We were sitting around in a circle discussing the community health needs in a remote region of the Bateke Plateau in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). It had been a gruelling ride in our bright red Toyota Hilux over open prairie grassland. My teammate, Barb Ihrke, and I were making our first official visit as nurses to this area. Suddenly the meeting was interrupted by the sight and sound of a man peddling furiously towards us on his bike, crying out loudly, “Come quickly, come quickly! My daughter just delivered, and the baby is not breathing.”
Barb and I jumped into the truck and followed the man over the sandy, grassy path about two kilometres to a small mud-brick house in a village with five or six other houses. Our hearts sank as we took in the scene – the tiny lifeless baby girl lying uncovered in a corner of the cool dirt floor, her mother and several attending women crying in despair. Quickly we picked up the baby, taking her to the warm truck and beginning basic resuscitation measures. We knew there was little we could do apart from a miracle.
As we worked over the baby, her grandfather, one of the very few Christ-followers in the area, took his stance in the middle of the village, loudly invoking the name of Jesus. And then, the miracle happened! The baby took one barely perceptible gasp, then another; her body began to warm up, and after a few very long minutes, she began to cry. Such music to our ears! Later, Barb and I had the privilege of giving this precious baby a name. We called her Lokumu (Glory) and praised God for the way He had demonstrated His power and opened the door for us to begin a community health and discipleship ministry in the area.
The Early Years
Strangely, the story of Lokumu connected with the desire and longing I had felt from an early age to be used by God as a missionary nurse in some African country. I grew up on a farm near Vermilion, Alberta, the fourth of six children. Hard work, strong extended family bonds, and the importance of being a good neighbour and friend were all values my parents taught us and lived out. Sundays were special days for our family. It was the day we would attend the small community church (called Windermere) in our neighbourhood, joined by four or five other families. Our church was led by a lay pastor who volunteered his services. Every week we would give the offering in its entirety to a cross-cultural worker either overseas or within Canada. Frequently these workers would join us on a Sunday when on home assignment or visit our home. I would sit enthralled, listen to their stories, and dream of one day joining them in their adventures.
One summer, a visiting pastor shared the story of The Pilgrim’s Progress over several Sundays. As a four or five-year-old, my heart was so drawn to Christian and his journey in ways I could not explain. One night while lying in bed and talking to my older sister, I felt a strong sense of unease come over me with many questions about all I was hearing flooding my mind. I went to my mom’s bedside, where she patiently answered my questions and explained in simple terms what it meant to invite Jesus to be part of my life. The memory is still as strong as the experience all those years ago. I had set my heart on the journey, and there was no turning back.
When I was in my teens, our church family began regularly attending the Alliance church in town after our country church closed. There my call continued to be nurtured as I prepared for nurses’ training. This is not to say I did not try to dismiss or shake that sense of calling I felt on my life.
While in nurses training, and then the year following when I travelled to Newfoundland to work in a United Church hospital, my intimacy with God waned, as did my desire to follow Him wherever He might lead. At the time, I was in a serious relationship with a guy who respected my beliefs but did not entirely share them or my life goals. Everything in me longed to forget the calling I had sensed from the Lord and settle down in Newfoundland. But I had no peace in that decision. A year later, I reluctantly applied and was accepted at Canadian Bible College (CBC) to begin preparation for serving overseas.
Several significant events happened during my two years at CBC, changing my reluctance to a deep and joyful sense of surrender. During my first year, revival broke out on the campus. Classes were cancelled for several days while staff and students met together, worshipping the Lord, confessing areas the Spirit was spotlighting, and soaking in all He was showing us. I heard again the voice of God, which I had known so intimately and trusted so completely as a child. The conviction He was inviting me to serve Him overseas was stronger than ever. Still, I resisted the thought of leaving family and friends to work and live far from everything familiar. What if something happened to a family member and I was not there?
While I was in the midst of this struggle, I got news my father had been killed in a farm accident. I was unprepared for the massive wave of grief rolling over me or the profound impact his death would have on my whole family system. My desire was to quit college and help my mother and younger siblings on the farm, but Mom would not even entertain the thought. Both she and my father had sensed and affirmed God’s call on my life and encouraged me to pursue His leading. Somehow this helped me work through my grief as I returned to college.
Back again at CBC, I settled into my studies and my role as one of the resident assistants (RA) to the Dean of Women, Mrs. Rose. I had accepted the position of RA with little thought of what it might entail beyond helping me pay for some of my tuition fees. However, the mentoring and spiritual direction I received from Mrs. Rose, one of the wisest and most discerning women I have ever met, was a big building block in my own spiritual and leadership development. Her way of seeing potential in my life and calling it out made a lasting impact.
