Meet Our Workers

Jason, a young man with a buoyant spirit, came to WEC from Manitoba. He had completed two years of study at Millar Bible College and was eager to get experience in missions. He went on a two-month short term to the Middle East with WEC. On his return he was more determined than ever to follow God’s leading and return to the same area. He joined the 2017 fall Candidate Orientation class in Hamilton and is now in language study in the Middle East, building relationships with people he desires to lead to Christ.

Priscilla was born in Toronto and moved back to Hong Kong with her parents at age 5. When she was 13 they returned to Canada. Priscilla heard about WEC while volunteering at an orphanage in Hong Kong. She began her preparation for missions at Eastwest College in New Zealand, a WEC missionary training college, and returned to Canada to do her Candidate Orientation with WEC in 2011. Priscilla has been very involved in outreach activities with a church in Japan.

Priscilla recounts how she was called to Japan:

Since I was young I wanted to go to China to be a missionary. However, one night in Bible college, while looking at the world map I asked God for confirmation about China. Suddenly I heard a voice inside of me saying, “Does it matter?”  I was quite surprised to hear this question and I thought, ‘no, it doesn’t matter at all’. And from then on, I relaxed and let things be. One day while reading one of the textbooks, again I heard a voice, “You’re going to Japan!”  I quickly put down my book and felt my heart pumping hard.  I was very surprised because I had never thought of going to Japan. 

I had a Japanese classmate in Bible college. While everyone else was complaining about having too much homework, or the food not being good, she was always very happy.  She then shared with me that she had never been with so many Christians before (my college only had about 40 students).  Back in Japan, she had no other Christians at her workplace, and she had been having meals by herself for almost 20 years. Now she felt like she was in heaven.  I didn’t have a huge vision about what to do coming to Japan, but after hearing from this classmate, one of my desires was to give the Japanese a chance to meet a Christian face to face.   

I had many fears before I came to Japan, but God encouraged me through the story of crossing the Jordan in Joshua 3– Go and stand in the river. He only wants me to be in Japan, to stand here with faith, like the priests who carried the ark standing firmly on dry ground.  And He will part the water; He will take care of the rest, in a mighty way. 

It has been a great privilege to get to know and journey with my Japanese brothers and sisters.

Shane, from Ontario, and Michelle, from Texas met while serving as single workers in Central Asia. They married in 2003.

Michelle had been wanting to start her own mission with a multinational, multicultural, faith-based pro-evangelism approach. On meeting Shane and seeing WEC had all these distinctives, she knew there was no need to remake what was already done.

Shane joined WEC in the fall of 1996. Michelle completed her Candidate Orientation with WEC in the spring of 2004.

Shane felt called to WEC because of the daring nature of the WECers he met, going to far-off lands to people who had never heard the Gospel. He ended up in a remote part of Central Asia for two decades. Shane and Michelle have two lively children, Liberty who turns 12 in March this year, and Van who just turned 9 last November.

The children share their parents’ love of travel and adventure, and do so with an understanding that their family is following God, trusting Him to provide all they need.

They all moved to France in 2018 to share the Gospel with French people and are now studying French at a university in the north for up to two years, before moving to the south of France to join a couple reaching out in a region where there are very few Christians.

Michelle loves cycling and getting out, and will meet ladies at a moment’s notice for coffee. Shane enjoys building his Instagram portfolio, swimming, and reading. Liberty has a love for horses, drawing, and thrives on the competition of running and sports in general. Van enjoys building his Legos, collecting Pokemon, and has found a love for the Beautiful Game – football/soccer. If you want to contact the Cookes their email address is: news@cookesoverseas.com

“Looking back, we can see the Lord preparing us for the future. I, Cristina, am from Colombia. Roly is Canadian.  As a young man he attended a youth exchange program in Guatemala where he learnt Spanish.  We met when I was studying English in Canada and so we’re both fluent in Spanish and English.

“We got married in 1982.  Both Roly and I came from a non-Christian background but in wanting to be the best parents we could before God, we found the Lord. We figured that if we wanted to know what God wanted from us, we should read the Bible, and so we did.

“Once we found this new life in Jesus, we were so filled with joy, we just couldn’t contain ourselves. For us, it was the natural thing to go and tell others who had never heard the good news of a new life in Jesus Christ. We joined WEC in 1992.

