Cambodia Outreach has over 100 staff and volunteer staff working in various areas to reach out to the community. For most of our Cambodian's this is their first place of employment so learning how to work and new ways of doing things is an integral part of the work experience. Click below to meet some of our staff.
Jesse McCaul was born and raised in Oregon, USA and moved to Phnom Penh, Cambodia in 1995 when he was seventeen years old. Though raised in a Christian home, it wasn't until his late teen years that Jesse began to seek a personal relationship with the Lord and decided to live for God wholeheartedly. Never having had any dreams or desires to be in full-time Christian ministry, Jesse's desire was only to be used by God. Jesse worked in various spheres in Phnom Penh, including becoming a well-known English teacher, known nation-wide as Dr. English, managing several schools and helping set up the Christian Broadcasting Network's (CBN) offices in Phnom Penh. During that time, Jesse was also very involved in the beginning years of New Life Fellowship of Churches in Cambodia mainly through teaching Bible studies, out of which have come several of New Life's top leaders. In 1997, Jesse met his wife Soar and the two of them got married in January 2000.
In 2001, Jesse and Soar felt the Lord urging them to commit themselves to being used in New Life Fellowship of Churches on a full-time basis and Jesse stepped down from his work outside the Church. In 2004, Jesse began to pastor New Life Fellowship Phnom Penh, the founding Church in New Life Fellowship of Churches Cambodia and a solid Cambodian leadership team began to be assembled. In 2006, Jesse began to oversee the entire work of New Life Fellowship of Churches Cambodia. Soar, with her own unique areas of giftings has also been involved in Christian ministry for many years, including hosting the popular Christian television show One Cubed on Cambodian national television. Their daughter, Jessica Faith was born in 2006 and continues to bring joy to her parents.
Jesse is now the Senior Pastor of New Life Fellowship Phnom Penh and the Overseer of New Life Fellowship of Churches Cambodia. He is also the Country Director of New Life Foundation, a non-profit humanitarian organization doing relief and development work in Cambodia with a particular focus on the education sector. Jesse and Soar consider Cambodia their home and are passionate about planting churches and ministering to the poor.
Pastor Johnny Khen was raised in a non-Christian family and held a hatred for Christians. In 1999, with no money for classes, Johnny was led to New Life for their free classes teaching English. Through the classes, Pastor Sophea led Johnny to have a relationship with Christ in 2000. Since this time, Pastor Johnny’s entire family has put their faith in the Lord as well!
The Lord has chosen and anointed Pastor Johnny to be His servant to bring the lost back to Him. He has been working with New Life since 2001 as the Pastor of Programs. He is passionate about the gospel and raising up new leaders. His gift to organize is perfectly matched to oversee our small groups, 9:10 discipleship classes, children's ministry, and other church programs. He is currently raising up new leaders to grow a church plant in the city at Tuol Songke.
Pastor Johnny and his wife Rumnea married in 2006 and are blessed to have a beautiful daughter, Sarah.
Mara was born in 1973 during the time of the American bombing in Cambodia. His province was one of the most bombed areas, which included his village, but God protected Mara and his family. After that from 1975-1979 he experienced the Khmer Rouge regime. This regime caused many people not to have enough to eat so many die of starvation, others die of working too hard, or were even killed by this regime. A total of 21 of Mara’s relative were killed during this regime. But amazingly Mara’s parents told him that the Khmer Rouge people really like him a lot and would actually give him food any time he asked them for it. Mara also believes this was God favor and protection on his life even though he didn’t know God. In 1980 the government of Cambodia started to set up schools again and Mara joined school at the first grade, one year after freedom from Khmer Rouge. After 10 years of study he got to graduate from high school and was looking to continue his study at a university. There were no universities in his so Mara had to move to Phnom Penh where he didn’t know anyone.
Mara joined the Royal University of Phnom Penh. During that time he was involved in politics, and worked as a journalist for a local newspaper. Later his friend invited him to go to New Life Fellowship to study English for free. After he was there for a while he felt the love and care of God’s people towards him and God started change his hear. He received the Lord Jesus Christ in 1995, got baptized, and began following the Lord. This was also the year he graduated from University.
In 1999 Mara started working for New Life Fellowship as an evangelist and helped plant the first daughter church in the Cambodia country-side. That was the same year that Leah Cassidy, an American, came to be a missionary at New Life teaching computer. In 2001 Mara married Leah and they continued working at the church. Mara worked as a evangelist helping plant more churches in the provinces and Leah worked in the church office. In 2003 they had their first daughter, Naomi. In 2005 they had their second daughter Anna. In 2010 they had their third child, Joshua.
Mara currently oversees Pastoral Care department, which ministers to men, women, married couples, older and sick people, business and professionals, and New Life’s healing homes, as well counsels members, and preaches at many of the church services. Mara loves to evangelize and pray for people, see them come to know Jesus and be set free. Leah is involved with teaching the Bible, women’s ministry and discipling and helping women in the church, as well as homeschooling and caring for their children. They both continue to serve the church, they and their kids love, New Life Fellowship.
