Nelson and Cheryl Buchanan

Missionaries to International Ministries Office

Ministry Description

Our main ministry is Online English Café, a program that connects native English speakers with ESL students around the world for conversational Bible studies. Our goal is to empower Christians from all walks of life to actively share the Gospel and disciple people from around the world.

This program started as missionary-run local outreach in 2016 using English as a hook to have Gospel conversations. Once Covid-19 hit, we had to move it all online, which, consequently, created more interest in the program as well as expanded the potential reach of the program.

All of our curriculum is pre-made and easy to use. Our volunteers are not so much “teachers” as they are “facilitators.” As long as you can speak English and you love Jesus, you are a good fit to lead a group.

At the beginning, the curriculum is evangelistic, discussing everyday topics and leading that discussion to the Bible that culminates in an opportunity to present the gospel. For those students who are interested in learning even more about the Bible, they can then take more in-depth Bible classes and training or be connected with missionaries or local churches in their area.

About Nelson

I grew up in a Christian family in Quebec, Canada, and accepted Christ as a young child. But in my teen years I strayed away from God. I redevoted my life to Christ when I was 19 years old during a men's Bible study in 1 John. It was a struggle for me to change the way I was living at the time. However, a few months after I became a Christian I had the opportunity to go to Word of Life Bible Institute in South Korea. During that year I grew so much and, after a mission trip to Thailand, I decided to become a full time missionary with WOL. So many of my classmates at the Bible Institute had come from another program of WOL called SYME, an English discipleship program. They told me about how it had changed their lives. So after talking with the director of the school, I decided to head towards opening an SYME in another country. During my time in preparation to go full time, I met my wife Cheryl, who was also serving as a missionary. After spending some time getting my masters in Teaching English and raising support, we headed to Taiwan as missionaries. We stayed there for 7 years working with English Discipleship programs. One of the programs that came out of our time there was English Café, a ministry that is described more fully below. We have now moved to the USA to focus completely on leading the global English Café outreach.

About Cheryl

I'm from Pennsylvania and I grew up attending church with my parents and brother and sister each Sunday. We had a really good Sunday school program at my church and by the time I was eight years old, I knew that I was a sinner and that I needed to trust Jesus as my Savior. One Sunday, I prayed with my Sunday School teacher to accept Christ. We also had a great missions program at my church and missionaries from all over the world would come and share about the work they were doing in different countries. After graduating from college, I decided I wanted to study the Bible more, so I attended the Word of Life Bible Institute in NY. My understanding of who God is grew a lot at that time and I also met a lot of Asian students who told me about the Word of Life ministry, SYME, in their home countries. Many had become Christians through that ministry, so after finishing the Bible Institute, I went to serve in South Korea for four months. I loved being able to serve and minister to people everyday. God lead me to go back full time as a missionary first to South Korea and then in Taiwan with Nelson. Our first child Ava was born in November 2016. Our second, Owen, was born in 2018.

Life Verse

Ephesians 3:20-21 Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.