First Adventist Minister is Ordained on the Island of Bonaire

Newly ordained Jurvensly Koots has been serving in Bonaire and currently serves as the executive secretary of the Bonaire Mission.

May 24, 2024 | Kralendijk, Bonaire | Pablo Lake and Inter-American Division News

Seventh-day Adventists in Bonaire, an island municipality of the Netherlands, gathered recently to witness the first ordination ceremony to take place on the island. More than 200 church leaders, members, family, and community members met at Antriol Adventist Church on the premises of the original site of the first church building in Bonaire, as Pastor Jurvensley Koots was officially ordained.  Koots has been serving as the executive secretary of the Bonaire Mission since 2018.

“This marks a pivotal moment for the local church and its members,” said Pastor Shurman Kook, president of the Dutch Caribbean Union which oversees the church in Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao. “The church in Bonaire is being empowered with a minister with full ecclesiastical authority today,” said Kook. “There is no longer a need for authorization to perform baptisms or to have an ordained minister sent from the Dutch Caribbean Union to perform the services of a duly authorized Seventh-day Adventist minister.”

The ordination is a landmark, explained Kook, since the Bonaire Mission was organized in 2017, as it transitioned from the previous Curacao and Bonaire Conference setup.  Other ordained ministers had been sent to Bonaire, but the mission had been without an ordained minister since 2021.  In the meantime, the Bonaire mission, which oversees four local congregations, had been overseen by the union.

“Our local church members see this event as a beacon of growth and empowerment for the advancement of their faith on the island,” said Kook.

Inter-American Division President Pastor Elie Henry spoke during the ceremony as he reflected on the significant milestone reached by the membership with an Adventist message legacy since the first church was organized in 1941 on the island.

“God has been with His church on the island, and we can see growth,” said Pastor Henry. “The ordination service as a Seventh-day Adventist Church is very special for it not only marks a specific moment in the life of the servant of the Lord, but also in the life of the church.”

Pastor Koots, 40, is originally from Curacao and has been serving as a pastor on Bonaire since 2017, before he was called to serve in Bonaire as a pastor and appointed as executive secretary of the Bonaire Mission, where he has developed his ministry primarily.

Koots reflected on his journey and the divine guidance he has received: “When I look back on my life, it illustrates what God wants to teach us as His children and that is to recognize that it is the hand of God that has led and is leading every step I take,” he said. “I am a living testimony of what God can do with a person, everything that He desires.”

Pastor Koots was handed the minister’s bible by Nurelle Chirino, treasurer of the Bonaire Mission. “We thank you and your entire family for what you are doing for the advancement of God’s work here in Bonaire,” Chirino said.

Ministerial Spouses Association associate director Anna Maria Manuel spoke to Koot’s wife Suehedy Balootje about the unique role she and her husband play together in ministry. “In a pastor ministry it takes both the strength of the husband and the sensitivity of a wife to represent Christ fully to His church, just as Adam and Eve represented together the full image of God,” Manuel said.

There are more than 430 Seventh-day Adventists attending four congregations in Bonaire.