Pastor Pisit grew up in a refugee camp on the Cambodia/Thai border where blood and death were an everyday occurrence. He is from a Buddhist family where his father was a smuggler of cigarettes and other materials and his mother was a nurse and midwife. Since there was no one else to take care of him, his mother often had to bring him along to work. But the local library provided a safe place so he spent a lot of time there reading. Pisit skipped several grades because of his high marks and was starting high school by the age of 10. Shortly after however, he began neglecting his schoolwork. In 1993 he moved to Phnom Penh to live with his family and complete high school.
In 1995 he started studying English at a local church. During this time he attended youth meetings and activities at NLF. A missionary started coming to his house for Bible study with his uncle but he would also sit in on the lessons. He realized that a lot of the stories this missionary was sharing were familiar to him. Then he remembered that when he was a child he had come across a picture Bible in the library. He loved it so much that he couldn't put it down and read it through three times. After reading Bible he saw a Jesus movie but didn't think much of it at he time. He began growing in the Word but soon got busy with school and stopped going to church. When Pisit attended his uncle's baptism, he felt something inside of him urging him to he get baptized and set free too. He talked to New Life staff and they told him he should to go to Bible classes before getting baptized. He never neglected church after that and also began to help volunteer. After completing the Bible classes Pisit had to wait for the baptismal class to fill up. It took 2 years before he could finally be baptized, but he spent his time waiting serving the church.
Pastor Pisit has been a full time pastor for the last five years but has been working with New Life since 2000 as the Pastor of Youth, Worship, Creative arts, and Media. His vision for New Life is for it to be a resource center for other churches. His desire is to train worship leaders and be 3 things to the people around him: pastor, friend, and brother. He has been married for three years to his wife Seiha and they have an 8-month-old daughter named Sophia.
After being born and raised in the provinces of Cambodia, Pastor Samdy moved to Phnom Penh for secondary school. He had a desire to study English, but when he was unable to find any free classes, he began taking free Mandarin classes instead. Classes were held in a pagoda and the students were required to worship Buddha everyday for 30 minutes. Being raised Buddhist, this was no problem for him. After one year, a friend of Samdy's found free English classes at New Life Fellowship. He made the switch and attended two classes everyday, one of which was with Pastor Jesse. Coming into the class, he hated Christianity so much he decided he had to find out more about it. Jesse also had bible classes from everyday so Samdy started to attend. After one year of studying, in 1998, Samdy gave his life to Jesus. His extended family was furious when they found out and demanded he not go to services on Sunday. So out of respect for his family, Samdy did not go to service on Sunday. However he did still go to the Wednesday night service and the bible classes. During this time, Pastor Jesse asked him to translate for him and in 1999 he began volunteering at New Life. God softened his Aunt's heart and she no longer protested him attending services.
In 2002, Samdy was invited to work part time at New Life. In 2003, his parents moved into Phnom Penh where he found out they also had accepted Jesus! In 2004, he came onto staff full time and in 2005 he wed his wife, Navy. The following year, both were invited to be on Pastoral staff. His current job is the Administration Pastor, where he oversees all functions of the church.
Pastor Sophea Sem is a Cambodian national, who accepted the Lord in 1997 and entered the ministry part-time in 1999 as a youth pastor and small group leader. He later came on staff at the church full-time, working with the youth, with outreach to English students, discipleship groups among the students, and leading small group Bible studies. In 2001 he was serving as an assistant pastor in New Life Fellowship, with Chuck McCaul.
Jenny Ringer came to Cambodia, originally, in 1997, as a missionary intern with the McCaul family. She lived and worked with the McCauls for one year, from 1997 to 1998, and then returned to Portland, OR, where she finished a Bachelors of Theology at Portland Bible College. Upon graduation in 1999, she returned again to Cambodia, to work with the growing church there.
Sophea was married to Jenny in 2003. A few months later, they both felt the Lord leading them to step out and pastor a church plant that was struggling. The church is located in an area just outside the city limits, called New Phnom Penh, or Phnom Penh Thmey (in the Cambodian language). The church has grown in the last 6 years, since opening in 2004 and now numbers about 200 people in our weekly worship service, with around 250 members meeting in 30 small groups in homes around the community every week.
Sophea and Jenny Sem are joined by an adopted daughter named Elise (age 10), a son named Joseph (age 6), a daughter named Abby (age 4), a daughter named Zanna (age 2), and a son named Elijah (born May 3, 2010).
Pastor Sotha first heard stories from the Bible when he was 10 years old, from an American pastor arriving with American troops. In 1975, because of the invading Khmer Rouge, Sotha was separated from his parents and sent to live with his grandparents, his body becoming raged by disease because of the harsh conditions. Defining him as useless because of his sickness, the Khmer Rouge came from him, tied him up, and dragged him through the night to a hole in one of the now infamous killing fields. When the soldiers ran into their superior, he allowed Sotha to be released, claiming Sotha would die soon enough on his own. This same man that released him was responsible for the death of Sotha's brother only a few months before.
