Support Ben and Rachel's Mission in Bosnia

Hello everyone! For those of you that may not know us, we are Ben and Rachel Schulte. We currently live on Hilton Head Island in South Carolina, but we are originally from St. Louis, Missouri. We both grew up in St. Louis---the second largest city of Bosnians outside of their capital Sarajevo.

In 2016, we started attending a small church in Affton, Missouri called Church of Affton. The Pastor Jason, his wife Rachelle and his kids Hannah and Isaac were missionaries in Bosnia for a couple of years. After being in Bosnia, he pastored a church in Arkansas for 7 years before coming to STL. Throughout that time, they maintained mission work in Bosnia by taking teams there every year to teach English. They shared their love for Bosnia with the church and cast a vision for mission work in STL and in Bosnia.

In 2018, we went to Bosnia for our first mission trip. We laughed, we cried, we met new friends and created lifelong memories. We shared the gospel and spoke truth to those in Bosnia that had lost hope due to the war in the 90s. We had several opportunities to share more about Jesus and his love for everyone! After our trip in 2018, we really felt led to be missionaries in Bosnia. Ever since then we have felt a huge call to continue to help those in Bosnia. We continued mission work stateside while Rachel finished her degree.

In 2019, Ben had the opportunity to go back to Bosnia with a group to teach English in Mostar. This trip was an amazing trip, but it was also an emotional one. This was the first trip after Jason passed away. Jason cast the vision that God had given him for reaching Bosnia with the Gospel and he had sowed seeds into our life.

At the beginning of 2020 we moved to HHI. We have had this constant back and forth of "where are we supposed to be, how are we supposed to serve". We felt like we had deserted the call that God had for us on our lives. Through Rachel being involved with Perspectives (a class held in STL) we have been offered another opportunity to go back! Our time in SC has really served as a time of healing after Jason tragically passed. During this time, we have been able to mature and grow more in Faith and now feel ready to continue serving the way we have felt that God has called us.

On this trip, we will be working with two evangelical churches in the city of Mostar, the primary church being BC Mostar. One main purpose of this trip is to educate individuals as to who Bosnians are, understand what they have been through regarding the war, and experience their culture in such a way that it transforms hearts and encourages ministry to the over 70,000 unreached Bosnians here in the greater St. Louis area. We will be leaving around October, 2024 but will be purchasing tickets this week!

We are looking for people who would be able to partner with us financially as they feel led to. We are also looking for people to partner with us in prayer as we prepare for this trip. Let us know if you would like to support us and be put on our newsletter feed.