This was not the first time Brother Finlay set foot on the Solomons. Besides serving as a circuit and district overseer at various times, in 1965 he spent three months in north Malaita as a special pioneer under assignment from the Papua New Guinea branch.

Omega Nunu went back home to Taba’a village located high in the mountains of the Kwara’ae section of Malaita. He became the only elder in the congregation.

Pedro Kanafiolo, a strong, energetic brother from Malu’u in north Malaita is now serving as a special pioneer in relatively new territory on the island of San Cristobal. Simon Maedalea, who left the branch project as a carpenter, later pioneered in east Malaita.

The Good News Spreads

For years the preaching activity centered on just two islands, Malaita and Guadalcanal, which had just one congregation. In the 1960’s and 1970’s, small groups of interested people were formed in Munda and Gizo in the western Solomons. But progress was slow. Eventually, interest spread to other areas as pioneers traveled to Choiseul in the west and the Santa Cruz Islands in the eastern outer islands group.

Malaita is known for two things: one, as the origin of the famous shell money that was once used for paying the bride-price; and two, as home to a rugged people, who have a craving for travel. Malaitans are hard workers, many of them maintaining mountain gardens of truly heroic proportions. Because of their migrant spirit, they can be found in every province of the Solomons, some even living outside their tribal areas for more than 50 years. It was therefore no coincidence that when Norman Sharein, from the Papua New Guinea branch, went to the north of Malaita in 1962, he found hundreds of them, many willing and eager to accept Bible truth.

Many Malaitans had been involved in a failed political movement striving for independence from British rule, called Ma’asina Ru’u (The Brotherhood). Feeling alienated from the established churches, they formed their own religion, Boboa (Foundation). However, that name proved to be prophetic. A large number of them accepted Bible truth and became baptized Witnesses who went on to become sturdy preachers and pioneers. They have served not only in the scores of isolated mountain villages in their own tribal area in Malaita but everywhere throughout the Solomons, no matter how remote and isolated the territory.