The stories of three sister missionaries serving together in Vanuatu from the Pacific Island nations of Kiribati, Tonga, and Fiji

Sister Timoteo

Rabi Island (pronounced Ram-bi) is a small island in eastern Fiji.  Following the war, in 1945, the island was repopulated by people from Kiribati, an island nation in the South Pacific that lies north of Fiji.  The people were Banabans, whose own island in Kiribati had been destroyed by the war and by phosphate mining.  The English brought them to Rabi Island straight from Japanese concentration camps, gave them tents and a two-month’s supply of food, and left them to fend for themselves.

In 2002 two LDS missionaries came to Rabi Island.  Their purpose was to locate a member of the Church who was living there.  A policeman greeted them as they debarked from their boat.  They located the man they were looking for.  He no longer wanted to be associated with the Church, but the policeman did.  The policeman, Brother Sigrah, became the first convert on the island, and the first branch president.

The missionaries also became close to the older brother of Oere Timoteo.  Oere was a 14-year-old girl.  The brother was baptized, and then the missionaries began teaching his Catholic mother, his Methodist father, and his two younger sisters and younger brother.  The last to join the Church was Oere’s father, who was baptized in 2010.

Twelve years after the first convert was made on Rabi Island, the Rabi Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints now numbers 300 out of a total population of 5,000 on the island.  A missionary from the Sigrah family has already returned home, and 3 other missionaries from the island are currently serving, including Oere Timoteo, who is serving in the island nation of Vanuatu.

Sister Tu’uefiafi

The mother of Tiana Tu’uefiafi was a less-active member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  She had formerly been married to a Latter-day Saint, and had raised eight children in the LDS Church; but the marriage ended in divorce.  When she remarried, she married a man who was a pastor in the Free Church of Tonga (FCT), and ceased attending the LDS Church.  She and her new husband had three more children, including Tiana.

In 2004 one of Tiana’s brothers joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  Members of the ward became interested in the family.  One day when Tiana was eight years old, a group of sisters from the Relief Society showed up at her house, and invited her to follow them.  To her surprise, and without her father’s knowledge, the sisters had arranged for Tiana’s baptism.  Thereafter, whenever she attended the LDS Church, her father beat her.

The baptism had not gone through proper channels, and perhaps for that reason, no record was made of the event.  At the age of 17, Tiana went to live with her LDS sister and her sister’s returned-missionary husband.  She began attending the LDS Church.  No record of Tiana’s baptism could be found, so missionaries taught Tiana the gospel, and she was rebaptized.

In 2010 Tiana moved back home.  Missionaries came to the house, and invited everyone to attend October general conference at the stake center.  That Sunday Tiana’s father thought she was dressing up to go to the FCT Church, but instead she attended general conference.  He was furious.

The FCT Church held meetings every Sunday at 6:00 a.m., from 9:00-11:00 a.m., and from 3:00-4:00 p.m.  LDS Church services were held from 12:00-3:00.  Tiana and her father made a deal that she could attend the LDS services each Sunday if she would also attend all three of the FCT meetings.  Every Sunday morning Tiana was at the 6:00 FCT meeting, stayed until 11:00, attended the LDS Church from 12:00-3:00, and finished with an FCT service that ended at 4:00.  That amounted to seven hours of church meetings, but if she missed any of the FCT meetings, she couldn’t attend LDS services.  That was the deal.

Tiana’s membership in the LDS Church was distasteful not only to her father, but to her neighbors and extended family members as well.  “The neighbors wouldn’t talk to me for three months,” Tiana says, “and my father’s family hated me.”  Her father’s sister and her husband were both pastors in another church, and were particularly hateful, and made it a point to never speak to her.

Tiana’s father, however, had a brother who was a member of the LDS Church living in the United States.  He came for a visit to Tonga, and took the family to church.  He instructed Tiana to always be on time to her meetings.  He encouraged her to submit an application to serve a mission, which she did.

One day Tiana couldn’t find her Book of Mormon.  After looking everywhere, she finally found it beside her father’s bed.  Her father was by now reconciled to the idea that his daughter was LDS, and didn’t object to her serving a mission.

Tiana’s family went to church with her on her last Sunday in Tonga.  Her mother has continued to attend, and has now gone to the temple as well.

Sister Vasu

Mereoni Vasu has a Fijian mother, and a German father.  The family attended the Assemblies of God Church in Fiji.  Mereoni was the youth and dance leader for her local congregation, and her mother was the head of the women’s ministry of the Assemblies of God Church for all of Fiji.

Mereoni was working as an accountant at a resort in Fiji.  Nearly everyone who came to the resort ended up at the bar, and got drunk.  One day, however, a group of young single adults showed up at the resort for an activity.  They were different.  Mereoni was drawn to them.  “I’d never seen such happy people in my life!” she said.  The young people were LDS, and became her friends.

That was in 2010.  Shortly thereafter, Mereoni resigned her position, and moved to Suva.  Her house was close to the Fiji Temple.  Every day she would look at the temple and think, “This is where my friends go.  These people don’t drink, and they’re still happy.”

In 2011 Mereoni began taking the missionary discussions.  In November 2012 she was baptized.  Her mother was not happy.  Why would she join The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints?  Any other church would have been OK, but not the LDS Church.

Mereoni was working in the finance department of the West Pac Bank.  She applied for work at Bred Bank.  She was accepted for work at Bred Bank on the same day that her mission call arrived.  She had not told her mother that she had even applied.  She told her mother, “I have gotten a call from the president of the Church telling me that I need to leave everything and go on a mission.”

Mereoni received a wage increase at the same time that she was baptized. She saved all the extra money, and by the time her mission call arrived, she had enough saved to pay the necessary expenses.

Mereoni’s parents wouldn’t go to church with her, but both came to her setting apart.  She left on her mission one year and one month following her baptism.  Mereoni wrote letters home.  Soon her mother began taking the missionary discussions.  She “felt something different,” and was soon baptized.

Mereoni sent an inspirational magazine article home to her father.  Her father is a busy executive who owns and runs restaurants.  He rarely shows emotion, but the story in the article touched him, and he sent his daughter an email—the first communication she’d had from him in the nine months she’d been on her mission.