My Nonprofit Reviews

My interest in people groups, cultures and languages began when our family moved to Japan when I was 7-10 and continued as we sailed around the world in a yacht my dad built there. When I was led to Christ by an American missionary in a Chinese church in Japan while attending a bilingual university, I already had an international mindset and I fell in love with sharing Jesus Christ with people of every country.

I don't know how many years ago I became aware of Open Doors and starting subscribing to their magazine, reading and praying through every article, watching their videos and identifying with persecuted believers. (I always wear the "ONE WITH THEM" wristband though I think they have been discontinued). Open Doors has given us opportunities to write letters appealing for freedom for imprisoned believers and to post prayers for them. We have donated to many of their causes.

My husband Jerry and I live in Long Beach, which is an amazing intersection of nationalities. We have found websites--Scripture Earth, Pocket Testament League, Every Tongue.com--from which we get links to the Bible, translations of John 3:16, or can buy gospels and New Testaments in other languages. On our morning walks and everywhere else we go we carry gospels of John in English, Spanish, Khmer, Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese, Korean, Japanese (including a manga version!), Arabic and Farsi. (Have yet to find Tagalog.)

We had a chance to help teach English conversation for 3 months to citizens from one of the World Watch list countries. One of them had become a believer in his home country through God speaking to him in dreams. He came to his first church service at our church, took his first communion and was awed to be handed his first New Testament--in his own language!He wanted to be baptized back home. I was able to warn him before he went home that since he left the government has been cracking down on Christians there and he needs to be wise and careful about living out his faith.

I am currently running a series on forgiveness on my blog hiddeninjesus.wordpress.com and have posted several of the Standing Strong Through the Storm emails I receive in that series. To date (since 2012) my blog has attracted over 103,687 visitors from 188 of the 195 countries in the world. And of those 188 countries, I have had multiple (or repeated) visitors from 40 of the 50 countries on the World Watch List, from 10 or less per country to hundreds (Mexico, Indonesia. Kenya, Nigeria, Malaysia) to 1,148 for India.

I just realized the other day that if you count my reading about, praying for and writing to persecuted Christians (through my blog), I am a full-time volunteer for the persecuted church, thanks to the inspiration and resources of Open Doors!