Generations of Faithfulness

While we were in central Florida, we stopped in to see Evelyn and her daughter Connie and son-in-law Gary.

EVELYN has been a missionary all of her life. She grew up in the Middle East, where her parents were missionaries to Arabic-speaking people. She recalls traveling with her father on camelback as he served as an evangelist to Bedouin groups in their desert tents.

With her husband, Grady, Evelyn served as missionaries in Vietnam.They were in Vietnam during the war between North and South Vietnam, a time when some of the missionaries who served with them were killed. Their love for the Vietnamese people ran deep. When they returned to the States, they launched a refugee-resettlement program in the U.S. for World Relief. This program has helped to resettle more than 250,000 refugees from more than 80 countries--and it still continues today.

Each of Evelyn's four children have served as missionaries or as church leaders, and now many of her grandchildren--a fourth generation--are serving in ministry.

We first met Grady and Evelyn when we were moving to Wheaton for Bas to begin his work with World Relief. We lived with them while we were looking for housing and had a wonderful glimpse of their lives. A few years later, when Grady retired, Bas was asked to take Grady's place as the vice president for international ministries. Evelyn became an important mentor for Lynn when Bas started traveling internationally.

Now in her nineties, Evelyn is still a missionary. She speaks regularly about her missionary experience in area churches. When she encounters someone who speaks Vietnamese or Arabic, she immediately starts to speak to them in their own language.

When Evelyn learned that the man giving her a manicure was from the tribal area where Grady and she served in Vietnam, she talked with him in his own tribal language. She invited him to her church. He confessed that he was lonely because he did not know other people from his tribal group. Evelyn told him about a North Carolina church that many people from his tribe attended. He decided to move there and recently phoned Evelyn--he calls her “Mother"--to tell her that he had been able to arrange for his wife and child to join him from Vietnam and that he had decided to study to become a pastor to his people.

When Evelyn encounters Arabic women at the mall near her, she speaks Arabic to them. The women weep because they have suffered much abuse and antagonism for their ethnic background. Evelyn reaches out to them and loves them.

At a recent denominational meeting, Evelyn heard women singing in Arabic. She recognized the songs and joined in the singing. Later, a number of these women told Evelyn that the Lord had used her father to lead their fathers and uncles to faith.

Several years ago, Grady died. While Evelyn is in good health, her vision has deteriorated over the years due to macular degeneration. This past year, Connie and Gary retired from World Relief and moved to Kissimmee to help Evelyn. All three live together in the same house.

CONNIE AND GARY
When we first met Connie and Gary, they were missionaries in Indonesia and were spending their furlough in Wheaton, where we lived. We attended the same church and got to know each other's families. Bas and Gary served on church boards. Our older children attended youth group together. We became good friends.

Their youngest child, Ryan, had severe learning disabilities that made it very difficult for him in school. Recognizing that these disabilities could not be adequately addressed at the mission school their children had attended in Asia, Connie and Gary made the agonizing decision not to return to Indonesia as missionaries. Connie began working at a World Relief, walking in the footsteps of her father.



A gifted communicator, Connie quickly took on increased responsibilities and ultimately assumed key major-donor fundraising responsibilities with World Relief. After the South Asia tsunami, Gary joined the staff of World Relief to help with the response in Indonesia. Later, Gary led efforts to strengthen World Relief’s relationships with churches in the field and in the U.S. A few days before we arrived at her home, Connie retired from World Relief, after 25 years of distinguished service.

We had delightful and sometime teary conversations about God's faithfulness in the years since we had last been together. When we asked about Ryan, Connie and Gary told us about the dedicated teachers who had patiently worked with and encouraged Ryan through difficult school years. He was able not only to attend college, but also to thrive there. He now is the Director of Special Education for an entire school district. He now encourages parents whose children are struggling as he had. He now hugs struggling students and tells them that he knows how they feel--and that they will make it.

God is indeed faithful and good. We marveled at His work through the four generations of this family that has given themselves to His service.