Godwin knows this from past experience serving in missions. But more recently, dozens of short-term mission workers joined her team at IMM. They raised personal support to help complete a 90-day filming project of the biblical story of Esther, created for an Iranian audience.

That experience reminded Godwin of both the challenges of missions and the urgent need for more workers. With IMM, Godwin sees the growing need for media content that can reach closed parts of the world. But one essential resource is often overlooked.

“It requires not just funding and not just bodies in chairs,” she says. “It requires dedication.” 

Internships and one-year mission trips can be awesome ways to explore God’s calling. But Godwin says, “I still would insist that you feel like God has prompted you to do that year, that two years, because you will learn so much and you will grow so much. It’s a good way to find out if you have enough passion and enough dedication to continue to be on the mission field.”

(Photo courtesy of Jon Tyson via Unsplash)

Yet for many missionaries confident of their calling, family voices can be a challenge at every step. 

“It’s hard when someone back home, who you love very much, just wants you to come home and have a normal life,” says Godwin. 

There’s a lot to navigate in family relationships and pressures like that. But we have to remember that in the Lord’s economy, every Christian has a role in sharing the gospel with the world. More than simply asking whether we are givers, pray-ers, or goers (or all of the above), Godwin encourages believers to consider one critical factor: how dedicated are we to the roles God has given to us? 

“It’s only going to work for all of us in every role that we play with the inspiration and aid of the Holy Spirit,” she says.

Dedication is the antidote to any contrary voices that deter gospel ministry. If you know a missionary or ministry worker, take time to ask about their calling. Listen to their passion — and ask God to show you your place in their mission. And then dive in with total commitment. 

“Pray for people you know who are in missions already. Pray for ministries that are trying to recruit people to come to them, and for the fundraising. These are all aspects of the whole job of missions. We can’t do it without this community of believers around us,” says Godwin. 

“It’s so important that you find people to pray for that you’re passionate about, and things to give to that you’re passionate about, because you are included in whatever [fruit] we find out in heaven. Whatever blessings come from what we do, it is shared with everyone who gives, it’s shared with everyone who prays.”

Learn more about International Media Ministries’ limited series about Esther here.

Clip from Esther: Queen of Hope. (Photo courtesy of IMM)

Header photo is a stock image courtesy of Jason Hogan via Unsplash. 

2025 Myanmar earthquake relief (Photo courtesy of AMG International)

On Tuesday, the military junta declared a ceasefire till the end of May, ostensibly to help with earthquake recovery efforts. However, during the previous April ceasefire, war monitors reported dozens if not hundreds of breaches by the junta, including relentless bombings of areas such as Rakhine state’s Kyauktaw township.

Few people in Myanmar, if any, expect this next ceasefire to be different. 

Meanwhile, the UN World Health Organization says nearly 6.3 million people need urgent help. Brian Dennett with AMG International describes quake survivors still living in makeshift shelters.

“Rainy season starts normally in May, and that’s coming, and that’s just going to be very complicated for them,” he says.  

Into the massive needs has stepped the network of churches AMG works with. Dennett says they have come alongside hundreds of families with generators, food relief, and other aid. They have been in the process of repairing 26 homes. 

“As always, at the center of everything we do is the gospel. So we are not just providing humanitarian aid; we are also providing hope and sharing Jesus as we go about this. And we have the most committed team of gospel-centered workers right there in the field,” says Dennett.

Find your place in the story

As Myanmar navigates internal pressures and desperate needs, would you prayerfully consider giving financial support? 

“Christians all over the U.S. have been very generous and given towards this, but our fear, with news coverage coming to an end, [is] it’s really becoming more difficult to raise funds — and yet there’s still a huge need,” Dennett says.

“We do not have the cooperation of the government there, so that’s challenging. If anyone would like to help, you can simply go to amghelp.org and you’ll find Myanmar earthquake relief right at the top of the list.”

A gift of $400 covers the cost of a generator, $100 will provide a temporary shelter, and $50 will provide a family food package. 

“Thank you all so much for your prayers and for your support. Our brothers and sisters in Myanmar really need us,” Dennett says.

2025 Myanmar earthquake relief (Photo courtesy of AMG International)

Header photo of earthquake relief courtesy of AMG International.

“I’m from Morocco, and I’m 19 years old. Though many people surround me, I have no one to talk to. I am so grateful to the Lord for your help and advice.”

(Photo courtesy of Vitaly Gariev via Pexels)

This heartfelt message came from a listener of “What’s Up”, a SAT-7 program designed to connect with young people across the Middle East and North Africa. Formerly known as “Catalyst”, the updated show targets viewers aged 18 to 24, encouraging honest conversations, emotional depth, and mutual support — especially for those often misunderstood by their families or communities.

