This article draws upon Michael W. Campbell’s biography of Ratu Ambrose and Milton Hook’s account of Adventism in Fiji, both published in the Encyclopedia of Seventh-day Adventists (ESDA), available at encyclopedia.adventist.org. It was prepared by Dragoslava Santrac, ESDA managing editor.—Editors.
Adventist missionaries from North America and Europe traveled far to share the gospel, often enduring great hardships and even risking their lives. Still, their work would not have succeeded without the help of local converts who served as a bridge between cultures and carried the gospel to their own people. One of the first Fijians to do this was Ratu Ambrose, a high chief whose influence changed how his country saw the new faith. For a long time Adventism seemed foreign and distant. But when this respected leader accepted it, hearts began to open, and the gospel found a home in Fiji.
How It All Began
The story of the Adventist message in Fiji began on the rolling blue waters of the South Pacific with a missionary ship named Pitcairn. On August 3, 1891, its sails caught the winds that carried the gospel to Suva, Fiji’s harbor town. John and Hannah Tay, two of the first Adventist missionaries to arrive, stayed in Suva to sell books to Europeans and to plant a seed of faith that they would sadly not live to see blossom. John Tay, the first to dream of a mission base in Fiji, succumbed to influenza just months later, on January 8, 1892. Yet his vision would not die with him.
The Pitcairn returned to Fiji on its second voyage in August 1893, this time with Dr. Merritt Kellogg on board. As he traveled through the islands, Kellogg noticed something special: the people seemed ready to hear the gospel. “We ought by all means to place workers on the Fiji Islands,” he wrote. “I have great hopes of the native people.”[1] Those words proved prophetic.
John and Fanny Cole answered the call in 1895, transferring from Norfolk Island to Levuka, the old capital of Fiji. After a year they moved to Suva and were joined by John and Susie Fulton on July 18, 1896. Their task was immense: spreading a new faith across a scattered archipelago where travel was perilous and roads were nearly nonexistent. To reach the villages tucked behind the reefs, they acquired a tiny boat they called The Loughborough. It was the first Adventist mission boat permanently stationed in the South Pacific.
Eventually The Loughborough was replaced by a larger boat called Cina,or “Lamp,” which showed their hope that Christ’s light would reach all of Fiji. The missionaries learned the language, printed tracts, translated hymns, and preached wherever they could. Still, the gospel’s greatest breakthrough did not come through foreign voices but through the transformed life of a Fijian chief.
The Conversion of a Chief
In 1899 two Fijians stood at the forefront of a spiritual awakening: Pauliasi Bunoa, once a Wesleyan missionary, and Ratu Ambrose, the hereditary tui (king) of Suva. Their conversions marked a new chapter for the Adventist message in Fiji.
Bunoa had read a tract on the Sabbath by John Fulton (“Adventist Apostle to the Fiji Islands”) and could not rest until he obeyed the conviction of his heart. Ambrose was drawn by the witness of Bunoa’s faith. A high chief and governor of the islands, Ambrose had a lineage that could be traced directly to Fiji’s royal house. His mother, Adi Elenoa Mila, was a sister to King Cakobau, who had ceded Fiji to Britain in 1873. His father descended from Ratu Tanoa, Cakobau’s father. By birth and influence, Ambrose was a man of immense power. He had married Adi Kelera, daughter of the Vunivalu of Rewa, uniting two of Fiji’s most powerful clans. As a chief, he oversaw 13 villages. To his people, he was a man of prestige and authority. To God, he would become a humble servant.
In a society in which rank and dignity defined identity, the sight of a royal chief kneeling before a child echoed the very image of Christ washing His disciples’ feet.
Ambrose first felt the tug of divine grace through Bunoa’s quiet testimony. One Sabbath evening Ambrose visited Bunoa’s home. As they prayed, something broke inside the proud chief. He began to weep deeply, and said he “was desirous of being a Christian.”[2] “He . . . cried out, ‘I am a sinful man; what must I do to be saved?’ ”[3]
Beside him, his wife, Adi Kelera, listened in astonishment as her husband’s heart melted before God. She urged him to worship with the missionaries. And so they did. Soon after, Ambrose gathered his people and declared that no one had pressured him to change his faith, that “he knew it was right, and would stand with it.”[4]
That year, 1899, Ratu Ambrose and Pauliasi Bunoa were the first Fijians to join the Adventist Church through baptism by immersion. It was a simple service, but to those who witnessed it, it marked the dawn of a new era.
When a King Bowed Down
Soon after his baptism Ambrose took part in his first Communion service. John E. Fulton later described it as one of the most moving moments of his ministry. “A week ago last Sabbath we observed the ordinances of the Lord’s house,” Fulton wrote. “That was a blessed day. The ordinance of humility was new to our Fijian brethren but was greatly enjoyed.”[5]
The next moment surprised everyone. “Ratu Ambrose, who is one of the highest chiefs of Fiji,” Fulton recorded, “washed a young boy’s feet.”[6] In a society in which rank and dignity defined identity, the sight of a royal chief kneeling before a child echoed the very image of Christ washing His disciples’ feet. Many could hardly believe their eyes.
