JOY LOEWEN

I BELIEVE!

Nothing Wasted

Joy Loewen

A PIONEERING FAMILY

I was raised in a pioneer visionary missionary family who ministered among the Somali Muslim people for fifty years. Their first twenty years were spent working among Somalis in Yemen where I was born. When Mom and Dad received the long-awaited permission to reside in Somalia, they moved there and opened up a hospital, clinics and schools. The translation of the Bible into Somali, when there was no alphabet at the time, was an incredible challenge. It was exciting to be part of a pioneer endeavor where Scripture and worship songs were birthed for the first time in history. I remember being part of daily prayer meetings where big needy prayers were lifted up to God. Miracles were expected and they happened. The memories of those prayer meetings where so much faith and perseverance had to be exercised shaped much of who I am today. When the missionaries had to leave Somalia Dad started up a radio program called Voice of New Life. The radio programs have been discontinued but have since been expanded and are now available on the internet for Somalis living anywhere in the world. My parents, Warren and Dorothy Modricker, were College Church missionaries and we spent some of our furlough years in Wheaton. We have all been the recipients of the church’s outstanding hospitality, material generosity especially of clothes and housing, prayers and financial support.

EXCITEMENT, ADVENTURE, TRAUMA

The excitement and adventure of missionary life seemed to pulsate in me being raised in such a courageous pioneer visionary family. Yes, there was excitement and adventure, but the truth is I was actually traumatized by some of the things I went through in Somalia and left

that land unhealed. Living in Somalia had some dangers. One of those was walking through the murder of one of the missionaries. Mr. Merlin Groves was murdered and his wife survived a brutal stabbing. Their children were our playmates. I was left frightened especially of Muslims well into my adulthood. We often form generalizations which are distorted. A magnified fear and anxiety that all Muslims are dangerous took root. I had a bad case of Islamophobia. Ed and I met at Moody Bible Institute. While there we responded to a missions talk. We prepared and went to Pakistan to work at TEAM’s hospital. For me the response was primarily out of obedience to the Great Commission. There was no particular love for Muslims yet birthed in me for I remained unhealed. In fact I did not really know apart from a doctrinal fact that God loved me. I had become a child of God but did not know how loved a child of God I was.

A MISSIONARY DUTY

Three months after we arrived in Pakistan, and I had acquired a minimal level of language proficiency I asked a senior missionary if she would take me to a tailor’s home to get some Pakistani outfits sewn. I had a plan to share the gospel in my bare minimal Urdu with the tailor. I put together a three minute speech and memorized it going over it many times. When I arrived at the tailor’s home neighbor women crowded into the courtyard to get a view of the foreign woman. Someone offered me a chair while the women all sat around me on mats. I shared my memorized three-minute gospel presentation which I suspect no one understood but I was flying high. I had become a missionary! I never inquired of their names or their stories. There was no love between us. I just simply did my missionary duty to fulfill my calling from God. It was actually very empty. Empty of love and the power of the Holy Spirit.

JESUS LOVES ME, TOO?

It was in Pakistan where God began a big healing job in me and revealed his deep love for me and for Muslims. One day I got the nerve up and shared with a senior missionary my dilemma. “I know that God loves the Pakistani Muslims but I don’t know God loves me.” He was understandably shocked and replied, “I’m sorry I can’t help you.” I felt so dismayed and ashamed but God was directing everything. Shortly after that I came down with hepatitis. While on my sick bed, in the middle of the day, I heard an inaudible voice say, “Joy I love you.” Those words were repeated multiple times and came washing over me like a big wave. When I recognized that it was the voice of God speaking to me I told him, “Stop I got it.” You might say I moved from being mostly obedient to falling in love with Jesus; ...from head to the heart. God removed the fear of Muslims from my life and replaced it with his love. Fear and love cannot coexist. From that point on the reason for giving my life in cross cultural ministry among Muslims moved from obedience to love and compassion.

