Reaping in Due Season
The Celebration of Tom and Susan Stiles’ 42 Years of Ministry with OMS
“The world is a better place, and heaven all the richer because of the life and service of OMS missionaries, Tom and Susan Stiles.” During the weekly chapel on May 31, One Mission Society celebrated the Stiles’ 42 years of service with OMS by reading a letter from Dean Davis, a former Ecuador coworker, about Tom and Susan’s missionary career.
After graduating from Purdue University, Tom went to Ecuador to teach beekeeping at the Vocational Bible Institute in Cuenca.
While there, OMS asked Tom to teach a course on Galatians. Because he spent most of his time with students, he acquired enough Spanish to teach in nine months. That teaching experience set him up for 45 years of patient, systematic, and faithful leadership as a seminary professor and director.
In 1979, he enrolled in Asbury Seminary for his master of divinity degree, where a fellow student introduced him to Dean, who was organizing an evangelism trip to Ecuador with OMS’ Men for Mission ministry. Dean asked Tom to teach the team songs in Spanish.
Gail, whom Dean would later marry, and Susan, a new Christian and seeking God’s will for her life, were on the team. After meeting, Tom and Susan kept in contact. Eventually, Dean asked Tom when he planned to ask Susan out.
“Will she go out with me?” Tom asked. When Dean said yes, he immediately called Susan.
“The rest," Dean wrote, "is history.”
Tom and Dean began dreaming about ministry in Ecuador. OMS started ministry there in 1957, but few Saraguro people had accepted Christ. More experienced agencies encouraged OMS to focus on the indigenous communities and have their missionaries learn the indigenous languages.
OMS then asked the Davis and Stiles families to serve the Sarguros. The two families raised their support and studied language in Costa Rica together.
The Mission worried their relationship would disintegrate, but the Stiles and Davises enjoyed doing life and ministry together.
On August 10, 1985, the families arrived in Quito, Ecuador, and received sad news. The Vocational Bible Institute would need to be closed for a year. When offered the role of school directors when the seminary reopened, Tom and Susan accepted.
The Stiles and Davises continued working closely together as a healthy, functional missionary team.
“Although the work was very slow,” Dean said, “Saraguros began to come to Christ.”
The Stiles moved around Ecuador as their family grew, but their hearts remained with the people of the Andes and southern Amazon basin.
“They were constant in season and out of season,” Dean said. “Always believing the scriptural admonition to not grow weary in well doing because they would reap if they would not faint (Galatians 6:9). The Stiles did not faint.”
“Beekeepers are practical and patient,” Dean said. “You don't put a hive out today and expect to get honey tomorrow. Tom Stiles missionary ministry has always been practical, and he's always been patient.”
Susan has gifts no one else on the team had: the ability to make connections, build long-term relationships, and meet practical and health needs. Susan has an associate degree in dental hygiene and a bachelor’s degree and a master’s in education.
Many people are following the Savior because of Tom and Susan.
After the MFM trip, Susan later visited Tom in Ecuador to “see him in action.” While traveling to their destination, their bus got stuck in mud. They waited all night and day until help arrived.
“It was a lot of time to think and a lot of time to pray,” Susan said, “and a lot of time to listen to things that were going on around us. Like the Macedonian call, I really heard the Lord say: come help us.”
This call was important to Susan. “I didn't want to be just a wife, following my husband around,” she said.
She read Psalm 40:2, “He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand" (NIV).
Tom talked about the adventure of being in Ecuador, including the beautiful Andes Mountains, hiking, fishing, the challenge of the road situation.
Getting to know the people was also an adventure. Farming is at the heart of Ecuadorian culture, and they needed to relate the Gospel to the Ecuadorians.
Tom shared his heart for the people of Ecuador, “You looked down the valley … and you knew, there were still places before the end of the road that needed the Gospel.” Tom said. “The Lord just put a burden on me to work on setting up churches or worshiping communities in all these little rural villages.”
2 Corinthians 4:7, “But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.”
By Hannah Kemper, Summer 2023 OMS Communications Intern