My name is Linda and I am eight years old. I am a student in our local primary school. I have a brother, Oclesiu, and a little sister, Gabriela, and we all go to the same school. Every Sabbath we don’t go to school, because our mother has taught us that that Sabbath is God’s special day. Every Saturday our teachers look for us, but we are never there.

One day Oclesiu, Gabriela, and I were all told to go to the school office to meet with the teachers. We went there, and the teachers asked us, “Why don’t you come to class every Saturday?” I said, “We are Adventists, so we have worship in the church every Sabbath day.”

Then they asked us, “What is that?” I told them that the Sabbath day is God’s day for all people, and that we must worship Him. When I said this, the teachers became very angry and they wanted us to bring our church leader to meet with them at the school.

My classmates also ask me many things about the Bible and want me to tell them Bible stories, so I tell them all the Bible stories that I know. One friend asked me, “Why don’t you come to class every Saturday?” I told him that every Sabbath we must stop working, because that is God’s day. When He made the world He stopped on the seventh day and made it holy.

Even though my brother, sister, and I don’t go to school on Sabbaths, we know that Jesus helps us to always get good grades on our papers anyway. In the Bible it says to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you” (Matt. 6:33, NKJV). So I believe that God has a great plan for us to help us with our studies.

I just want to ask you, when you pray, please don’t forget to pray for my teachers. They said they won’t give us our final tests because we are always absent on Saturdays. So I just pray to God about that. God knows everything about us. Please also pray for the children. We will be very happy when we have our own Adventist school here, so we won’t have any more problems about the Sabbath day in our school.

Ironia’s Story

Here’s another story from a girl in Timor-Leste:

My name is Ironia. I’m eleven years old and am in grade six. I want to be a Seventh-day Adventist member and am studying the Bible with my father. After I learn more, I will be baptized. I’m happy to be in an Adventist church family, because I can know Jesus better. I put Jesus in my everything.

I never go to school on the Sabbath day, because my father and mother have taught me the Bible, so beginning from the first grade, I haven’t gone to school on Sabbath.

Sometimes my teachers hit me and punish me for not coming to school on Saturdays. When they ask me why I don’t come to class every Saturday, I explain to them that the Bible says in Exodus 20 that the Sabbath day is when God stopped from His work and made that day holy, and that we are to worship Him. They listen, but then they always punish me.

But I always tell my father and mother about my problems at school, and they pray about it. Sometimes I have wondered, why don’t we have an Adventist school in Timor-Leste? But then I heard that we will have an Adventist school here because of the Thirteenth Sabbath Offering! Please pray for us here, and thank you so much for helping us to have an Adventist school—we really need one!