A REDEEMED SUFFERING

We served in Pakistan from 1978–1988. We were bewildered when we sensed God was redirecting us with our two children to return to Canada to minister among Muslims there. In 1988 we didn’t know anyone we could ask to help us to know how to proceed. At that time not many mission agencies accepted sending countries as legitimate places to minister but thank God that has changed significantly. Arab World Ministries accepted us to work with them in Canada until that agency was absorbed into Pioneers. The last thirty-three years we have been involved with Muslim international grad students, refugees from war torn Islamic countries, Muslims who have immigrated with professional skills, asylum seekers and followers of Jesus from Muslim background. We have a wonderful open door in our own country with complete freedom to share the gospel. Today I thank God for all that I went through growing up in Somalia because God has redeemed much of the suffering and removed my fears and anxieties of Muslims. God has healed me. God loves Muslims and so do I. John 3:17 says: “God did not send His Son into the world to condemn it but to save it.” We partner with God in his heart cry. My earlier suffering and trauma have enabled me to understand what many of my Muslim friends have gone through. God does not waste anything but can redeem everything for his glory and purposes. God has given me many opportunities to help equip Christian women in befriending Muslim women with the hope of sharing the Good News with them. To reach the millions of Muslim women will require a great equipping of Christian women who will love them deeply and sacrificially with the love of Jesus. They will be largely reached oneon-one as a neighbor, work colleague, or classmate. The secret is not only sharing the Good News with them but to actually love them. I discovered missionary work is empty and powerless without encountering God intimately and without loving the person. My experience at the tailor’s home showed me clearly what was needed to be effective and fruitful for God’s glory.

Joy writes about her experiences and gives practical advice for sharing Jesus with a Muslim friend in her book, Woman to Woman, Sharing Jesus with a Muslim Friend, available at the College Church bookstall.

FACE TO FACE

The Bellows Tool of Serving

Jay Cunningham, member of the Nominating Committee

The most important tactical tool for your wood-burning fireplace is the bellows. Rapid expansion and compression of the bellows forces air through a small nozzle and increases oxygen supply, thereby raising the rate and intensity of combustion. With just a few hedge-clippinglike movements of your arms, and a whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, those quiet embers begin to glow brighter and brighter until, suddenly, they burst into flame. Soon, the logs are burning, too, their mesmerizing flames throwing off light and heat, creating a cozy atmosphere.

No analogy is perfect, (bear with me now) but imagine that the work of the Nominating Committee at College Church is a bellows tool. Working with the glowing embers identified by the congregation, we gently stir up or fan the flame of desire and aspiration for ministry. The Holy Spirit is like the wind that fans those embers into flames.

This January, all College Church members will receive an invitation to recommend names of individuals the Lord brings to mind to serve in elected leadership positions. You can begin praying now for the Holy Spirit to point out other College Church members whom you can see serving in these positions.

Perhaps you already know someone who might be a good fit for serving as a deaconess or the recording secretary, the nursery superintendent or church treasurer. Perhaps you have thought of someone who could serve as an elder or on any of the other boards, committees and elected positions. You can find all these elected roles and who is currently serving at college-church.org under the Discover menu and select “elected positions.”

There is tremendous precedent for choosing leaders when you read in Acts chapter 6 that the people were encouraged by the apostles to choose people to serve who were “known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom.” Here’s an idea: pause right now and ask the Lord to begin to show you people in our body who are “known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom.” Thanks!

Once you start to pray, you might observe that fellow church member Suzy has a heart for people. She loves serving others. She goes out of her way to be sure that strangers are welcomed, that no one gets left behind. She’s quick to offer prayer for someone who looks like they could use it. Or perhaps you Suzy is good with numbers (“Well, she’s a lot quicker at math than I am!”) and has a mind for organizing businesses. Or she might be naturally gifted at connecting with pre-teens or middle-school kids and they seem to enjoy being around her. She’s the kind of person others wish to follow. Well, enough about Suzy. You get the idea.

Here’s the cool thing: among all the other marvelous blessings we enjoy as believers, we are entrusted, through the nominating process, to help the entire body at College Church function as God intended.

In one of the great leadership passages in Ephesians 4 we are encouraged “to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.” When you and I pray for the Lord to show us who our leaders should be, we are helping to equip College Church so that all the parts are held together by the leadership joints…everything is welloiled and in good working order. (Think, the Tin Man after the oil can is applied).

Do you want to be a fully engaged member at College Church? Do you want to help fan into flame the gift of God? Start now by preparing your heart to help the Nominating Committee.

