Our dreams, not faded...

What a story René and Janneke Don have to tell. For fourteen years, they worked in Australia for MAF (Mission Aviation Fellowship) an adventure they once thought impossible. Since March 2023, they’ve been living back in the Netherlands with their three sons aged 13, 11, and 6. So we paid them a visit to hear about their experiences.

Janneke had a heart for mission work from an early age. “As a child I already wrote in friendship books that I wanted to become a missionary someday. When René and I met, we got involved in youth ministry at church together, but for him, there was no talk of us entering the mission field as a couple. He was a software engineer and couldn’t yet picture the combination of computers and Africa. Before we got married (in 2004), I very consciously surrendered it to God. I knew He had placed the desire for mission work in my heart, but I also knew God had destined us for each other. So every time I had doubts, I reminded myself: I’ve placed it in God’s hands.”

"Every time I had doubts, I reminded myself: I’ve placed it in God’s hands."

"Just as Janneke had a longing to become a missionary, I had the dream to become a pilot and used to draw little airplanes in my school notebooks," René shares. “But flight training is very expensive, and I had poor eyesight which is a real issue in aviation. Still, I could do gliding as a hobby. During summer breaks, we often traveled abroad with a club for this. One of those flights went wrong. I didn’t have enough altitude to land and crashed, breaking my spine. Thankfully, the prognosis for recovery was good, but it was a tense time. In the six weeks I had to lie flat, life came to a standstill. And I found myself thinking: ‘Do I want to continue doing what I’m doing for the rest of my life, or do I want something more?’”

During that period, I played a lot of computer games. In one game, an opponent was named Cessna (after the aircraft manufacturer). He turned out to be a Dutch guy in Australia, doing training with MAF. He was headed to a program that needed many pilots. I knew Australia had less strict requirements, and I wondered: could this be what we’re meant to do? It felt out of reach at the time I had a broken spine and poor eyesight but the desire was there!

After much discussion and prayer, we decided to walk down that path. We approached every meeting with MAF with the mindset: “This is another traffic light Lord, show us whether it’s red, yellow, or green.” That’s also how we try to discern God’s voice. You can only steer a ship if it’s moving. I believe God wants us to take steps, and then He’ll guide the direction. The fact that the medical clearance and selection procedure went well was confirmation for us that this was right.

"Lord, show us whether the light is red, yellow, or green."

For Janneke, this process was very special, because she had consciously surrendered her desire to God, and now He was bringing it back to her Himself. That truly felt like a confirmation of her calling. “Somehow I knew during the whole process that things would work out,” she says. “Although the time surrounding the selection and visa application was full of uncertainty, we had peace through it all.” Ultimately, we were sent to Millingimbi, a very remote island inhabited by Aboriginal people. The circumstances there were pretty tough, but we were blessed to share a lot from the Bible.

In 2015, we moved to the main base in Arnhem Land (Australia), where, two years later, René experienced multiple retinal detachments. He had to travel 1,300 km to a specialist eye hospital, where he ultimately underwent four operations. At the time, I was heavily pregnant, and in the midst of that emotional rollercoaster, I asked myself whether we had truly understood our calling, or if we had been pursuing our own ideals. But during that period, we were so deeply encouraged by fellow Christians. It was truly from God. And the doctor said it was remarkable how much vision René still had left, given the circumstances. Extraordinary!

After all this, René began working as operations manager in Mareeba. We were strongly convinced that our time with MAF wasn’t yet over. Even though this was a good choice for our family, we also felt it was a transitional station.

While we were on furlough in 2022, we both had the sense that we needed to return to the Netherlands. It was a deep feeling of “this is where we’re meant to be.” Even though we hadn’t been waiting for such a moment, we had always said: “We were called into mission work, so we’ll remain until we are called out of it.” Confirmation after confirmation followed, and eight months later, we moved back to the Netherlands.

“We were called into mission work, so we’ll remain until we are called out of it.”

Now René works from Teuge for MAF International, and I work as a biology teacher at our children’s school. Each year, we ask God for a word for the new year—and this year the word was “growth spurt.” So we’re curious to see what’s still to come!