, God’s means, in one locality, when the Lord has spoken that too much was already invested in one place, which meant that there was nothing in other places where there should be buildings and facilities to make even a beginning. What call had you to invest thousands of dollars in additional school buildings? You supposed you needed all this outlay, but did not entreaties come for you not to do this? { PH084 5.1 }

I was shown that a terrible condition of things is seen to exist in our world. The angel of mercy is folding her wings, ready to depart. Already the Lord’s restraining power is being withdrawn from the earth, and the power of Satan is working in the world to stir up the religious elements, under the training of the great deceiver, to work with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in the children of disobedience. Already the inhabitants of the earth are marshalling under the leadings of the prince of darkness, and this is only the beginning of the end. The law of God is made void. We see and hear of confusion, perplexities, want and famine, earthquakes and floods; terrible outrages will be committed by men; passion not reason bears sway. The wrath of God is upon the inhabitants of a world that is fast becoming as corrupt as were the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah. Already fires and floods are destroying thousands of human beings and the property that has been selfishly boarded by the oppression of the poor. The Lord is soon to cut short his work, and put an end to sin. O that the scenes which have come before me, of the iniquities practiced in these last days, might make a suitable impression on the minds of God’s professed people. { PH084 6.1 }

As it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be when the Son of man shall be revealed. The Lord is removing his restrictions from the earth, and there will be death and destruction, and increasing crime, and evil, cruel workings against the rich who have exalted themselves above the poor. Those who have not God’s protection will find no safety in any place or position. Human agents are being trained, and are using their inventive power to put in operation all the most powerful machinery to wound and kill. Instead of our enlarging and erecting additional buildings in Battle Creek or other places where our institutions are already established, there should be a limiting of the wants. Let the means and workers be scattered to represent the truth and give the warning message in “regions beyond.” { PH084 7.1 }