Matt started college with the question, “How can an engineer be a missionary?” He’ll never forget the day when God powerfully answered that question. Matt & Julie were getting ready to leave for home at the end of their first trip to Burkina Faso. They had just installed solar electricity at a rural clinic where the midwives had been delivering babies at night using flashlights. As they finished their last interview with a Burkinabe Christian engineer named Emmanuel, they asked him, “What can we really do to help the people and the church of Africa?”
Emmanuel responded, “The first missionaries came over and planted churches, then the doctors and the nurses came and set up clinics. Now we know about Jesus, and we are healthier; but we are still dying from starvation, and we are still completely dependent upon outsiders for everything. What we really need now is to have Christian professionals come and partner with us so that we can feed our families, support our pastors, and send out missionaries of our own.”
It was then that Matt & Julie knew that they would be spending their lives walking with the poor of Burkina Faso.