Through episodes that explore fear, pain, regret, and confusion, “What’s Up” program creates a safe space where youth can reflect and grow. Joe Willey of SAT-7 explains: “Scripture is not just for a particular day or for a particular time period. Scripture encompasses our entire experience, and we can go to God with pain, with suffering. We see this in the imprecatory Psalms. We see this throughout Scripture.”

Many teens in the region are surrounded by conflict, crisis, and loss. “What’s Up” gives them a platform to be heard — and to hear the hope of Christ.

“SAT-7 is saying, ‘No, you do matter. You are made in the image of God, and we want to give you an opportunity to voice your concerns, and also then be able to share from a biblical perspective God’s view on difficulty, God’s view on suffering,’” says Willey.

One powerful episode, “Is God present in the midst of painful trials?”, looks directly at grief and hardship, helping young viewers process suffering in light of Scripture.

“I pray that God would change the hearts of teens, because it really would change the culture of the Middle East and North Africa to have young people who said, ‘I’ve heard about Christ and I’ve heard about Him as the Son of God, not just as a prophet and I believe what He says is true,’” adds Willey.

Pray that more young people across the Middle East and North Africa will discover this SAT-7 program and be empowered by it to speak out. For the One who gifted us with the power to speak is the very One who longs to hear our voices.

Header photo courtesy of Ashkan Sadeghi via Unsplash.

One of the most beautiful sounds to the human ear is the sound of one’s own name, especially when called by the Creator and Savior. But many truth-seekers in South Asia have never known this joy because their language has not yet welcomed Jesus. Without Scripture in their heart language, they remain disconnected from the greatest story ever told.

Moved by this reality, twenty-five believers have answered the call to bring God’s Word into their world of sounds. Wycliffe Associates is coming alongside them, providing essential tools, encouragement, and training to make it possible. Mark Stedman from Wycliffe Associates explains:

“The teams that are choosing to do this work, they do it because they love the Lord. And despite all of that, sometimes these projects can take a year or even two years.”

Photo is a representative stock image courtesy of Randall Meng via Unsplash

Two years can feel like a long wait for those desperate for hope. That’s where Starlink — a satellite internet service — comes in. By equipping translators with their own internet kits, the mission removes several key barriers.

“So what’s exciting about this new technology is we can upload files, back up their work, and even have video calls with people in the remotest places on Earth, so they can work with facilitators helping them translate,” says Stedman.

Bringing the Gospel to these unreached groups costs about three to four thousand dollars, covering the Starlink kit, delivery, and setup. This is where your prayers and support can cross land and sea to reach the waiting hearts of Southeast Asia.

Visit Wycliffe Associates to learn how you can help!

Header photo Malaysia (Photo courtesy of Melanie Lim/Unsplash)

The Sudanese people have suffered relentless attacks, killings, sexual violence and loss at the hands of both the RSF paramilitary and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). The conflict broke out in April 2023 and there’s still no end in sight.

Child in Sudan (Photo courtesy of Abdulaziz Mohammed/Unsplash)

“You’ve got these two warring leaders that are essentially just up for a power grab. This is kind of a fight to the death, literally,” says Ed Weaver with Spoken Worldwide. 

As always, it’s everyday people who pay the price. According to the International Organization for Migration, 14 million Sudanese are currently displaced. That’s a fifth of Sudan’s entire population. 

“Literally every country around Sudan is absorbing all these people who are escaping,” Weaver says. 

But another danger is rising: cholera and dengue fever. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported that there have been 28,000 cases of cholera between late July and late October, with more than 830 people dying from the disease. 

Sudanese Bible translators with Spoken Worldwide are living in the midst of chaos and atrocities as refugees, yet they press on with the work. They look to reach fellow refugees with the gospel of Christ. 

“Here [are] some incredibly faithful, godly people, men and women not losing focus in the midst of all the reasons that they should lose focus,” Weaver says.

The SAF and RSF have support from different nations factoring into this long conflict. It should follow that Sudanese Christians have the support of the global Church. Would you commit to pray for them? 

“We need to be aware of their plight, looking for ways that we can serve them, encourage them, stand with them,” Weaver says. 

“We can be swayed so easily by mainstream media to focus on just the latest tragedy. [But] there are consistent tragedies that we need to be aware of and not be fatigued by.”

Find your place in the story by praying for the good news of Christ to penetrate Sudan.

