Working in Media for the Lord
24 Mar 2020
The beginning of Kathy’s journey
Back in high school I excelled as a student of French language and chose Islamic Art & Architecture as my art history subject for the High School Certificate – with no idea that both would be so relevant and useful in my future endeavours! But the Lord knew. I gained a Bachelor of Arts in visual communications and found my dream job as a graphic designer in television. I worked for 18 years in major TV stations in Sydney and Hong Kong, moving up to department manager. Then on my return to Australia, I took a new direction by retraining for radio presenting and production. I took every opportunity to gain experience, including part-time traffic reporting on an AM station and hosting my own community radio program.
First cross-cultural experience
My first overseas missionary post was in 2001 for 12 months. I joined a small team in southern Spain to support a Gospel distribution project and correspondence ministry to North Africans. I was introduced to a radio ministry in the area and volunteered for some recording with them. I was invited to join their regional team for North Africa/Middle East. So, that brought me back to Europe for 4 years, to lead the Radio Al Mahabba project (internet radio pre-evangelism through music and programs in Arabic).
Working in media
2020 is my 10th year on the Arab World Media team: I joined Pioneers in 2009 and headed straight to the production base in France. As the team’s audio visual (AV) production manager I began coordinating production for several Arab producers, who worked with our in-house technical staff, to record content for the ministry website. I was also commissioning AV projects from some freelance designers and production houses, such as website redesigns and character animations. Then, along with a team mate in the Middle East, began co-producing short original videos with media partners in Spain and the US, for use in our social media outreach projects. Research, scriptwriting, art direction, managing people – my experience in media enables me to make creative contributions to many aspects of the work we do to help Arabic-speaking seekers learn about Christ via media. I’m also responsible for archiving and managing all our digital material, which is often made available to other ministries – so I arrange delivery and distribution too.
What does Kathy do now?
I’ve been involved as a mentor/line manager to a variety of production staff on our team, most of them based in other countries! Currently this includes a graphic designer working on Facebook art projects in Egypt and a young media intern in Lebanon, who works part-time on video productions. Since 2014 our production team has been based in the UK. The work and our personnel both continue to change and expand – and my role does too! Most recently I’ve been writing and recording short audio updates for our Canadian media partner’s internet live stream about what the LORD is doing in the Arab World.
What has Kathy learned from her cross-cultural experience?
I’ve learned that the most amazing journey you will ever take is to discover and commit yourself fully and passionately to what, and where, God wants you to be. Truthfully, I had no ambition to ever work full-time in missions; I never dreamed of world travel… but as a teen, I told the LORD I was willing to ‘go wherever He sent me’. And He held me to that prayer… 25 years later!
What do you love to do, that you can offer the LORD for His purposes?
-Kathy, a Pioneers worker serving in Arab World Media.
Is God calling you to join the mission field? Get in touch.