The following steps of the journey seemed to happen quickly, graduation from CBC, appointment as an official overseas worker with The Christian and Missionary Alliance (C&MA), a program in Advanced Practical Obstetrics (midwifery) at the University of Alberta, French studies in France, and Tropical Medicine studies in Belgium.
Language Study and Healing Ministry
At the age of twenty-six, I landed in Kinkonzi, a rural area of lower Congo (then Zaire), which was the location of a mission referral hospital for the area and a four-year program Bible school. I was assigned to full-time study of the Kikongo language as my primary focus. However, the hospital was short-staffed; the veteran midwife who was scheduled for teaching the nurse-midwives could not return from the United States, and I was thrust into her position with limited experience and little time for cultural orientation and adjustment. Trying to prepare the students for their state exam, teaching for the first time in French, and learning Kikongo in any remaining time I had seemed overwhelming.
I remember crying out to God over the year and writing dramatically in my journal, “OH GOD, if I survive this term. I promise I will never forget those who come behind me.” It was a promise God would remind me of many times in the years to follow! Member care (pastoral care of international workers) was not a common theme at this point, but God was allowing me even in my first term to see the need for greater resources, training, and support systems for workers.
As I began to be a little more comfortable with my role and had become involved in the Scripture Union Bible study movement with students, I was assigned to be in charge of a thirty-bed hospital in a place called Maduda where there was no doctor. All the things I had feared when I was wrestling through the call to overseas ministry as a nurse came to pass. Fears of inadequacy, of being called on to do things I was not trained for, and anxiety over the implications of making a wrong diagnosis all threatened to paralyze me.
Many nights I would be awakened by the sound of a truck dropping off a patient at the entrance of the mission station where I was living. Each situation was a different emergency―a man in respiratory distress because of a snake bite to the head, a woman about to deliver twin babies, a young man who had fallen from a palm tree while trying to harvest palm nuts, a baby severely dehydrated or anemic. It was with this backdrop I began to lean into the power of prayer and to see the healing power of Jesus flow through so many sick people in miraculous ways. Ever so gradually, my fears and self-doubt began to be replaced with God-confidence and trust.
During the year I lived in Maduda, I had the privilege of sharing a house with two very dedicated and encouraging high school teachers, Norma Hart and Gretha Stringer. I was also invited into the life of the student movement happening in the high school campus where they taught. A revival had broken out the year before my arrival and continued in full force while I was there. Although I had the privilege of teaching a Sunday morning class to several high school students, I was the one being discipled. Seeing their deep love for God, evidenced by their practical help to those in need, and witnessing their zeal as I accompanied them on their outreach trips profoundly impacted me. Many of these students would go on to seminary and other places of higher learning, and eventually to ministries scattered around the globe where they continue to live out Kingdom values.
A year later, I was back in Kinkonzi and teaching in the nursing school again. So much had changed for me during my year away. I was developing a deep love for the Zairian culture and for the people who welcomed me into their lives. My aptitude in the Kikongo language was growing, and I had a new desire to see God work in the lives of student nurses as He had in the high school students. While I had never done much formal teaching before, I experienced so much joy in helping students expand their knowledge and develop their skills. During their years in training, many explored dimensions of faith during the Scripture Union Bible studies and worship times held regularly on the hospital campus. When they graduated, our teaching staff felt like proud parents about to send their children out into the larger world.
Over the years, the nursing school graduated many health workers who staffed medical facilities across the region and had a strong godly influence wherever they went. Qualified nursing professors and national doctors joined the missionary staff at the nursing school and hospital. The nursing school expanded to include other branches. The hospital continued to serve as a beacon of hope for so many who found both spiritual and physical healing.
As much as I loved being part of our active hospital, I was also discovering how limited the access to health care was for many people in the surrounding areas. Often people would come into the hospital in the final stages of a disease that would have been completely treatable with earlier intervention. Sometimes the use of unmeasured doses of indigenous medicine resulted in a deadly reaction. Other times, faith in the fetishes many wore to ward off the evil spirits believed to be the cause of disease did not have the effect they had hoped for.
So, when I was asked to oversee a primary health care initiative another colleague had helped develop, I sensed this was a door the Lord was putting before me. A primary focus of the program was to train, resource, and supervise village health workers. Most of these were trusted men chosen by their village leaders. As my Congolese colleagues and I travelled out to the areas where these men lived and worked, I had the privilege of learning culture and growing in awareness of spiritual and physical needs. There was a deepening of trust, relationships, and opportunities to share God’s love in ways institutional ministry did not permit. God was using this stage of the journey to prepare me for the next step.
