It is FICA’s vision for Christians to be a leader in the public space in Indonesia. Specifically, we are called to equip Indonesian Christians in the US that have the same vision as FICA. Those with the same vision would be first transformed thru biblical teaching and practice in FICA that to lead means to serve without regards. Secondly, we seek to execute long term and transformative impacts to area that either lack of resources or attentions from central government.
Part of this effort is to share our findings on Indonesia’s domestic issues in a series of papers. These papers will concisely describe the current conditions, the urgent needs, and the requirements to be the servant leader in these issues. At the end, we hope God works through these writings to inspire, challenge, and call us to be the one that rise to the occasion and lead.
A story of Dr. Jurianto Joe
In this paper, we are sharing our findings in the development of science and technology. As part of our research, we interviewed Dr. Jurianto Joe, the Chief Technology Officer of SURE Indonesia. Dr. Joe after finishing his doctorate degree from the University of Wisconsin Madison, worked and later co-founded a technology company based on his patents in Singapore. He then moved back to United States to work with a couple of technology companies. Being able to work in the U.S could be a dream come true for some us. It provides a stable income enough to pay for living and most toys one ever wanted. Plus, it provides access to an excellent living condition where our family would enjoy such good schools, save neighborhoods, and good retirements. However, that does not make him settle.
God has put a seed in Dr. Joe’s heart to serve Indonesia through his involvement in FICA. Dr. Joe is the founding member of FICA and has served as FICA’s president. As we struggle to find our calling together in FICA, we could sense his passion grow stronger every time we talked. About 3 years ago, they sensed the tide in Indonesia was turning. God has opened the window of opportunity both on national and personal levels for Dr. Joe and his family to go back to Indonesia.
At the national level, we could sense at that time that the society would become more pluralistic in leadership, economic, and more importantly in ideas. The society will not punish leaders those are gracious and serving while reward those entangle in corruption, collusion, and nepotism practices. The economic will be more transparent and reward entrepreneurs with good character and morale. Ideologically, the universal truth about human dignity and importance of faith, character, and morality would be more acceptable regardless of its racial or religious roots.
SURE Indonesia: Developing rural areas to compete in global market
Personally, Dr. Joe has been invited to join Sure Indonesia which is part of a Surya Group. Dr. Joe shares the same vision as SURE Indonesia which aims serve Indonesia in achieving equal standing with the developed countries especially in human development and economic. SURE Indonesia focuses its efforts in the grossly under-developed area in which the local government has minimum capability and resources. In these areas, SURE Indonesia engages in two areas: 1. education with the development of innovative learning method called “GASING” to accelerate math learning for those who are behind; and 2. technology to enhance facilities and meet energy needs.
SURE Indonesia develops technology that focuses on developing comprehensive solutions for rural villages in Indonesia. SURE wants to develop beyond the prosperity of the locals. SURE aspires for the village to be competitive in the global market by taking local products to global market. Using their “Complexity” algorithm, SURE assess the local assets including its population to help villagers understand the market potential of local products. From there, SURE develops a development building block for each village. Most of the time, SURE has to start from scratch, since these villages are lacking in infrastructure, health care, education, and monetary wealth. This whole process is part of SMART VILLAGE PROGRAM, Smart Village Program is solely designed for the village to be successful and for the villagers to love and own their lands. Consequently, SURE has to innovate to overcome the temporary deficiency in resources and to utilize the unique assets. For example, in the area of renewable energy, SURE is constantly inventing and looking for new ways to provide electricity from the resources available locally or from practically readily available technology. From bio-ethanol generator to the more expensive solar panel technology, SURE is able to power these villages. It is Dr. Joe and his team responsibility to device and to apply the right technology for these villages.
SURE Indonesia: innovating to meet the urgent needs of rural areas in Indonesia
From Dr. Joe and SURE perspective, Indonesia is not lacking creative scientists and innovators. The Indonesian government also has institutions that are tasked to generate innovations in science and technology. The reason why we are not seeing a lot of new innovations from Indonesia are mainly for these three reasons. First, most of the inventions stop at prototype stage and cannot be mass produced. The prototype is typically working only at the laboratory or at test setting. Some of the prototype might even be used in the inventor labs or homes.
Secondly, most of these innovations are disconnected from the market. The innovators have neither conducted market research nor promoted their product well resulting in lukewarm response from the market. The market deems the innovation not beneficial or less valuable compare to comparable product.
Lastly, the reason why we encountered minimum innovations is the uneasiness of Indonesian investors to invest in technology. This is because they are not familiar with this type of investment and do not want to invest in prototype stage. They want product that can be manufactured readily and sold immediately. Furthermore, most scientists do not know how to approach the private investment group that has access to funding, market and manufacturing facility.
Dr Joe pointed out that a lot of time, the scientists/engineers did not do a due diligence market study before developing a product based of their invented technology. After a technology invention, what is needed is an understanding of the market before developing a product based on the newly invented technology. He said that it is still a long way taking a prototype to a manufacturable product SURE recently has emphasized the importance of market research before developing products.
To learn more about products and technology developed by SURE Indonesia, one can visit the list of website below. These are products from various divisions inside SURE Indonesia.
SURE Indonesia – www.sure-indonesia.com
LED product – www.kunangled.com
Sensor products – www.xe-mart.com
Education – www.suryainstitute.org
Complexity –
Noble vision motivated by God’s calling
To be true to the bible, we need to judge the nobility of their vision with their actions. When Peter embraced God’s calling to him, he accepted God’s vision with tremble and humility. Jesus told Peter that He would build His church thru Peter. Not only that, Jesus told Peter he would have power so powerful even the gates of hell shall not prevail against it (Matthew 16:18). With so much authority riding on Peter, he could have turned to be a menace for the whole body of Christ demanding more and more gifts and power. Instead in his letter, Peter identified himself as a fellow elder serving the flock. He mentioned in 1 Peter 5 the importance to be humble and surrender to the mighty hand of God.
Similar to Peter, Dr. Joe is motivated by God’s vision to make Indonesia a great nation. God’s calling is the reason for him to leave United States. As part of the team in SURE Indonesia, he seeks to develop rural area rather and not just exploit its resources. Their projects are designed to build the infrastructure and the quality of life. Their goal is to develop the rural areas so that the villagers love and own their lands.
It is almost impossible for one to pursue his/her calling without the help of other believers. Dr. Joe’s passion about Indonesia was started and molded into a practical vision in FICA; where Christians gather to pray, struggle about God’s word, fellowship, and to serve each other and Indonesia. This is a model adopted from the bible described in Acts chapter 2. God’s vision for them was embodied in the Holy Spirit had to be shared and lived out together. With shared experience and utter dependence on the power of Holy Spirit, they became one body and gained confidence to preach that Jesus is the Lord.
It could be God is trying to call us back to join hand with Surya Enterprise in building Indonesia. Dr. Joe story should inspire us to follow God’s calling to the fullest; even if it requires us to leave our comfortable live here in United States. If we do have that calling, we should have confidence that God will lead us to green pasture and not forsake us. We should gather together in a fellowship of like minded Christians, so that when the persecution and trials come, we could not only stand firm but also push forward to tear down the enemy strongholds.