(Yes, that was 25 years ago so you can guess my age.) Just 25 years ago, I was applying to become an Anglican Frontier Missions (AFM) missionary. Two months prior, our church hosted a one-day missions conference organized by a couple just returning from the 1997 New Wineskins Conference. Karen and Gary Westerman were missionaries in Uganda. I was on their support team and even visited them in 1993. In fact, ever since joining their support team in 1990, I had been praying, “God! Here am I. Send me!” (Isaiah 6:8). I had traveled to Uganda, Greece, Russia, and China crying that prayer; but no call came! It took 4 more years for me to hear God’s answer, and when I did, it was so strong I couldn’t resist it.Granted, at that time I had no idea where I was called to serve. At the mission conference, the Westermans cast the vision for Unreached People Groups, ethnolinguistic nations in which 2% of the population or less identifies as Christian. Shortly thereafter I met with Karen and shared my sense of a call. Karen immediately challenged me: “You are thinking way too small!” She had met Tad de Bordenave, AFM’s founding director, at New Wineskins where he shared his vision to send missionaries to Unreached People Groups.

From there, God took me step-by-step through the application process. Tad networked with other mission agencies. I attended an Inquirers Conference that year. I kept asking God, “Where I should go?” A few months later, I heard back from missionaries working with the Miao people in China.

There are many Miao (9 million) scattered over 6 provinces. This couple had been asking God to call others to work with the Miao in China. They asked: “Would I take the role of Strategy Coordinator for the Miao in Hunan?” I immediately said “Yes!” and surrendered it all to God as I took on my role as a Non-Residential Missionary. It was over a year before I actually met the Miao in person. I was doing research and getting others to pray for them. But in my heart I was wondering whether I would even like them!

By April 1999, that concern was wonderfully answered. During an exploratory trip to central China I fell in love with them. As I was heading home, I knew I had to make many changes in my life to serve the Miao. AFM did a lot to encourage me, providing me with some excellent training.

Everywhere I went God was opening doors for me for this work. I traveled to China many more times, and was planning to move there to be closer to them. But God, in His heavenly wisdom had other plans. In 2001 while I was on home leave, God started to bring Paul and me together. Paul visited China in June 2001 where he proposed to me in Shanghai, the city of his father’s birth to missionary parents.

In a move that seemed a distraction to my mission plans, I returned to Maine to get married and live there while Paul’s youngest son was going to high school. But the good stuff was yet to come. In 2003 God called Paul into full-time mission work with the Miao! Together we started a business marketing Miao hand embroidery. We made trips to the Miao area several times a year. In 2006 we sold our home and moved to Hunan Province to serve as Strategy Coordinators while running a business in our home. Every day Miao women would come to sew the products, immersing us in their culture.

We lived among the Miao for 14 wonderful years, employing Miao people, sharing the Good News, baptizing people, and being a witness for Christ in our city. God did amazing things through us and the other expat missionaries who were serving with us. The relationships we developed with the local people were so precious. People were being loved and felt loved.

Fast forward to 2020. Amazingly, we were unscathed by Covid that year, living in a remote city that remained free of Covid. We were shocked, though, when we were taken for questioning by the national police. We willingly confessed we had broken the law by baptizing people in our home (not an official church). We had 5 days to leave! Five days to pack and say goodbyes to all our friends there. We miss our Miao friends dearly, knowing that we will not likely see them again this side of heaven.

We started as Non-Residential Missionaries and are now back in that role. Foreign missionaries are no longer allowed among the minority peoples in China. We dream that someday we might be allowed to return to see our friends, but it is unlikely. Instead we have taken to praying for the Miao people of western Hunan Province. We know that God has not abandoned them but is still at work among them. We are inviting our prayer partners to gather in small groups to pray for this UPG. If you would like to join in praying for our beloved Miao, please contact us at miao@pobox.com.

We will be at New Wineskins in September, participating in AFM’s “Exploring a Call to Missions” pre-conference on Thursday, September 22^nd. If you are praying about God’s call to missionary service, please join us. We would love to meet you. We will also be selling the products of these Miao women in the Johnson Spring building, right next to the AFM booth. Stop by and visit us there and help us support these Miao women.

God is doing amazing things around the world among the least reached –– He has extraordinary plans for you to be a part of it! What did I know 25 years ago when I heard God’s call to me? I couldn’t have begun to imagine what He had in mind. God has such a heart for the least reached in the world and has a special blessing for those who will serve Him there.