Whenever I think about the most meaningful experiences that shaped my life, many positive memories of my childhood emerge in Technicolor from the deep reservoirs of my soul…so many awesome moments that first awakened me to the presence of beauty in God’s world! In fact, I cannot remember a time when I did not have a childlike faith in God, the Creator of all things beautiful. (Matthew 11:25)

As a child, I remember marveling at the kaleidoscopic rays of sunlight shining through the stained glass windows at church. I remember imagining myself dancing on the fluffy white clouds tinged with pink that were visible from the window of my father’s piper clipper airplane. And I remember listening to classical music with my eyes shut tight, so as to concentrate more intently on the imaginative flight of iridescent butterflies that I was choreographing inside my mind.

My artistic gifts were nurtured by my military parents, who arranged for me to study all of the art forms as we traveled around the world. They also introduced me to artistic concerts, museums, exhibitions, and many beautiful books, of which I was an avid reader.

As a preschooler, trained at my mother’s dance school, I remember bursting out of a bass drum at the half-time show of a football game and dancing to the music of the band, dressed like Little Miss New Year. At ten years old, I remember attending adult art classes at the local university and painting the portrait of a little American Indian girl. At eleven, I remember writing my first “novel” about collie dogs, prompting my teacher to question my mother about where I might have copied the story.

At twelve, after being enthralled by a TV performance of the operetta Amahl and the Night Visitors by Gian-Carlo Menotti, I remember writing my own version of it, which the choir director helped me to produce at church. We couldn’t find a suitable boy to play Amahl, so I cut my hair and played the part myself! And it was also at that church that many teachers inspired us children to express our faith through all of the art forms! (Matthew 21:16)

But as I grew older and became more advanced in the various artistic disciplines, my teachers began to complain that I was spreading myself too thin, studying ALL of the art forms at the same time! Each teacher advised me to choose just one art form, and then to sacrifice my life to be the best I could possibly be in that one alone. However, I reasoned that God had created me with this multi-gift mix to serve Him, so why should I limit myself to only one of His gifts? Also, I began to realize that it would have to be something much bigger than a mere art form for me to sacrifice my life for it! It was then that I decided to offer ALL of my artistic gifts to my Creator-Redeemer and sacrifice my life to follow His calling as He prepared my future. (Romans 12:1; Jeremiah 29:11)

The problem was that the church my family attended during my teen years did not agree that it was appropriate to serve God through all of the arts, but only through the art of music. So at church, I limited myself to music for the time being, while continuing to treasure God’s vision in my heart. On the other hand, that church excelled in teaching sound doctrine, even to the children and youth. By the time I graduated high school, I had learned the equivalent of a seminary education!

Even though the early travels with my military family had provided many beautiful experiences in the arts that I loved, they also introduced me to many ugly, depressing scenes of poverty-stricken people everywhere. My young heart desired to bring beauty and healing to those people!

When I was 18 years old, a visiting evangelist preached a moving sermon describing the plight of the disadvantaged people around the world, who not only needed salvation from their physical dilemma, but even more so from their spiritual one. He said that apparently all of us present that evening were just content to sit together in a comfortable church enjoying God’s salvation on both fronts (physical and spiritual), while all of those invisible people were dying and going to hell!

But those people were NOT invisible to me! My memories were filled with their faces! At that moment, I knew that God was calling me to be a missionary artist like Jesus, sent by God to give beautiful flower garlands to the needy in exchange for their ashes. (Isaiah 61:1-3; Luke 4:18-19)

However, this time the problem was that being a missionary AND an artist was not considered to be an acceptable combination by most Christians, except for the art of music, of course. Therefore, many more years passed by, as I continued to follow other people’s expectations and make many wrong choices.

God’s once vibrant calling in my heart began to sink deeper and became quieter. I continued to be an artist in the world and a Christian in the church, but whenever I tried to bring the two together, I suffered retaliation from one or both sides, so that I would always retreat to a safe divided existence once again.

But then God allowed my "safe" world to crumble around me! My husband of nearly 20 years left me and our two children and filed for divorce. As I cried out to God for mercy, He healed me of my pain! And from that time onward, I was filled with the Holy Spirit, and my life was totally changed!

