OSP Director

Ryder and his wife, Beth, have served the Lord together in ministry for 26 years. Ryder attended Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1999 for Missions and Evangelism. He and Beth and their children served as IMB missionaries in Portugal from 2002-2004. They returned to the states to serve with Mailbox Club/Samaritan’s Purse for 2 years and returned overseas in 2007 as missionaries to Thailand. They lived and served there until 2023. During this time they established their own mission organization as the Lord focused their hearts on the peoples of the world who are oral preferred learners and in need of the gospel story through orality practices.  

Testimony:

Ryder:

I didn’t grow up in a Christian home. Most of my teenage years were spent living according to my flesh. At 20 years old I married my high school sweetheart. We struggled our first year of marriage as I continued to live selfishly. During that time my wife began to seek the Lord and renew her relationship with Christ. She wanted to attend church as things in our young marriage began to fall apart. She knew she needed Jesus. In God’s great mercy, I agreed to attend church with her. 

The first few visits of hearing God’s word were very difficult for me because I had never been exposed to God’s truth but his grace continued to draw me. After about 6 months, I gave my life to Christ. Everything changed as I began to live my life for Jesus instead of myself. For the first time in my life I experienced peace, hope, purpose and direction. 

I served in that same church for 11 years as a deacon and then an elder. God continued to call me for more dedication and service to him. In 1998 I took my first mission trip out of the country. Shortly afterwards God called me to full time missions. My wife and I took our children and began a life of service to the Lord overseas. I’m currently the founder of OSP International working among bibleless people groups in the Asia Pacific region sharing that same love and affection that Jesus demonstrated to me many years ago. 

Beth:

Sunday school, GA’s, discipleship training, and youth camps were common experiences in my childhood. At a young age I was bold to share my love for Jesus and the church. A testing of my faith occurred at the age of 14, when my parents divorced. I began to search for comfort in all the wrong places. Later I fell in love and married my husband who wasn’t a believer. I thought marriage would fill the emptiness in my heart - it did not! I cried out to Jesus and he reminded me of what I had believed and clung to as a child. Jesus became so real to me that I knew if nothing in my situation changed, Jesus was enough. I began to see my husband differently: there was compassion and desperate prayer. I began to attend church again and my husband decided to go with me. Within 6 months by God’s grace and gift of salvation, we dedicated our lives to Christ and were baptized. We stayed in that same church for 11 years, were discipled well, and served faithfully. In 1999, the Lord called us to the mission field. We have served in Portugal and Thailand (2002-2023).

​