Dear Sanctuary Inn Family,
My wife, Helen, and I are investing in Sanctuary Inn because we are sold on the importance of its work. We served in Brazil for 26 years and raised three kids there. When we arrived, our children were 3, 6, and 8.
After a year of Portuguese language school, we spent 15 years serving in Campo Grande, the state capital of Mato Grosso do Sul. I taught in a seminary while Helen oversaw our kids’ correspondence homeschool courses. During those first 10 years, I taught Greek and NT courses. But so many students were coming to me saying that God was calling them to missions that I re-tooled myself and helped to start a missions degree at the seminary. I led that program and taught missiology courses for the next five years.
Our children each left us at age 18 to go to college in the USA. Their transitions to America were really tough. People would say, “Aren’t you glad to be home?” Our kids werenβt home. They really missed their Brazilian friends and life. Both of our daughters participated in a Missionary Kid Reentry Program which helped some. The transition was hard for all three of them.
After our nest had emptied, we were invited to move to Rio de Janeiro to help launch the Brazilian Baptist Convention’s World Missions Training Center. We moved to Rio de Janeiro and spent the next 10 years teaching in and helping to direct that training center. By the end of those years we had helped to train over 300 Brazilian world missionaries. Today Brazil is the world’s second largest evangelical mission sending nation.


At the Missions Training Center we were not only involved in training missionaries, but also in caring for those returning and also debriefing them. We knew of its great importance. Now as “retired” career missionaries, we get to be a part of what God is doing at Sanctuary Inn. I serve on the Board and Helen serves on the TCK Care Team which provides a debriefing program for the missionary kids who come for longer stays at Sanctuary Inn.
As of now, over 300 missionaries, including children, have come for rest and debriefing. Global Workers are coming! Since Sanctuary Inn’s inception, the mission statement has been to care for both American missionaries and for those from other nations too.
The mission statement reads, “Sanctuary Inn is an intentional Christian community to equip, refresh and restore God’s Global Workers for kingdom purposes.” I am happy to say there have been many multicultural guest couples representing India, South Africa, Germany, and more. And there have been guest Global Workers from other nations too, including Brazil!
It is a joy to be able to continue to invest in God’s Kingdom and the care of His Global Servants. Thank you for your partnership in this valuable ministry!
Mark Downing and the Sanctuary Inn Team
Sanctuary Inn Board Member


Thank you to all of you who came to our Appreciation Brunch last month. It was a joy to celebrate how God is using all of us together to pay off the property loan and build the ministry of Sanctuary Inn these last seven years. To be God be the glory!