During this transition, God also reached out to me through an eye-opening book called Art and the Bible by Francis Schaeffer. This book bestowed upon me God’s irrevocable permission to serve Him as the artist He had created me to be!

Unfortunately, now I had one more stigma branding me as unacceptable for any service at all in the Kingdom of God…I was divorced! This compelled me to fast and pray diligently to seek God’s will!

In due time, another visiting evangelist came, preaching a different sermon, but with the same meaning and the same challenge as the first one I had heard at age 18. Although it was hard to believe, I realized that God was renewing His original calling to me. But this time I argued with Him, citing the apparently true situation that the church was never going to allow me to follow His call anyway.

Then He spoke gently in my heart saying, "Did the church call you, or did I call you?" "Well, of course You called me, Lord!" I answered. "Then just follow Me and let Me deal with My church," He replied. And so, like Job, I laid my hand upon my mouth and surrendered by faith to His command. (Job 40:3-4)

For the next ten years, meagerly supported by donations from a few individual Christians, plus small alimony payments, and frequent miracles, God led me from one city to another in the United States, ministering to Cambodian refugees through the refugee ministries of various churches.

After beginning to learn the Khmer language and doing research about Khmer arts and culture, I started helping the Khmer congregations create traditional-style performing arts with a Christian message to use as tools for evangelism, church training, and worship. At one church, our youth drama, David and Goliath, was televised in English and in Khmer and even won an award!

During those early years, I often applied to mission boards, but was always turned away, either because I was an artist, or because I was divorced, or because I was a single woman! However, along the way, God Himself became my Discipler and Mentor, where the human counterparts continued to be sorely lacking. My grateful commitment to Him was to diligently seek His kingdom and His righteousness; and His faithful commitment to me was to take care of all of my needs. (Matthew 6:33)

Later on, God revealed to me a deeper calling…to sacrifice even my own artistic aspirations to nurture His aspirations for others. With great abandon and trust, I allowed Him to plant me like a grain of wheat (or rice) in His chosen mission field in Cambodia, dying to my natural life, with the exhilarating hope of bearing abundant eternal fruit. (John 12:24-26)

Then God called one of the Khmer refugees, Noren Vann Kim (also a single woman), to become the first long-term disciple for me to teach and mentor for Him. She also served as my cultural consultant on missions projects while I completed my undergrad and grad studies at Wheaton College, paid for by government grants.

Eventually, Noren became my ministry partner. At just the right time, God provided the perfect fit for our Cambodian Christian Arts Ministry with a mission organization called Assisting Christian Individuals International. ACI shepherded us for many years after we moved to Cambodia, until we formed our own non-profit organization.

Now we have been serving God in Cambodia for 20 years, supported by a handful of faithful churches and individuals. So for the past 30 years, I can testify to God’s absolute faithfulness to provide for all of my needs and to produce abundant fruit through my life!

For all of these years, I have been serving Him as a "missionary artist," first training refugees, and then the CCAM team, to use ALL of the art forms in cross-cultural contexts to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ! But even while I am sacrificing my own aspirations to nurture God’s aspirations for others, I experience such joy serving as the “midwife” at the birth of countless new creations produced by those I am training.

In a sense, I am creating with and through them, similar to the way God creates with and through each human artist that He inspires. And as a result, the mutual collaboration that has developed within the CCAM team also fulfills God’s aspirations for the interdependence of the Body of Christ.

Now that the foundations have been laid for the spiritual and artistic training of CCAM disciples, God is beginning to once again call me to create personal works of art for His glory!

Because of my theological training, informed by my personal life experiences, I am also becoming an "artist theologian," exploring the Word of God to develop a practical theology of the arts to encourage Christian artists, or would-be artists, who are struggling to discover who they were created to be, and where they fit in the Kingdom of God.

And along with the other members of our CCAM ministry team (previously discipled and mentored by us), Noren and I continue evangelizing, rescuing, caring for, discipling, and mentoring more disadvantaged Cambodian children and youth, blessing them with the beautiful garlands of their own redeemed art forms in exchange for the ashes of their former lives!

But perhaps the best part of this story is that the students themselves are being trained in our school to be the missionary artists, theologians, evangelists, rescuers, and disciplers of the future! Praise God for His great love, wisdom, and power displayed on our behalf!