By the grace of God, Sotha recovered and now believes that God protected him that night because the Lord had a mighty purpose set aside for his life. In 1994, Pastor Sotha began attending English classes at a new church, New Life Fellowship. One day after class, a missionary shared the gospel with him and gave his own copy of the New Testament. On his first reading, Sotha read Matthew 4:4 and his heart was changed from that day on. He was baptized in 1994 as New Life's first Cambodia convert to Christianity. He became actively involved in New Life as a translator and became the Pastor overseeing the Provincial Churches in 2000. Since 2000 and under Pastor Sotha's leadership, New Life has planted over 60 churches in the rural provinces of Cambodia, and every day new Cambodians are coming to Lord through New Life and Pastor Sotha's work.
Suzanne joined the staff early in 2010 to help assist the Office Skills Training Centre. Her passion for excellence in teaching in English as a Second Language and experience as a pastor in Australia are helping her to develop Cambodian's skills as teachers and enabling the training centre to reach more students with the love of the Lord.
Kim and Susan Bonnevie are New Zealanders who came to Cambodia in 2007 in response to God's clear calling. Before the start of their Cambodian life, Susan was a registered nurse for 25 years and Kim was the senior pastor of CityLife Church in New Plymouth, New Zealand for 14 years.
After arriving in Phnom Penh, just one short year later, they opened 'Wonderful Healing Home'. It is a residential care facility for the poor and sick.
It is their passion that God's name is honored through His church embracing the ministry of caring for the sick and seeing them loved and healed in Jesus name. To this end, the ministry is called 'Compassion with Power'.
There is no charge to patients for their accommodation or food. In the call of God, there comes a release of the provision of God. The Lord is ever faithful to His promises!
Chris and Victoria Cox moved to Cambodia to teach English in 2007. In September 2009 after completing their teaching commitments, the Cox family joined New Life Fellowship of Churches to disciple students, being drawn by NLF's cultural sensitivity and biblical foundation. Now Chris and Victoria work alongside Pastor Sophea out at Phnom Penh Thmey teaching and discipling, assist teams and other foreign staff that come to help at NLF Phnom Penh Thmey.
Eileen started attending New Life in 2008 and was an active member of the church family. After a brief time back home in Canada, she came back to New Life Fellowship of Churches as a member of our staff helping at New Life School. Now Eileen's degree in TESL and intercultural studies experience a teaching assistant as helps with the numerous administration duties, works on the sponsorship program for New Life School, and teaches English.
Chris and Rhiannon joined the team from Australia in April 2009. With their ability to turn their hand to almost anything, Chris has used his business management skills to develop a business course for the Office Skills Training Center, co-developed a discipleship program for Cambodian Internship program and helps to increase capacity of our staff. Rhiannon’s administration skills are used to help in a number of areas. Both Chris and Rhiannon lead discipleship groups at our Next Step Houses.
A Mathematics and Christian Education teacher from Perth, Australia, Karen traveled through Europe before leading missions teams into Uganda and Cambodia where she learned about New Life Fellowship of Churches from her partnership with a UK mission's organization. Karen began her own adventure with New Life in July 2008 as the Short-term Team and Guest Coordinator and assists in almost every single ministry at NLF. God has given Karen an enormous heart for Cambodia and continues to use her to spread His amazing love and grace throughout the country.
Jennifer O'Daniel has felt the call the serve others for most of her life. After completing bible college at her church and experiencing a short term trip to Romania, the Lord confirmed Jennifer's passion to help those all over the world. Through the guidance of her church family back in Oregon, God brought her here to Cambodia in September 2009. Jennifer's primary position is Pastor Jesse McCaul's Personal Assistant, handling a wide array of administrative duties. Along with helping Pastor Jesse and his wife Soar, Jennifer runs Kid's Club, an English speaking class for children. She is passionate about giving these children a firm foundation as the future leaders of the church in Cambodia and strives to ignite zeal within them for the Word of God.
Jason and Angie Prosser fell in love with New Life through short-term trips back in 1996. Equipped and ready to serve after completing Bible College, in November 2004, God called them back to Cambodia full-time where they now oversee the foreign staff and help foster healthy marriages among the community through small groups and counselling. Individually, Jason oversees New Life's School of Leaders, co-leads the Internship Program, teaches English at the Office Skills Training Center and leads a small group for young men. Angie is actively involved in the Women's Ministries and leads a women's small group. There primary love is to help their three young children, Caleb, Justice and Emma, grow up with a love for the Lord.
Donnie Sargeant came to work for New Life Fellowship in year 2003 officially but went to NLF church for the first time in year 2001 while on internship for a YWAM, IPHC coarse. Donnie began learning Khmer with the English students and especially Pastor Samdy. His training in basic primary healthcare opened a door to work with the church in this area. Donnie works with those patients in most need to help them receive the medical care needed through the Patient Care Ministry. The people of the church and Cambodian people have special place in his heart but none greater than his wife, Sophea, who is most special as they grow as family within the church family.