Fulton was touched by what he saw. He said, “[Ambrose] is a high chief and much respect is shown him. But he seemed to enjoy bowing down as did his Saviour to show his love for his inferiors.”[7]
Some people thought Ambrose would lose his social status by following Christ. There were rumors that the missionaries had paid him to keep the Sabbath. But Fulton knew better. He wrote, “People say he was the biggest rogue in Fiji, and that we must have paid him a big sum of money to keep Sabbath. I remember when he came to church one Sabbath morning, he prayed and broke down and cried. He invited us to the town and gave us land. . . . It seemed too good to be true, and we all cried with him for joy.”[8]
A Chief’s Gift
That gift of land became the foundation of the Adventist mission in Fiji. Ambrose donated property and resources that allowed the missionaries to establish a permanent base. Through his generosity the mission gained a home that continues to serve the church even today. Within a year 29 church members worshipped in Ambrose’s village. What a remarkable beginning for the Adventist movement in Fiji!
Ambrose’s conversion also gave the new faith legitimacy. In a culture in which the word of a chief carried spiritual weight, Ambrose’s embrace of Adventism encouraged many others to take the message seriously. His influence bridged the divide between foreign missionaries and local communities. In every sense, the gospel had found a Fijian voice.
Together with Fulton and Bunoa, Ambrose helped take the gospel to other islands. In February 1900 the three men set sail aboard Cina on an exploratory trip through Batiki, Ngau, Nairai, and Vanua Levu. Later Bunoa voyaged south to Kadavu, distributing literature. When a storm wrecked their cutter on the reef, the setback only deepened their resolve. Another vessel, the Andi Suva (“Queen of Suva”), soon replaced it by late 1903.
Meanwhile, Adventist work expanded to the Lau Group in eastern Fiji. Calvin and Myrtle Parker, another missionary couple, joined the effort, enduring difficult living conditions and illness. Yet the flame that Ambrose helped kindle would not die out. Churches began to rise, hymnbooks were translated, and tracts printed in the Fijian language spread across the islands. Fulton even published Na Rarama (“The Light”), the first Adventist periodical in the South Pacific. Cole abridged and translated The Great Controversy, titled Nai Tukutuku ni Veigauna, a 1903 edition of 2,000 copies printed by Avondale Press.
A Royal Witness
Though Ambrose had traded royal privilege for Christian discipleship, he continued to use his influence for the gospel. He met some of the leading Adventist pioneers of his time. In 1899 he welcomed General Conference president George A. Irwin to Fiji, calling him Qase Levu kei Vuravura (“the big man of all the world”). Later, in 1907, he hosted Dr. Daniel Kress and Septimus Carr. Kress recalled, “We all sat down on the floor in a circle and carried on a pleasant conversation. . . . Brother Ambrose and his family were so genteel and polite that we soon forgot [we were sitting on the floor], and felt we were in the presence of friends.”[9]
Once known as ‘the biggest rogue in Fiji,’ Ambrose died a forgiven man, humble, devoted, and at peace with his Creator.
In 1910 Ambrose traveled beyond Fiji to attend the Australasian Union Conference session, accompanied by another early Fijian convert, Alipati Rainima. It was a momentous occasion and proof that the message once brought by foreign missionaries had taken deep root in Fijian soil.
Life’s final years were not without hardship. Around 1911 or early 1912 Ambrose suffered a terrible accident while fishing with dynamite, losing his right hand. Even so, he remained steadfast. When typhoid fever struck the following year, it became clear that his life’s journey was nearing its end.
On December 10, 1912, Ratu Ambrose fell asleep in Christ. He was approximately 65 years old. Those who were with him in his final hours heard him speak words that echoed his deep faith: “I have no fear at all, for I am trusting in the Lord. Today I look to my Saviour on the cross. It is He that separated me from the world and brought me into this clean church. I know I have been a bad man, but He has forgiven me.”[10]
His testimony was not one of perfection, but of redemption. Once known as “the biggest rogue in Fiji,” Ambrose died a forgiven man, humble, devoted, and at peace with his Creator.
A Legacy That Endures
The missionary journey that began with the Pitcairn and the vision of John Tay found its fulfillment in the faith of a chief who knelt like his Savior. More than a century later the story of Ratu Ambrose remains one of the most moving chapters in the history of the Adventist Church in Fiji. His conversion transformed how his people viewed the gospel. Through him the Adventist faith took on a Fijian face and became a living experience of grace rooted in the islands’ soil. From his royal home to the shoreline where he prayed, from his gift of land to his final words of faith, Ratu Ambrose’s story stands as a testimony to the transforming power of Christ. The chief who once ruled by decree became the servant who ruled by love.
Because of his surrender, the light that once flickered on a small mission ship now shines across the Pacific. Na Rarama, “The Light,” still burns in the hearts of Fijian believers today.
[1] M. G. Kellogg, “News From the Pitcairn,” The Bible Echo, Nov. 15, 1893, p. 366.
[2] Myrtle G. Parker’s letter cited in “Union Conference,” Australasian Union Conference Record, July 17, 1899, p. 4.
[3] C. H. Parker, “Mission Studies: Fiji,” Australasian Union Conference Record, May 31, 1909, p. 7.
[4] M. G. Parker’s letter.
[5] J. E. Fulton, “Progress in Fiji,” The Missionary Magazine, April 1900, p. 169.
[6] C. H. Parker.
[7] Fulton.
[8] J. E. Fulton, “The Work in Fiji: Evening After Sabbath, July 12,” Australasian Union Conference Record, July 22, 1901, p. 22.
[9] Daniel H. Kress, “Leaving Australia, and Our Trip to Fiji,” Australasian Union Conference Record, May 13, 1907, p. 8.
[10] “Obituaries,” Australasian Union Conference Record, Jan. 20, 1913, p. 7.