“I would encourage us to learn from them and, by those lessons that they’re teaching us, to be emboldened in our faith, to look at that as an example, praise God for their steadfastness and yet, weep with those who weep, mourn with those who mourn,” Weaver says.

“There will be a day for us to rejoice with them. But right now we mourn with them.”

Header graphic courtesy of Spoken Worldwide.

For Israelis, it’s been almost a full year of war, with the anniversary of the October 7^th attack next week.

(Photo courtesy of SGA)

Slavic Gospel Association (SGA) is in contact with ministry-supported Israeli pastors and Christian leaders. Although SGA primarily operates in Slavic countries, up to 30% of Jewish people in Israel are Russian-speaking immigrants.

SGA’s Eric Mock says, “Remember the movie Fiddler on the Roof where there was a Soviet pogrom that was driving the Jews out of Soviet Russia? A lot of them settled in Israel, and some of them who are settling, they’re believers. So that has grown.

“SGA works specifically with the faithful Bible-teaching Russian-speaking Jewish pastors and their churches that are in Israel, and they are responding in this crisis.”

These Christian leaders tell SGA that the latest Iranian attack — in addition to the last year of war and missiles and hiding out in bomb shelters — has taken the largest toll on their children.

Mock says, “For one pastor and his family that hid in a shelter, they said when the all clear was sounded, it took a while before their daughter wanted to go outside [after] the sound of the sirens and the reality of the explosions. It’s one thing as an adult to process. It’s quite another as a child.”

SGA supports a network of churches that Mock calls “God’s light in the middle of the darkness.” The ministry equips the church leadership with biblical training, offers encouragement, and helps provide resources so the churches can aid their communities.

“We have an Israel Relief Fund where we have been sending support directly to the churches there,” says Mock. “They purchase aid locally and then deliver it to a lot of people that, out of fear and anxiety, won’t even leave their apartments. They’re struggling.

(Photo courtesy of SGA)

“So this is an open door for them to minister to people, and we don’t know how badly this will all escalate. There are all kinds of issues. So by donating to Israel Relief, this is allowing the churches we serve to be ministers of God’s compassion — both in word and in action.”

Israelis, Iranians, and the rest of the world wait to see what Israel’s response will be to the latest attack.

Yet, Mock says, “The response of the Church is very predictable. The response of the Church is to point people to hope in Christ, to the solid rock of Jesus Christ, to the solid rock of His Word that remains unchanging, the promises of God remaining unchanging. In such times, this is where we find our hope.”

Donate to SGA’s Israel Relief Fund here.

Please also pray for the people of Israel to trust Jesus as the Messiah and claim God’s promises of hope and salvation in the Bible.

“We can easily be slaves to the news cycle and trying to understand what’s going to come next and how can we respond?” says Mock. “It’s at times like this that it’s vital that we fix our eyes upon Jesus.”

Header photo courtesy of SGA.

For the past five plus years, drought has been an unwelcome reality in Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia and other East African countries. Poor rainfalls have devastated the land and displaced millions in the urgent search for food and water. 

“They have experienced many crop failures because of drought. A lot of animals have died,” says World Concern’s Peter Macharia. 

Woman collects water from a protected water well.
(Photo, caption by Daryl Finley/World Concern)

In East Africa, World Concern serves as the hands and feet of Christ. They work among communities to provide water, nutrition and medicine in the face of hunger and disease. This help is critical, but today Macharia asks us to take a brief step back and consider how water points us to spiritual realities. 

“When we talk about physical drought, we should also be thinking about the spiritual drought. You know, water refreshes our weary bodies; so is the gospel. It refreshes our weary souls,” he says. 

“The Word of God in John chapter 15:3 says, ‘You already clean through the Word which I have spoken to you.’ So when you think about what water does to us physically, the gospel does the same to us spiritually.”

Macharia asks that the Church would take deliberate action to meet the practical needs of people in the Horn of Africa. 

“Think about people across the globe that are suffering without water, and find ways of how do they help? We are all living in a global village and we need to see the other person, the other country as my neighbor, because when they suffer, we all suffer,” he says.

Learn more about how you can partner with World Concern’s relief work here. 

Finally, in a world full of trouble, advocacy is another way you can stand with East Africa. 

“Prayer is able to go where we cannot go,” Macharia says. “(People) can also be participating by sharing the word and speaking about the suffering of the people wherever they are.”

Header photo of young girl in East Africa drawing water from unprotected well, courtesy of Daryl Finley/World Concern.

“They’re willing to endure the social ostracization and outright persecution. What gets really tough is when they’re starving,” says Bruce Allen with FMI.

