Patrick & Debbie O’Connor

Background:  As a child Patrick O’Connor spent three years living in India, but without realizing the value of that cross-cultural experience.  While studying business administration in college, he saw there was more to life than financial success. He began to seek God, and accepted Christ as his Savior.  Patrick says, “My business training let me see that the wisest thing to do with my life would be to ‘capitalize’ on it by ‘investing’ myself in the lives of others.” He earned a bachelor’s degree in International Missions at Moody Bible Institute, where he also met Debbie.   She accepted Christ while a student at the University of British Columbia, and later spent a year and a half as a missionary in Mexico City. The O’Connors were married in 1987.

Ministry:  The O’Connors began with the Mission in 1989. Their vision has been to start new chains of evangelical churches in the rural mountains of western Honduras. For this reason, they moved to the mountains in 1996, having spent a few years on the north coast of Honduras becoming better acquainted with cross-cultural ministry and with the culture. During this time in the mountains, the Lord has permitted a great quantity of new churches to be “birthed” in the mountains. Having set into motion daughter churches and granddaughter churches, the Lord has graciously raised up a team of national men to lead the new CB association of western Honduras. Having turned the work over to nationals, Patrick now provides training to key leaders. Patrick and Debbie also train North Americans for cross-cultural ministry through their missionary training program.

Leadership Training:  Paul wrote to Timothy saying, “And the things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, these entrust to faithful men, who will, in turn, be able to teach others also” (II Timothy 2:2). Following this simple principle, the O’Connors disciple mature, adult Honduran men, continually turning the ministry over to them. Just as the Apostle Paul entrusted leadership to local hands, so the O’Connors, resisting temptation to stick around, have prepared nationals to do the missionary task. This has freed them up to follow Paul’s model of looking for new areas.