Bateke Plateau
At the time, in partnership with our mission leaders, the National Church began to share its vision to reach out to the Teke people group living in an area east of the capital city of Kinshasa. Pastor Niosi Seke and an international worker (IW) named Theo van Barneveld, two amazing men of God, were pioneering the work. Their travel to remote villages, partly by vehicle and partly on foot, allowed them to build relationships with village chiefs and residents. The Bateke people had long resisted any outside influence and had little contact with the Gospel. A strong tie to the spirit world, Animism, and witchcraft characterized their religious experiences. Schools, access to clean water, and health care resources of any kind were minimal.
Theo challenged me to consider the possibility of joining the team and reaching out to the Bateke women as a nurse-midwife. I learned a small but growing number of men had embraced the teaching of Jesus and were interested in seeing better health and education for their children. However, most of the women in the village did not have the time or inclination to listen to the discussions or attend church meetings. They were too busy working long hours in their fields, barely managing to feed and care for their families.
I thought and prayed over what Theo had shared. I did not consider myself to be a “pioneer,” nor did I gravitate toward the kind of travel and lifestyle work involved with the Bateke people. But yet, the familiar gentle voice of the Spirit was once again beckoning me to follow new paths. Colleagues at the hospital gave their blessing to another nurse, Barb Ihrke, and me to be part of this endeavour. We joined newly arrived workers, Stan and Connie Hotalen, in Kinshasa to learn the Lingala language and begin travelling and ministering with the team of Congolese pastors. A close friend, Anne Stephens, would become part of the team a few years later.
Working on the Bateke Plateau was indeed a daunting assignment. Most trips were characterized by long gruelling hours over challenging roads. Spiritual opposition and oppression were frequent. Our small band of pastors and missionaries faced many physical attacks resulting in chronic or life-threatening diseases. Several of our evangelists lost a child due to inadequate health care resources, and one of our evangelists was murdered by soldiers on his way home following a teaching expedition. It is hard to describe the depth of our grief and desolation when we discovered his body, abandoned in a ditch. How we had to lean into the character and purposes of God as we wrestled through the seemingly senseless loss of our beloved brother, who had been such a gifted and fearless evangelist. During this time, I began to wrestle through and formulate more intentionally my own theology of suffering.
While hardships abounded, the rewards and sense of fulfilment were equally as great. Our team of North American and Congolese pastors, teachers, and nurses became a close-knit community. Discipling new leaders and seeing God use them to bring healing and redemption to those caught in bondage filled us with such joy.
Starting a well-baby and pre-natal clinic in the area where baby Lokumu was miraculously brought back to life was another milestone. How rewarding it was to minister to the needs of moms who cared deeply for their children but often saw them die from preventable diseases. It was a sacred privilege listening to their hopes and dreams and seeing many open up to the love of Jesus. God was building His church, little by little, on the Bateke Plateau, and the gates of hell would not prevail against it. This was a fact that we had to cling to as we were forced to leave the country a few years later due to rising civil unrest.
Canada: Missionary in Residence
Back in Alberta, I was invited by Sherwood Park Alliance Church to join their staff for one year as the missionary in residence. One year turned into three years as I stayed on to become director of Women’s Ministry. The church was in an exciting stage of development as they explored and implemented the Meta Model of small groups. I was fortunate to serve with a great staff and head up a team of seven ministry leaders. I relished the opportunity to learn more about the challenges and workings of one of the churches that had been part of my support system and ministry overseas.
Return to Bateke Plateau
Life was good, and I was content, but my journey was about to take another turn. The DRC mission leadership had determined, in many respects, the church was firmly established in the Congo, and most IW’s would not be returning to their former ministries. However, they wanted to send back six people, including a team of four, to work on the Bateke Plateau. I knew deep in my heart, my time with the Bateke people was not finished. So once again, it was back to DRC. During the next few years, political unrest increased. Finally, civil war broke out in the country, and as determined by our crisis contingency plans, we were forced to evacuate across the river to the Republic of Congo. There we were welcomed with open arms by our colleagues and put to work. One of my assignments was to teach a course on Freedom in Christ at the Bible school, which lead to walking several students through the “Steps to Freedom.”
A few months later, our team, accompanied by the Brazzaville team, made a sudden departure back to DRC when violence and political tensions boiled over in the city of Brazzaville. Back in DRC, a new government was in place, along with a group of very young armed soldiers patrolling the roads and streets. They had been recruited into service with little training or respect for the weapons they carried. This made road access to the villages on the Bateke Plateau very dangerous and difficult.
