About Us
Our Mission
We exist to mobilize Christians in local churches to serve refugees and immigrants with the love and gospel of Jesus through basic language classes and simple gospel events.
Our Vision
To see thousands of regular, everyday Christians in local churches in Europe sharing the love and gospel of Jesus with people from all over the world.
Our Story
“You don’t think it’s supposed to be us, do you?”
This was mostly meant to be a rhetorical question, and if Brad chose to respond, he was supposed to say, “What? Of course not!” I asked this question as we talked over outreach to refugees in Nantes, France, after spending a week there with a short-term team in October 2022.
During our days in Nantes, we had no inkling that God was going to call us to serve refugees in Europe. We had enjoyed new experiences with our team members, we had been fascinated to meet people from multiple countries, and our eyes had been opened to God’s work in moving masses of people out of the Middle East and Africa to Europe, where the gospel is accessible to them. Like you, we have heard for years about refugees and have even prayed for them, but of course it is very different to sit down at a table surrounded by them and look at their faces and hear their stories.
So, after 27 years of pastoral ministry in the US, we said “yes” and moved to France to help mobilize Christians to serve refugees. A team of four people from our church joined us, and in September 2023, Refugee Oasis officially launched in a local church in Nantes, followed by a second church in October, a third in March, and a fourth in September 2024. Jesus then told the RO Team to take this ministry to other churches in Europe.
We discovered that Christians in local churches throughout Europe are eager to serve! They are simply looking for a practical way to connect with the refugees and immigrants who are right in front of them and that’s what RO provides.
Just two years later, there are now RO centers hosted in churches in France, Spain, Germany, Belgium, and even the US. Our goal is to mobilize thousands of Christians to serve millions of refugees with the love and gospel of Jesus through basic language classes and simple gospel events.
God is providing an incredible opportunity in the massive movement of displaced people to cities like Nantes, Paris, Frankfurt, Antwerp, and Madrid where they can experience the love of Christ through regular everyday Christians. We want to be at the center of this opportunity, so we continue to pray the words of Psalm 67, “May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face shine upon us, that your way may be known on earth, your saving power among all nations!”
-Thea and Brad
Our Statement of Faith
WE BELIEVE that the Holy Scriptures, both the Old and the New Testaments, are fully inspired by the Holy Spirit, without error in the original manuscripts, infallible, and the final authority in all matters of faith and practice.
WE BELIEVE in one God, Creator of all things, eternally existing in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
WE BELIEVE that man was created in the image of God, but through Adam's sin became alienated from God, acquired a sin nature, and came under the judicial sentence of death. As a consequence, man is lost, unable to save himself from the wrath of God, and needs to be saved.
WE BELIEVE in the Lord Jesus Christ, fully God and fully man, born of a virgin, sinless and perfect, the only Savior. We believe that he carried our sins in his body on the cross, rose from the dead, ascended to heaven, and is now at the right hand of God, mediating for us. We believe in the personal and physical return of Christ in power and glory.
WE BELIEVE that salvation is a gift of God, sovereignly offered by grace to those who repent and place their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ; and that all who truly believe in him are eternally saved on the basis of his shed blood.
WE BELIEVE in God the Holy Spirit who indwells all believers to convict, enlighten, sanctify, empower and guide them in life and service.
WE BELIEVE that the true Church is composed of persons who, through saving faith in Jesus Christ, have been regenerated by the Holy Spirit and are united together in the body of Christ of which he is Head.
WE BELIEVE in the bodily resurrection of both the saved and the lost; they that are saved unto eternal life with God, and they that are lost unto eternal punishment separated from God.
WE BELIEVE that Christ commanded the Church to make disciples of all peoples, by going into all the world, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey all that Christ commanded.