A Calling to West Africa, Allan and Theresa Weikel
Feeling a tug on our hearts, we began pushing on doors to see if God was calling us to missions. One of the doors we walked through was the New Wineskins conference in Fall 2019. We went seeking to confirm God’s call. We met with missionaries from Chile who spent the day praying with us, answering our questions, and telling us about their missionary adventure. We met many wonderful people serving around the world as missionaries. One of our many divine appointments was when God intersected our lives with a Nigerian pastor (Mark Mukan), with whom we developed an instant friendship. Mark informed us of his work in Nigeria, and we have kept in touch with him on a regular basis. After many conversations with Mark and much time praying with him, for his family, and his ministry, God opened our hearts with much love for the people of Nigeria.
At the Sunday service, we were moved by the worship as we sang to our Lord with every nation, kindred, tongue, and tribe that was represented at New Wineskins. This powerful service gave us an insight into what it might be like in heaven when we worship God with the multitudes from every nation.
By the end of the conference, were certain of God’s call, so we made ourselves available in every way possible. We developed a prayer team to help us discern where God was calling us. We took Perspectives online because we thought this would be good use of our time while in lockdown during the pandemic and it was well worth the time and effort. The course taught us many things about pioneers who have forged the way to work with other cultures and to share God’s love and God’s mission in His way.
Isaiah 55:11
Eventually, through a series of God-orchestrated events, we were contacted by Trans World Radio (TWR) in the Summer of 2020 and asked if we were interested in serving with them at their West Africa Transmitting Station (WATS). We were delighted to discover that the station transmits Christian programming into many West African nations, including Nigeria! We love founder Paul Freed’s vision to blanket the airwaves with the gospel of Christ into hard-to-reach places. TWR’s mission is to reach the world with the hope of Christ through mass media so that lasting fruit is produced. We wanted to be part of TWR and gladly accepted God’s call to serve in West Africa. We recently returned from a 3-week vision trip to West Africa where God assured us that He fully orchestrated everything in our lives to come alongside the work He is doing in West Africa, including our attendance at the New Wineskins conference!
“So is my word that goes out from my mouth; It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it” (Isaiah 55:11)
We have been blessed in through every step of the process of discovering, discerning, praying, preparing and becoming what God wants us to be...simply available. Please visit our staff page at https://www.twr.org/weikel for information about our ministry and how you can partner with us. For more information about Trans World Radio visit https://www.twr.org.
The Weikels: Allan retired after a 36-year engineering career and desires to use that God-given experience to manage the maintenance program of the mechanical equipment at the West Africa Transmitting Station (WATS). As administrative assistant, Theresa will be using her background in human resources to support the station.