Something on the schedule for Anne Stephens and me was a long-anticipated retreat with the wives of the pastors and evangelists. The topic of our conference was Spiritual Armour from Ephesians 6. As our team assessed the risks and waited on God, we determined it would be safest to travel by motorized canoe to the retreat location. Travelling upriver, our canoe caught the attention of two armed soldiers on a large barge. Quickly the soldiers commandeered a small motorboat in the vicinity and headed our way. Despite our protests, they climbed into our canoe, which was already filled to capacity. They continued to shout at us, demanding to know what our mission was. How would this all end, we wondered? Finally, our fears began to subside as their demeanour softened, and we began to share with them the love of Jesus. An hour later, we had dropped them off at a village where they were posted, and we were back on our way to meet with the other women arriving by boat and land.
What a time of singing, laughing, crying, praying, and studying together we had over the next few days. How blessed Anne and I were to share this time with these courageous women who had given up the relative comfort of their lives to join their husbands in reaching the Bateke people for Christ. It would be our final time with this group.
Mobile Member Care
As I returned to Canada in the late ‘90s, it became increasingly clear we would not be able to return to DRC. I was uncertain as to what the future would hold. During this time, I worked part-time on my master’s degree through Canadian Theological College (now Ambrose Seminary) and signed up for a course on Transitions taught by Joan Carter. The whole concept of transitions was new, but William Bridges’ explanation of the three stages (Endings, Neutral Zone, and New Beginnings) totally resonated with me. The course taught me a vocabulary for what I had been experiencing—lack of focus, chaos, confusion, discouragement, low energy—and essential tools and incentives for navigating through this phase of the journey.
I began to journal and review how the Lord had led me in the past. Each new role had built on the past one as God revealed new dreams and opportunities for each season. I realized just how much I enjoyed new challenges. My reflections revealed how deeply crisis situations in my own life and the lives of my colleagues had impacted me and how often in the past years I had found myself walking alongside my colleagues who had experienced tough times. I began to learn of a new ministry being formed to respond to the crisis needs of cross-cultural workers, likely to be located in West Africa. This ministry’s rationale was to provide help and support on the field for workers who had experienced trauma. Too many workers had returned to their home countries to seek help and had not returned. Others were living under the impact of unresolved grief and trauma. How I resonated with the need for this ministry!
Dr. Karen Carr, a clinical psychologist with trauma experience, and Darlene Jerome, personnel director for the Cameroon Branch of Wycliffe Bible Translators/ SIL with a graduate degree in Intercultural Training and Management, were pioneering the effort. They were taking some courses at Regent College in Vancouver, so we connected by phone. Our two-hour call led to a face-to-face meeting and then enrolling in a Critical Incident Stress Debriefing training at the Justice Institute in BC, where Darlene and Karen had also been taking courses. The following year I joined them in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, to become part of the newly formed Mobile Member Care Team (MMCT).
A group of mission leaders from across West Africa, including my own regional developer, Ron Brown, had formed a liaison committee and were on the ground to welcome us, support us, and help discern the ministry’s roll-out. They knew firsthand the difficulties facing so many cross-cultural workers and the lack of available resources on the continent.
We began by offering a workshop developed by Ken Williams entitled Sharpening Your Interpersonal Skills in various countries around West Africa. Then we started to create and offer workshops to train mission leaders in crisis care. Team members with gifts in coming alongside others were trained to debrief and care for their peers. We established an office in the capital in Abidjan, a city with a good airport and good accessibility to surrounding countries. From there, we could respond either directly or through those we trained to many different crisis situations.
The region of West Africa, stretching from Senegal to Nigeria, was fraught with trauma situations threatening workers’ resilience. Civil unrest, erupting into violence, forced many international workers to evacuate to a neighbouring country. Our team was often called upon to debrief these workers and continually come alongside them as they faced the aftermath of trauma or the ongoing uncertainty of transition.
On many occasions, international workers became the target of armed robberies, physical assaults, or kidnappings. For example, one worker was taken hostage at gunpoint while eating in a local restaurant with her young daughter and her daughter’s friend. She was menaced for several hours and then forced to lead the perpetrators to another missionary home, where they robbed the family. As a result, two of our team members travelled to the city where they lived to debrief the adults and children involved. Later, one of the couples received counselling from our staff to deal with some of the ongoing symptoms of trauma.
In other instances, there was not one specific incident precipitating the need for a worker to look for additional resources or help. Rather it might be the cumulative effect of living with high levels of stress over a long period of time. Or it might be the aftermath of crisis leading to burnout or depression prompting the worker to seek counselling with MMCT.