More amazing facts and riveting stories will be forthcoming about elected positions. For more information, drop us a note at nominations@college-church.org. Thank you!

2022-2023 Nominating Committee: Allison Bonga Jay Cunningham Teri Hiben Josh Moody Jeff Oslund Becky Sandberg Dave Setran

UNDER THE RADAR

It’s no fun to hear about an event after the fact. That’s why we’re Introducing Under the Radar. If you know of a local event that includes College Church members or attenders or may be of interest to them, email connections@college-church.org with the details and we may be able to include your event in this space.

MESSIAH

presented by the Community School of the Arts at Wheaton College

Suzuki Strings Christmas Concert featuring calligraphic artwork by Timothy R. Botts. Students ages four through high school will perform familiar Christmas favorites such as the “Hallelujah Chorus,” “Joy to the World” and “For Unto Us a Child is Born.”

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 10 AT 10 A.M.

Edman Chapel at the corner of Washington and Franklin Admission is free for this family-friendly event

at the Bookstall

BEST BOOKS 2022

We asked ministry staff and elected leaders to share favorite books they read in 2022. Here is a partial list. We will publish more in the January issue of Connections and all titles will be published at onewordjournal.

JOSUE ALVARADO, pastoral resident The Cross of Christ*

By John Stott Stott helps us to see how the cross is central to the gospel in a profound but simple way.

CHERYCE BERG, director of children’s ministries Holier Than Thou*

By Jackie Hill Perry Jackie writes, “[B]ecause God is holy, all that He says is true and all that He does is good....Hear this: God’s words and works can be trusted because it is impossible for God to sin against you.”

MARK BERG, elder Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0

By Jim Collins Classic business book—profound concepts made accessible and applicable O Jerusalem

By Laurie King Fiction, 1920s, Sherlock Homes & Mary Russell Project Hail Mary

By Andy Weir Science fiction—very creative No Little People*

By Francis Schaeffer A collection of Schaeffer sermons— a classic

JAY CUNNINGHAM, deacon Created to Flourish

By Peter Greer This book opened my eyes even more to the amazing impact that Hope International (and other micro finance organizations) have had by helping the poorest of the poor to get lifted out of poverty by creating very small businesses. Trust groups, populated mostly by women, serve to not only teach simple skills like saving and investing, but also are the central place where the gospel is shared and lives are changed. This is a strongly hopeful book. This Land of Snow: A Journey Across the North in Winter

By Anders Morley This memoir of a young man’s cross-country ski trip from the Pacific Coast of British Columbia to Central Canada was a fascinating read. The writing is strong, and the use of language and analogy is captivating. I was excited to read a book by a fellow Taylor University grad...but I was disappointed in the end to learn that Morley no longer believes in God and much of the book’s introspective nature tended toward selfishness and how others had disappointed him in his life. He also had a patronizing view of women. But if you like snow or skiing or nature... there’s a lot in here that is beautiful.

Affirming the Apostles’ Creed*

By J.I. Packer This delightful, short book is well worth a read. Packer provides the history of this central Christian creed, breaking each line into a jam-packed theological package of the wonders of God. This book helped really appreciate what we recite at College Church on a Sunday morning, and taught me how creeds are one key way to pass down theological truths from generation to generation.

CHRISTMAS AT COLLEGE CHURCH

CHILDREN’S CHRISTMAS CHOIR CONCERT December 4 at 5 p.m.

“O GREAT MYSTERY” ADULT CHOIR CONCERT December 11 at 5 p.m.

STARS CHRISTMAS PROGRAM December 18 at 5 p.m.

CHRISTMAS EVE SERVICES December 24 at 4, 7 and 9 p.m.

CHRISTMAS DAY SERVICES 9:30 and 11:00 a.m.

He Has Come!

Christ has come—three words change all Three words reverse our very Fall! We are not left by God above He came He came He came in love! We come to Him not first, you see We live by God’s Priority He came, he comes, he’ll come again Praise the Advent Lord! Amen.

—RICHARD MOOMJIAN

COMMONS COMMONS

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CLAPHAM SCHOOL STARS RESALE SHOP CROSSINGS EAST