“First we went to Spain, and then to Equatorial Guinea (the only Spanish speaking country in Africa) where we lived for 20 years during which the Lord taught us and molded us. We lived in a small wooden house with no running water or electricity and the whole jungle as our back yard. Our three children loved it.

“We were involved in leadership development, helping the small churches to have pastors well rooted in the Word of God and evangelizing villages where there was no church.  It was a joy to see one small tribe being reached with the Gospel for the first time, and believers with a passion to share their faith and freedom in Christ. Today, we see Africans with the same call, passion and desire we have.”

In 2016 God led Roly and Cristina into a new, exciting stage of their lives – recruiting Africans for missions. Through them the ACTS 13 program has been launched with the goal of helping the African church to identify, prepare and send out their own missionaries. They are forming a team to develop the work and also planning their first Candidate Orientation in Ethiopia in November 2018. Roly and Cristina are based in Ghana.

Mention Fred and we think evangelist. Fred loves people and he loves Jesus. People are drawn to Fred’s open, friendly manner. He would be happy to stay in Canada to win souls for Christ, but God gave Fred a definite call to serve Him in the Middle East. Following Bible School at Briercrest, Fred applied to WEC in the spring of 2015 and went on to the Middle East that fall. Fred comes from a hard working Dutch family in Abbotsford BC from whom he learned the building trade.  Fred’s desire is to live in obedience to Christ and win souls for Him. His motto is: Christ must increase and I must decrease. John 3:30

Partnering with the Church in Africa in sending cross-cultural workers to make disciples of Christ amongst the unreached in the region and beyond.

Pete was born in Belize, Central America. Raised in a Christian family he accepted the Lord at the age of 13.  In 1984 Pete’s family moved to Aylmer, Ontario and he attended Bible School there.

Cathy, from Saskatchewan, gave her heart to Jesus at the age of ten. She trained to be a school teacher at University of Saskatchewan. During her studies God challenged her with a message given by a preacher at church on being willing to launch out into the deep, Luke 5:4. Cathy applied to WEC, but before coming to Hamilton she enrolled for a year of Bible School in Aylmer, Ontario where she met Pete. And, as they say, “The rest is history.”

Cathy completed WEC’s Candidate course in 1990 and went to Texas to study Spanish and on to Mexico for ten months. Pete joined the 1992 fall Candidate course where his call to Mexico was confirmed. Pete and Cathy were married in May, 1993 in Saskatchewan.

Pete had a vision to see a Christian camp established in Mexico and they played a key role in seeing El Monte, a multi-ministry centre, started.  During their time at El Monte the Lord laid on Pete and Cathy’s heart an unreached people group in Mexico, the Purhépecha.  In 2013 the family moved to Michoacan, a central area of the Purhépecha. Two years later they returned to Canada so that their children, Josiah and ChristyAnn, could finish secondary school and prepare for College.  Pete and Cathy are getting ready to return to Mexico in September 2018. Their vision to reach the Purhépecha for Christ has not diminished.  Pray with them to see a strong church formed among the Purhépecha that can withstand persecution and be a bold witness to their own people.  And pray for their children as they remain in Canada without their parents.

Linda Nagel joined the staff in Hamilton in 2006. Linda heads up the Prayer and Mobilization department and is the Deputy Director of WEC Canada. If you receive the monthly Prayer Front*, Linda is the editor. She also leads the editorial committee for RPM. Linda served with WEC in Côte d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast) West Africa for 38 years. During that time she taught Bible in the public schools, pioneered a work among unreached peoples and served as Field Leader for nine years. Linda would be slow to acknowledge that she is in the midst of writing of her experiences in Côte d’Ivoire. We are looking forward to reading this when it’s published!   

Ruth Brandon is that welcome voice at the end of the line when you call our WEC number, on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. She retired from full time teaching in Ontario schools in 1998 but wasn’t prepared to sit back and take her ease. In 1999 she joined WEC and went to Asia to train national school teachers how to teach English. She also did a lot of community work and helped plant churches. She served as a witness for Christ in that nation for over ten years. Ruth puts together the Weekly Prayer News* that goes out by email. She has four children and three grandchildren.

Karen Woods came to us from Williams Lake BC as a volunteer in 2006. After a few months she decided to join WEC full time. She is responsible for receipting and other duties in the finance department. Karen is the go to person when we can’t figure out what’s wrong with the photocopier, computer or stamp machine! In other words she is very practical and is called on for many extra jobs. She does the layout of RPM for email, website and print. Karen is a widow with children and grandchildren and also a talented amateur artist.