Just as we began to gain traction in our ministry, violent civil war erupted in our own country of Cote d’Ivoire. Suddenly we found ourselves holed up in the SIL guesthouse in the city of Bouake, doing a workshop while there. Unfortunately, our building was right in the middle of the crossfire between government and rebel forces. We hunkered down on the second floor for seven days while the sound of heavy artillery and missiles whistled overhead. God miraculously protected us during those intense days, providing food and water as we were unable to leave the building complex. Finally, on the eighth day, French troops secured the city and arranged for us to drive our vehicles out to safety. The relief we felt soon gave way to realizing we would be forced to evacuate from the country.
With input and prayers from our regional board and other advisors, we moved next door to the country of Ghana to set up a new office. Again, we were plunged into the uncomfortable neutral zone of transition. Our team had increased to four with the arrival of an office administrator, Janna Greenfield, but was now back to the original three as we waited for new team members to join us. This time of reduced travel was spent developing a more intentional community as a team, revising some of our workshop material, and exploring new horizons. We became increasingly aware of the strength and size of the indigenous African mission force, particularly in the nearby country of Nigeria. We discovered an estimated 5,000 African missionaries were working across West Africa. As we developed relationships with indigenous leaders, we also learned of the complex member care needs facing their workers and their desire to partner with us in developing and implementing more resources. A veteran Nigerian worker, Patience Ahmed, with training in counselling, joined our team for a few years and contributed so much in terms of experience and cultural awareness.
The resident staff of MMCT for West Africa never grew larger than six people at one time, but the enlarged team of trained mission leaders and peer responders spread across our region numbered well over three hundred. From the beginning, the vision of the international board had been to go beyond West Africa. Workshops expanded into other parts of Africa, and eventually, a team was formed in East Africa. God had taken our small and often faltering offering and multiplied it in ways only He could do.
Retirement
After fifteen years with MMCT, I sensed the Lord calling me to a new leg of the journey back home in Canada. I was nearing the official retirement age and had many questions about what the next season of life would hold. Colleagues who had gone before me said this would be the most challenging transition yet. How much, I wondered, was my identity wrapped up with the roles and titles I had assumed over many years of service? As in previous transitions, I realized I needed a fresh calling for the next season. I was privileged to attend two Holy Spirit encounters being offered by the Western Canadian District and sensed God was enlarging my capacity for Him. One day, in particular, I remember having set aside as a retreat day. The day ended with a fresh sense of the Spirit’s presence and anointing as I released all my dreams and future plans to His care and direction.
Shortly afterwards I was asked by the Africa regional developers, Richard and Merinda Enns, to work with them in a member care role for a couple of years from my Canadian base. My role was extended for a third year working with the new directors of the Alliance Global Member Care. During this same time frame, I also accepted a part-time interim position for a year and a half as pastor of Adult Discipleship Ministries in my home church, Parkview Alliance, in Vermilion, Alberta. The church was going through a transition, and I felt privileged to join the staff and give back to a church that had supported, prayed for and encouraged me over so many years.
I still felt that God had something new for me. For many years I had been interested in spiritual direction. So many times, I had said or heard one of my colleagues say, ‘I wish I knew what God is up to!” In navigating my own transitions or walking alongside others in grief or crisis, I had become more aware of how hard it can be to discern the voice of the Spirit or to sense His presence during those seasons.
Another realization was how easy it was to slip into spiritual complacency or neglect spiritual disciplines when life or ministry became routine or hectic. I was grateful for the many times God had used spiritual companions at crucial junctions in my own life, and I longed to be more equipped to be a similar soul companion for others. So it was exciting when the way opened up for me to take the two-year Soul Formation program followed by the additional year of Spiritual Direction out of Portland, Oregon. Those years provided a fertile and sacred place to learn and grow in a supportive and like-minded community. At the conclusion of those years, I began to offer spiritual direction to leaders in ministry, and in particular international workers.
After spending many years living overseas and travelling to many places around the globe, I have come back full circle to the town of Vermilion, where I was born. From here, I connect virtually via ZOOM with ministry leaders, many of whom are cross-cultural workers, and offer debriefing and spiritual direction. I also do some training for mission organizations with Outreach Canada in the area of debriefing. As I continue on the path set out for me, I am filled with gratitude― to the One who has written His word on my heart from an early age, toward my whole extended family who has loved and supported me, to the churches who prayed for me and gave financially, and to all the leaders, colleagues, and friends who have been my companions on the journey.
This is an excerpt from the book, On Mission Volume 3. Download your free copy today.