What impact can one life really make? At AFM, we get to witness the answer to this question every year in the lives of our student missionaries—Christ-motivated young people who answer God’s call to take the everlasting Gospel to the unreached world.

Our SMs come to us full of raw energy and enthusiasm about the calling God has given them. We work with them, equip them, and send them to some of the most remote places on earth to share the love of Jesus and make impacts in unreached communities that will reverberate throughout eternity.

Gina served with an AFM missionary family in difficult country where outreach had to be secret. The “church” in that area consisted of the missionary family, Gina and one local convert. Unfortunately, an illness forced the career missionary family to leave their post for almost a year. Gina was faced with a choice: return home or stay and nurture the sole believer from this previously unreached people group. Gina chose to stay and keep the Church alive.

Kiana went out for what she thought would be one year of SM service in Palawan, Philippines. At the end of her first year, the Lord answered her fleece in a miraculous way, so she stayed a second year. During that year, she was asked to go alone to an unreached community deep into the jungle to open up a new church and school. Kiana responded and forged a new work. After returning to the States to finish her education, returned to the Palawano people she had grown to love and spent another two years among them.

Joshua went out as a student missionary to serve a people group in Cambodia where he had spent part of his childhood. The career missionary family he worked with decided to leave the project, and another family stepped up to prepare to take their place. While the new missionary family went through training and raised funds, Joshua agreed to keep the project going until they arrived. He has been running the project singlehandedly for two years now. One local grandmother reported, “I love Josh even more than I do my own children. He is so good and kind.” Joshua is making an eternal difference in the lives of the people he serves.

We are thankful for the impact AFM student missionaries are making among the unreached. We are also grateful to witness how mission service transforms the lives of our student missionaries. The following letter, reproduced with permission, demonstrates how God is working in the lives of the young people He is calling and sending out.

Dear John Baxter,

We are getting excited about Mandy coming Stateside; it is amazing to think that she has been in Laos for 19 months. I have been wanting to write AFM for some time; if I wait until Mandy gets home I’m afraid I’ll never get it done.

I want to thank you and your staff for all AFM has given and done for Mandy. I call AFM Christian finishing school. Mandy came to you with a love of Jesus and wanting to serve—but not really possessing any tools; after all she had just turned 20. The one month training she received at your retreat, including Jesus Survivor Camp, gave her many of the needed tools. And, the guidance she has received in Laos has been wonderful—the Adamses will be her friends forever.

Mandy has learned to live by example, keep in check her emotions/passion, live within her meager salary (never asking for money, even when she needed a couple of fillings), find value with her personal worship, pay tithe, find a love in teaching, and cement the rest of her education (teaching and then nursing) so she has what she needs to be a career missionary.

AFM took away some of the pain we would have experienced in guiding her and let us be there instead as a listening ear. Granted, there were times we wanted to step in. But letting her learn on her own and under your leadership made her less dependent on us. The bright side? Mandy appreciates us even more than she already did. She thinks we are so much more wise.

Please let us know when your training for the new SMs is, as we would like to send Mandy back to Michigan if at all possible.

I would recommend AFM to any student. If there is ever a time you’d like me to talk with a parent about his/her concerns, I’d be more than happy to do so.

God’s blessing,
Pam Shultz

As you read this month’s special student-missionary magazine, you will begin to see the impact that a year of service can have on the student missionaries’ lives and on those they serve. You cannot live overseas for nine months and remain unchanged. The course of each SM’s life will be altered forever, as will the lives of those they reach for Christ.

It costs between $12,000 and $15,000 to send a student missionary. This includes the cost of training, materials, a small stipend, health insurance and travel expenses. The student missionary is responsible for raising $5,000 of this amount. The rest comes from AFM’s Student Missionary Fund. To send this year’s group of SMs, the fund needs to raise $210,000.

Would you please help send eager SMs to some of the least reached places on earth? Your gift to the SM Fund will impact their lives as they impact the lives of the unreached for eternity. Thank you so much for your generosity!

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