Three eager teams covered the Central West (CW), Far West (FW) & South West (SW) of Queensland during August and September 2024. Much of this country is remote with few folk living in the small towns and scattered sheep/cattle and goat properties – sometimes all three.
Truly Remote
The Central West (CW) of Queensland encompasses an area from Roma north to Emerald and the coal fields, west to Barcaldine, also taking in the semi-remote towns of Aramac, Muttaburra along with Ilfracombe and Isisford to the west of Blackall and Yaraka southwest of Blackall.
How the Lord blessed us. During the weekend we were in Roma, there was a combined churches special get-together. We had the opportunity to set up a stall and one of our Gideons spoke to the much-enlarged congregation plus we had the opportunity to engage with folk over lunch.
Emerald is in the northern part of the CW. The highlight here was joining forces with The Gideons Northern State chaplains Jenny & Rod who live in Emerald and successfully covered much of the town. Thanks to Jenny’s thorough knowledge of her hometown, the ladies were able to visit, very successfully, some 25 medical and para-medical centres in one day. The men managed 16 accommodation places with only two refusals, one motel taking 80 Bibles.
The most remote distribution was Yaraka, a very tiny community 164 km SW of Blackall with a population of 18. The Bibles left on the last visit had all disappeared so the hotel was very pleased to be replenished.
The South West (SW) begins with St George as the hub of a number of very small communities which were all visited.
The SW team were very busy ensuring every possible location was covered, even very remote spots on the map such as Toompine, southwest of Quilpie, consisting of one pub but no other buildings and Adavale, north of Quilpie, similar but several folk do live in that town. Despite the smallness of the communities, there were opportunities to place Bibles and present Personal Workers Testaments. The team’s overall territory stretched from St George including some communities to the east, south and north out to Cunnamulla on to Thargomindah, Noccundra and even Innamincka in South Australia, back through Eromanga and Quilpie to Charleville.
“There are so many stories and miracles – GOD is so GOOD as he enables us to fulfil the Great Commission, enjoy wonderful Christian fellowship, travel safely and learn so much about our wonderful remote areas.”
A Testimony from St George
We had a great day at a school in St George. A teacher told us when we arrived at the school that we could see the students in the playground, take the names of the kids who wanted a Testament and then leave the Scriptures at the office for them. Many students came to ask what we were doing. Thankfully the chaplain came out and we were able to hand out 72 Testaments. One Year 12 student came to ask if she could have some Scriptures for the kids who were too shy to ask for them. Max had been told there were 50 students. Praise the Lord, 70+ were handed out. How easy for us to underestimate what God will do, despite man.
Innamincka
Leaving part of the SW team at the remote spot of Noccundra by the Wilson River, some members travelled west over 500 kms in the day to visit the South Australian outpost of Innamincka. On arriving in the town, the team discovered that the flying doctor was also there – God’s divine timing. The medical clinic had a notice on the door “Closed For 2 Weeks”, but opened on 9 September, the day the SW team was there. Praise God for the great opportunities we had in a very, very remote community.
The Far West (FW)
That is exactly what it is! Longreach is by far the largest town, just 990 km, as the crow flies, NW from Brisbane. This town is surviving to a great extent on tourism with the Stockman’s Hall of Fame, the Thompson River and the QANTAS Museum just to name some of the attractions.
It is really a large circle for the FW team – down to Stonehenge on to Jundah and Windorah, then west to Birdsville 379 km further across gibber plains and sand dune country – some sealed roads. They then turned north to Bedourie and Boulia with a quick trip up to Duchess and back to Boulia. All of these towns have country pubs and generally welcome Bibles being placed.
This section of the FW was covered by a team of two couples who were experiencing remote areas for the first time. From Boulia they had to return to Longreach via Winton which was a 362 km journey crossing the magnificent Cawnpore Hills ablaze with colour. A further 180 km took them back to Longreach.
One of the FW team members happened to speak to the chaplain of the school in Aramac who reported that a student was in trouble and had been expelled for the day. Later he told the chaplain that he’d been given a Gideon Bible and he had been reading it, paying particular attention to the red words as he thought they were important! Praise the Lord!
There are so many stories and miracles – GOD is so GOOD as he enables us to fulfil the Great Commission, enjoy wonderful Christian fellowship, travel safely and learn so much about our wonderful remote areas.