Reflections

Seasons of Life

I (Asher) started diving in 1990, at a time when I was just able to afford this somewhat expensive hobby. Soon the hobby became a passion, combining my other (also somewhat expensive) hobby – photography, and became an avid underwater photographer. 

For a good number of years, with our four children, we frequented various parts of Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines for scuba diving! Slowly, but surely, children grew up, have their own lives, and we too grew older, and I started to think about life beyond the hustle bustle of a career. 

At that season of our lives, we were pondering what we could do together as a couple, after the children have grown up. We talked about doing something together for a season. About two years passed, and we learned that a small scuba diving resort in Lembeh, North Sulawesi, was available for sale, and we proceeded to buy the resort. 

During the purchase process we were not sure if it was God's plan for us to have this, and along the way we encountered some obstacles and were about to give up, but the Lord cleared the obstacles.

The first two years was ravaged by COVID, then came the slow phase of building up the business, and maintaining the resort and its facilities. For Sharon, it was a period interspersed between wrestling with the Lord, and quiet trusting and waiting out, and often praying and asking the Lord whether it was the right decision when COVID hit and we couldn't even begin. 

Even during the waiting, I know that the Lord is working "for His glory and my good" – a song that since became one of my favourites.

A Season of Redirection

Soon enough, managing a full-time job and a part time passion project became difficult, and I took the decision to retire slightly earlier, to focus on the diving resort. 

Why did God bring us to the island of Lembeh?

Is this the season that God has brought into our lives for a renewed focus, to redirect our lives for the gospel? And how does owning and running a scuba diving resort help us to be His witness and bear fruit in this the season?

Clearly it is a calling to service, in a tentmaker manner (see Acts 18:1-3), to go and open doors, to bless the people (and be blessed by them), and to reach out to new friends that God brings into our lives!

A Season of Purposeful Work and Witness

There are open doors to three groups of people: the guests that come to dive with us (divers), the community around us (primarily the village and schools), and the staff that are working for the resort. And thus, we see this as a season of purposeful work. 

Whilst enjoying the fun of running a resort and providing a diving haven to divers for vacation - in 30 months we have had divers from over 40 countries diving with us. We want to share God's love and His gospel whenever opportunity arises. 

And North Sulawesi is unique in that it is one of only seven provinces that has Christian majority, out of 38 provinces in the sprawling archipelago of Indonesia. The others being East Nusa Tenggara and Papua (five provinces), both are in the far eastern side of Indonesia. North Sulawesi, and in particular, Manado can thus be thought of as Antioch of Indonesia.

As for the community, we have begun work with the local technical high school that was ravaged by a mudslide and flash flood that took place two years ago. They have a high school course on computer and networking, and the entire computer lab had been wiped out and there was no computer to use in their lessons! 

They can only teach in theory and rent laptops from other schools for tests and exams. The school asked for 25 laptops, and so far, we have been able to provide 13 laptops, some with help from donors who have come to dive with us and clearly share our vision of blessing the community with resources for education. 

Season of Learning and Reflection

“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens….” 

 Ecclesiastes 3:1

We have begun a journey of faith in this season of our lives. And honestly, we have only taken perhaps the first and second steps of the journey – to go and begin to reach out and impact lives. 

The learning curve has been very steep. I am an active underwater photographer, not a dive professional. To manage a dive resort’s day-to-day matters with Sharon, from compressor and tanks, to boats and engines, to divers and dive planning, and even management of a small medical emergency are all new to us. 

And neither of us know how to do marketing, knew nothing of how to do social media, setup website, and many other details of operating an enterprise.