“One pastor told me that he was fasting, he and his family and he had a two-year-old daughter at the time. [They] were fasting four days a week, ‘not because we’re super spiritual, but because we have no food.’

FMI-supported church planter in Indonesia. (Photo courtesy of FMI)

“He was seriously looking at leaving this remote village in a rainforest to go to a big city on the island where he might be able to find employment, not in vocational ministry.”

FMI began financially supporting this pastor, allowing him to continue ministry. His church is the only one in that rural area and continued to grow over the next year.

“Even the local witch doctor had become a follower of Jesus Christ and one of the elders in the church now!” says Allen.

“So I just think, ‘What would happen to these areas if the pastors didn’t stay?’ Ministries like FMI really play a vital part in sustaining and helping local churches in challenging areas to thrive.”

You can support an FMI church planter making a difference for Christ in rural Indonesia! Learn more at FMI’s website.

Then, Allen asks, “Pray for people who would like to partner with FMI, that God would raise up people to help support the work of so many churches in the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation.”

Pray also for church planters in rural Indonesia, for their spiritual encouragement, creativity, and endurance to proclaim the Gospel in remote areas.

Header photo courtesy of FMI.

It would be easy to turn off the news, but that’s not the call of the Church. Edward Graham of Samaritan’s Purse says these stories should urge Christians to prayer and action.

“God calls us to run to the sound of the guns, go to the fire, and help those in need,” Graham says. This starts with meeting immediate needs – food, water, shelter, transportation, and medical help. “We can have a hospital anywhere in the world in 36 hours as long as we have approvals. We have our own aircraft, hospitals, and doctors.”

But practical needs are only a start. “The most important part of the story of the Good Samaritan is that the innkeeper was paid a debt,” Graham says. “The man said,’ If this doesn’t cover it, I’ll be back and take care of the rest.’ Well, the debt is the blood of Jesus Christ. That’s why we go.”

It’s not an easy or safe task, and Samaritan’s Purse’s work in Gaza in a perfect example of that. “We have to be careful in Gaza with our team or safety in the work that we do, but we’re loving and serving on both sides of conflicts,” Graham says. “We do it all the time. Armenia, Azerbaijan – we were on both sides of the conflict there. You name the war, we’ve been trying to be on both sides if they allow access.”

But they’re also training people to serve in countries where things are safer. The goal is to provide chances for Christians to come alongside the brokenhearted in every part of the world. It doesn’t matter what skills those Christians bring to the table: “We train our staff and our team and how to respond.”

Maybe this is speaking to you. If you’re interested, Samaritan’s Purse can find a place for you in the mission field. “God will take the resources that you have; you just need to be bold enough to get out of the boat,” Graham says. “Too many Christians would be like the other disciples sitting in the boat. I need Peters who at least will take that step of faith and want to be part of a miracle and get out of the boat. He gets a bad rep for sinking, but he’s the only one that got off the boat.”

Reach out to Samaritan’s Purse here if any of this sounds like something in which you’d like to be involved. Even if you don’t go, pray for the Church as it serves the brokenhearted in the darkest and most desperate parts of the world.

Headline courtesy of Samaritan’s Purse.

Slavic Gospel Association’s Eric Mock says they are concerned these growing negative perceptions could also impact Ukrainian ministry support.

“Now is not the time to step away from supporting these churches! Because not only are these churches continuing to be salt and light, but from them are coming a faithful number of believers that are impacting the nations,” says Mock.

Aid to children and families in Ukraine. (Photo courtesy of SGA)

“We have to make that distinction between whether the US should be involved in Ukraine from a government or from a political point of view and that which God is doing in his Church – which is very profound – which is why we need to be serving these churches.”

Christian leaders in Ukraine are being trained to take the Gospel to their war-torn communities, and they need support more than ever!

At Irpen Bible Seminary in Ukraine, “They’ve got more students than they can even house — so many that the students are actually staying in the SGA office in Irpin and having classes there.”

Mock says, “I’ve got pictures of the students hanging their clothes in rafters that they just wiped down from soot and they’re staying in those rooms so that they can take classes and go back to their churches and minister because there are so many people coming to these churches now, they need more servants.”

(Photo, caption courtesy of SGA)

Continued ministry support is a significant encouragement to our Ukrainian brothers and sisters in Christ.

Click here to donate to SGA.

“Biblical training is going on and caring for the people’s training, and now is not the time to let our foot off the pedal.”

Header photo of Odessa Theological Seminary in Ukraine. (Photo courtesy of Slavic Gospel Association)