Upuia Fineaso, Missionary Intern 2021-2021 Detroit Program
Upuia Fineaso watched her parents’ conversion into the Adventist Christian faith at the age of five. She grew up going to a church Sunday with her mom’s family, and then to church on Sabbath with her dad’s family. Her dad was a back-sliden Adventist. However, her mom responded when bible workers came to promote an evangelistic effort in Sacramento CA. Her dad slowly started coming and soon both her parents made the decision for baptism and rebaptism into the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Although she had never felt a call to foreign mission, she always wanted to carry on what the Bible workers did when they helped her parents come into the church through inner city evangelism.
Upuia enrolled at Hartland College, graduated in 2019 with a health ministry degree, and became more familiar with CAMPUS when Jermaine Gayle came as a Resident. Then her classmate, Grady Yonas came as a Resident. While Upuia was applying to nursing school, she attended GYC Louisville and was praying for God to open up opportunities for ministry. The morning messages were from Sikhu Daco, and one morning she spoke about taking a year to be a missionary. Sikhu also talked about the importance of ‘purposing’ in your heart as Daniel did to follow God. She asked her parents about doing OYiM+ and went to ask parents, and her parents told her to wait; she took the advice and admitted it was her biggest regret.
Mission work was not in her parents plans. However, when God desires for a person to be in missions, and that person desires to do His will, He will give that person another opportunity. At GYC Houston, Upuia was praying once again that God would lead her to a ministry. Pastor Steve Conway talked about starting a Center of Influence in Detroit near Wayne State University. Originally Upuia looked for an OYiM opportunity in her home Potomac Conference, but there was none. So when she saw Pastor Conway again at another GYC, she asked him about the Detroit Center of Influence. At the end of the conversation, she was led to fill out the application at the CAMPUS booth.
However, Upuia had to submit her application three separate times due to the application shutting down. The application usually takes about an hour to fill out due to the essay questions. CAMPUS nor Upuia could figure out why the application continued to shut down. So, she interpreted the difficulty as the enemy not wanting her to apply to the program. Upuia preserved and after a month she was able to submit the application.
Now, she had to tell her parents, but she waited until she knew she was accepted. After her interview with the Conways, they let her know she would receive an answer in two weeks. Two weeks passed, and God impressed her that she needed to tell her parents. However, she delayed another week. Her mom was out of town and when she returned, God gave her the courage to talk with her mom and dad about being a missionary at the Center of Influence in Detroit. Two days later Pastor Conway reached out and extended an invitation for her to be a missionary in Detroit as a missionary.
“This is the first time I have diverged from their expectation for me about the future.” She admits “They want me to serve the Lord, but they also want me to be successful.” Her parents are more content now, but there was a lot of denial from March until July. Then August hit and she made preparation for leaving. This is when the reality of her leaving settled into the home. Up to this time, Upuia was a full-time student at her local community college and working part-time as a barista. This allowed her to help around the house, care for her younger siblings homeschool, and transport her brothers to functions; both her parents work full-time. Upuia loves her parents and deeply appreciates their advice, yet she also realizes that God is the one who led her to come to Detroit to help establish a Center of Influence near Wayne State University.
Originally she understood that transportation would be provided and she would not need a vehicle. So when someone offered to give her a car to use, she declined. Then a month before she was to come to Detroit, she learned she would need her own car. She went back to the person who offered her the transportation, and the couple was happy to help her. Now she has been able to drive to and from ministry opportunities this fall. God worked out all the details. In reflecting on her decision she shared, “God was so clear, I could not question. I would have been a fool to stay home and ignore the facts of his providence.”