Our Story

So, here is the long version of our story. A Story of how God gave each of us a desire for missions and brought us together. Interestingly, we both grew up in Pittsboro, Indiana with parents heavily involved in missions at our local churches. Since we grew up going to different churches and there being four years in age difference, we never met until later in life, even though we grew up in the same small town and went to Moody Bible Institute!

Eddie’s Story: After a High School mission trip to Brazil, Eddie sensed the Holy Spirit leading him towards full-time ministry. This was something several pastors had previously encouraged him to do, but he had not yet received an inward desire. In High School and College, he was able to be a part of dozens of cross-cultural ministries that gave him a broad spectrum of experience. As a student at Moody Bible Institute, the interest in missions grew exponentially and upon graduation, he decided to learn Spanish. A pastor at the time encouraged him to learn in Costa Rica – where his son was a missionary. That is how Eddie came to help out where he could with Dave Graef and Cam Woolford as they planted Roca Viva. As his year of language school came to an end, a missionary friend from Moody encouraged him to check out an opportunity in Puebla, Mexico. It was there that he assisted in church planting for over two years. 

After those cross-cultural missions experiences, Parkside Bible Church – where Eddie grew up – asked him to come back to lead them in missions at home and abroad. It was upon Eddie’s return to Indiana and teaching a young adults Sunday School class that we finally met. But before we get to that part, let me bring you up to speed on what led me to that moment.

Sara’s Story: It all goes back to growing up with my dad as the leader of the missions committee at my local church. My job was to help the missionary kids feel comfortable whenever they came to visit and it gave me many opportunities to sit in on conversations about missions all around the world. That was the spark. One night during summer camp at Twin Lakes Christian Camp as a senior in high school, the Holy Spirit convicted me of not being willing to go wherever God called me to go. That was when I said, “Here I am, send me”. I knew I wanted to help further the Gospel to the ends of the earth. That same summer, I went on my first mission trip, my first real experience in cross-cultural ministry. I immediately applied to Moody Bible Institute hoping to teach missionary kids somewhere overseas. However, after a near-death experience with my severe food allergy on a semester abroad in Europe with Moody, I was uncertain if participating in overseas missions was something I could do, so I transferred to Moody Distance Learning. God used that season of uncertainty to solidify my faith. I realized that God is the One who created me with the severe allergy, He would sustain me no matter where I was and I could not use it as a crutch. Upon graduating with my Biblical Studies degree, I looked into opportunities to teach English overseas but the door just never opened. I ended up taking a teaching job as a Bible teacher at Bethesda Christian School and attending Parkside Bible Church. And because of that, I met Eddie there at Parkside. 

After I walked into that young adult Sunday School class, I knew I wanted to get to know this missionary from Mexico. But, unbeknownst to me, Eddie had gone to his fellow pastors asking them if he should pursue me and they had said “No way! She is way out of your league”. So it took us a while to get to the point of finally dating. On our first date, we spent several hours talking about our shared history, our shared love of missions & our shared love of the outdoors. It was on a mission trip to South Africa as we served alongside each other that we saw how obvious it was that God had brought us together at the right moment in our lives – two people who loved Jesus and wanted to serve Him in ministry. So we got married! 

We were married in June of 2016 and within our first two years of marriage, we visited as many of the missionaries supported by Parkside as we could. That time was formative in my understanding and love for cross-cultural ministry. From the hustle and bustle of Hong Kong to the serene quiet of a little town in England, as we sat at the tables of our missionaries, my heart became even more burdened that all the nations would praise the name of Jesus. That time became the most formative in why I want to continue pursuing cross-cultural ministry. I saw God’s heart for the people of the world. I have strived to share those experiences with the people at Parkside hoping that they will continue to also see God’s heart for the world.

God’s heart is for the nations to know Him and to worship Him, and Eddie hasn’t ever been able to sit still without pursuing that same heart. For Eddie, he has pursued missions and cross-cultural ministry now for the past 15 years in full-time ministry, serving as a pastor at Parkside for seven years. We hope that people would worship Jesus, for churches to be established, and that they would grow in spiritual health to then go tell more people about Jesus and plant more churches. 

We now have two beautiful children – Louis (2 years old) and Eileen (4 months old as of the writing of this post!) – and can’t wait to share with them this love we have for people to know Jesus. We are excited for this next chapter God has called us to work cross-culturally with Roca Viva in Costa Rica! 

• Sara 

P.S. I warned you this was the long version. 🙂