An Eager Student Moves In

Another pioneer of that time, 19-year-old Cecyl Pinas, worked tirelessly in Wageningen, a settlement about 120 miles [190 km] west of the capital. There he met Adolf “Jef” Gefferie, a 21-year-old mechanic, who heard the truth and gulped it down.

Bible studies with Jef lasted three or four hours. After one study, Cecyl and his partner said, “Jef, we’re tired. We’re going home.” Jef said, “I’ll accompany you halfway.” The pioneers stopped halfway, but Jef kept asking Bible questions. The pioneers walked on with Jef trailing. At home the pioneers said, “Good night, Jef.” But Jef went on asking questions. “Listen, Jef,” said Cecyl, “you can ask more questions, but I’m going to bed. So if I don’t answer, I’m asleep.” ‘That was a good idea,’ Jef thought. He lay down on the floor, and the discussion continued till Cecyl was silent.

The next day Jef brought his belongings to the pioneers’ home. “Before we knew it,” laughs Cecyl, “he had moved in with us. We studied every free moment. In three months Jef was baptized, and two years later he became a special pioneer.”

The Paradise Book Prepares the Way

The branch project done, the brothers concentrated on preaching along three rivers, the Saramacca, the Suriname, and the Tapanahoni. Nel Pinas, brother of Cecyl, and Baya Misdyan traveled to the Aucaner Bush Negroes along the faraway Tapanahoni River​—an area no Witness had visited so far. Yet, the Kingdom message had been heard there. The book From Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained had prepared the way. How could that be?

In 1959 Nel Pinas discussed the book’s pictures with Edwina Apason, an illiterate Aucaner woman whom he met in Albina, a village in northeast Suriname. Edwina loved what she learned but after seven months returned to the Tapanahoni. Contact was lost.

Eight years later, however, one week before Nel traveled to the Tapanahoni, he met Edwina in the capital. She told him that she had been preaching all that time among her tribe by using the pictures of the Paradise book. When she heard that Nel was leaving for the Tapanahoni, she begged him to look for two interested persons, Yabu, a young man, and Tyoni, a young woman.

A Heartwarming Response

Two days after reaching the Tapanahoni, the brothers found Yabu’s village, Yawsa, but he was out. The following evening, though, Yabu came to the brothers. He told them that he had broken with demonism and wanted to serve God. He took five days off from his job and studied with the brothers for eight hours each day. After those days, he wished to serve the true God, Jehovah.

Now the brothers searched for Tyoni, a 20-year-old Bush Negro girl who was already preaching in her village, Granbori, by showing the pictures in the Paradise book. However, her brother, a witch doctor, had taken the book away from her. Tyoni cried and prayed, “Jehovah, please, give me another Paradise book.” No wonder the two brothers felt impelled to find her!

One day Tyoni heard that Witnesses had arrived in a nearby village. Hurriedly she paddled to the village, but the brothers had left. How disappointing! Later, though, the brothers returned and studied with her for three days. She related that the times when she had nothing to eat, her relatives would offer her unbled wild meat. She always refused. Her father threatened to beat her if she would not quit her beliefs. Yet she said, “Even if they threaten to kill me, I will not give up.” And that from an illiterate girl who learned the truth only from pictures! Touched by her faith, the brothers gave her their last copy of the Paradise book. She hugged the book. Overwhelmed with joy, she thanked Jehovah for answering her prayer.

After two months the brothers returned to Paramaribo, but later Nel and his wife, Gerda, moved to the Tapanahoni to work as special pioneers, building on that foothold in the rain forest.