From Faithful Foundations to Global Missions: Taking the Message of Jesus from Ohio to Southern Asia

I grew up in rural Ohio with parents who never possessed a passport. Homeschooled in the 1980’s, exposed to foreign worlds and concepts only through brief paragraphs in textbooks. I had never met a Buddhist, visited a Stupa, or read the Pali Cannon.

My parents loved Jesus, and at least three times a week the family loaded into our conversion van and drove 40 mins each way to Mansfield First Assembly. We filled the entire 3rd pew on the right. It was in that pew that I heard Pastor Tom Blair intentionally introduced our congregation to people who were living out the Great Commission. He wept as missionaries spoke of the hopelessness of the people in the lands they served. He cheered as they shared their victories on difficult mission fields we could only begin to imagine. With his words and actions, Pastor Blair demonstrated that this work was valuable. Several times a month he would give these global workers space to open my young mind and heart to the world’s, people, and religions I would otherwise have never known. Watching the images of desperate people throwing themselves prostrate before an unhearing, uncaring statue, begging it for mercy, stirred a longing within me to be used by God in His rescue mission.

I was discipled with a firm foundation of Biblical missions through diverse church ministries. I pledged my meager allowance to BGMC and my babysitting earnings to Speed The Light. In Junior Bible Quiz I “buzzed in” on the 30-pt. question, “From Mathew, quote the Great Commission”; and in Teen Bible Quiz I memorized Luke 24:46-47, planting missional seeds deep into my heart. In the third grade a missionary spoke to our Missionette class. I heard about Amy Carmichael and the Buddhist/Hindu world of India for the first time. In Fine Arts I preformed drama solos that portrayed exotic places and people awaiting the Good News.

Then, at Southeastern Bible College I committed to go! (I also committed to marry Kyle). We were called— not just to a nation that was lost, hopeless, and desperate—we wanted to go to a place where the Gospel had never been proclaimed. To go to a people who had never rejected the gift of salvation but were waiting to hear it for the first time. We learned that most of these never reached nations were shrouded deeply— deceived profoundly—by Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam. In our naivety, we believed that when the Gospel was proclaimed, the truth would be accepted with open arms in massive numbers.

We wept at our table in Sri Lanka as we filled out our first quarterly missions report— Salvations 0. Our hearts were broken, and our minds confused. Every day we drank cups of tea with new friends, visited the market with a smile to buy fruits, fish, and vegetables striving to build relationships that would allow us to share our testimonies. We walked our neighborhood and prayed, even as loudspeakers boomed the chants of Buddhist monks and the heavy perfume of burning incense thickly filled the air, we knew the Gospel was the hope of nations. Why was this island nation we loved and were called to serve not grasping hold to the hope we held out.

We began to understand the ties that bound their hands from freely accepting His great gift of salvation. Identity. It is loudly and frequently proclaimed that “to be Sri Lankan is to be Buddhist.” It is their highest value. Sri Lanka is the oldest continually Buddhist nation in the world. Sri Lankans believe they are the chosen protectors of pure Theravada Buddhism, which they believe originated on their island. Buddhism must be preserved and protected with violence when needed and death if necessary. The teachings of Christ to love others extravagantly and find unspeakable joy in Him are in juxtapose to the teachings of Buddha. Buddhist are trying to rid themselves of all emotion. They must separate themselves of all desires, even love, joy, and hope, if they are to ever find freedom from the cycle of reincarnation. Less than 2 percent of the population are believers of Jesus and there is a tangible force pushing against all attempts to illuminate the darkest corners and demonic presences are tangible.

The weight of the discouragement and disillusionment felt as we submitted that first missionary report will always be with me. Yet, I am sustained by the strength of the foundation laid in my life. An anchored faith has enabled me to battle against the powers and principalities of this complex Buddhist land as we proclaim the hope of the Gospel with boldness and joy.

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Sensitive Missionary