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From Luke’s Journal February 2024 | Vol.29 No.1 | Missions and Sacrificial Service

Our Calling

Our journey to long-term mission began almost twenty years ago. I was a relatively young Christian looking for friends through the campus Christian group at university. During evangelism training, God suddenly and strongly convicted me of the need and urgency of taking the gospel to the ends of the earth, and to share the gospel with people who have the least opportunity to hear it.

I had already intended to study medicine, and it seemed to make perfect sense to continue with that plan, both as a way of sharing the love of God practically, and for the potential that medicine had to provide access to countries that are otherwise hard to enter. At the same time, I met my future husband, who, when praying about how to serve God with his life in Year 12, had felt called to study medicine with the view of using it to share the gospel in places of need. So we both enrolled in medicine (Alon taking a short detour first to study at Bible College), thinking we’d be on our way overseas in a few short years!

Wind the clock forward nineteen years and we are now (finally) in the last stages of preparing to go, with the hope to be able to depart early in 2024. We have clocked up a range of different skills (everything from specialist college fellowships and how to lead a Bible study, to how to learn a new language and survive a hostage scenario). We’ve gained practical experience in medicine and ministry as we’ve served in our local hospitals, and our local church, and added six children to the family. Although the timing is not exactly what we had in mind initially, we trust that none of these experiences are wasted, and that God has been using the last nineteen years to shape, equip, grow, and prepare us for the chapter that lies ahead.

The question of ‘Where?’

For us, the decision of ‘short term’ versus ‘long term’ was an easy one. Individually we went on several short-term trips, which were helpful in experiencing firsthand some of the different longer-term options that are available, and in discerning the path that God had for our family. There are so many needs here in Australia and we are grateful for the opportunities that we have had to care for patients and serve in the church over the past two decades, but the needs in many other countries are so much greater.

We long to be able to bring the hope and light of the gospel to dark places where people live in hopelessness. We long to be able to disciple new believers and see churches started in places where they did not exist before. We long to be able to communicate the truth of the gospel to people in their heart language. To do these things takes time and requires proficiency in a language that we do not yet have!

“We knew we were prepared and willing to serve long term. But we still didn’t know exactly where we were going.”

We knew we were prepared and willing to serve long term. But we still didn’t know exactly where we were going. All we really knew was that we wanted to go somewhere where people had little opportunity to hear about the saving work of Jesus. So, with this in mind, we drew up a list of possible countries. With the help of some mission organisations, we began reaching out to and speaking with doctors who were serving in some of these countries.

As we spoke with various people, Alon and I both simultaneously, but separately, felt God telling us to consider a particular country in West Asia that wasn’t on our list at all. When we started to research this country, the first thing that struck us was the need for the gospel. Though this country received the gospel early on through Paul’s missionary journeys, by some statistics, it now has the lowest percentage of evangelical Christians out of any nation in the world (<0.01%)!

“Though this country received the gospel early on through Paul’s missionary journeys, by some statistics, it now has the lowest percentage of evangelical Christians out of any nation in the world (<0.01%)!”

It is a country where the people are deeply patriotic, and the majority religion is strongly tied to their national identity. It is a country where most provinces have no known groups of believers meeting. It is a country where it is technically legal to be a Christian, but where believers face rejection and persecution. The churches that do exist are small, believers are often spiritually young without role models to mentor them, and most church leaders have no formal training. It is also a country where the law has recently changed to allow foreign doctors to work there (though we are not aware of any currently doing this). It is this country that we feel God drawing our family to.

The city we plan to move to has a population of about three million people. There are two small churches that we know of, with a total of approximately twenty to thirty national believers!! Our first few years will be committed primarily to language and culture acquisition. After that, we hope that Alon will be able to work as a doctor. This will allow him to share the love of God practically through his care for patients, build relationships, and provide our family with a legitimate and stable reason for remaining in the country. As a family we hope to partner with the local church to disciple and equip new believers, actively invest in relationships, and seek out those who are spiritually open with the view of sharing the reason for the hope that we have.

Why are we planning on taking six children to a country that doesn’t know Jesus?

Sometimes I am tempted to question the wisdom of that. With six children in tow, it will not be an easy venture. Our time and priorities will, out of necessity, be divided. I simply do not have the same availability and capacity as someone who isn’t caring for six small dependent humans. Will there be challenges? For sure! Will it cost us? No doubt! But He is worthy. If He “did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all” (Rom 8:32), then He is worthy of our full obedience, our sacrifice, our lives.We read of Jesus’s command to his disciples to “go and make disciples of all nations…” (Matt 28:19) and we feel compelled to go.

Furthermore, I don’t think that having a family precludes us from overseas gospel ministry. On the contrary, I believe that the same God who first put unreached people on our hearts, has given us these six precious blessings, and is capable of using both of them for His glory.

“In fact, just as God has been working in us over the past twenty years (and beyond), preparing us for what lies ahead, he has been working in our kids, preparing them.”

In fact, just as God has been working in us over the past twenty years (and beyond), preparing us for what lies ahead, he has been working in our kids, preparing them. From a young age our oldest two girls (eight year old twins) have had both a desire to share the gospel with their friends and an ability to do so clearly and boldly, in a way that both excites and convicts me! As a mum, I find my children are one of the easiest connection points with non-believers; parenting is the greatest thing we share in common, and talking about the challenges is a great opportunity to share how Jesus transforms my parenting. Playing children break down barriers  and create opportunities at the park, with neighbours, in the supermarket.

We love the opportunities we have to invite others into our family; to be part of our meals, our family devotions and our (mostly) ordered chaos, and it is our prayer that they might see the tangible difference the gospel makes in the very normal, everyday aspects of our life. At times I am nervous about taking our children overseas; about the challenges of us all learning a new language, a new culture, new relationships, not to mention just the flight over! But most of the time I am excited. I am excited to see how God uses our family and the unique things that each member of our family brings. And we are praying that God will work through our family (all of us) to bring the light of Christ into a dark place.

It is important to know that we are not going because we are especially courageous, bold or spiritual. In fact, at times we are very weak, afraid and sinful. But time and time again we see God using people in spite of their shortcomings. In fact, his “power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9). So, in weakness we prepare to go, praying that God will use us for His glory.

If you would like to know more, or to pray for our family, we would love to hear from you. You can contact us at alonandkerri@gmail.com

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