DVD, Compelled by Love, (2014)
Co-founder Iris Ministries
Missionary to Philippines, Taiwan, Indonesia, Hong Kong and London; Started missions work in Mozambique in 1995
Founded over 10,000 churches and care for over 10,000 children; oversees a national Bible college
BA & MA, Vanguard University in southern CA
PhD studies, Kings College, University of London
Husband: Rolland
Adult children: Crystalyn and Elisha
Guest Bio
Heidi Baker: Compelled by God’s Love to Act
CBN.com
–COMPELLED BY LOVE
Compelled by Love, is the new, feature-length documentary about Heidi, a modern day Mother Teresa whose ministry is based in over 30 nations around the world. The film was shot on the run over a period of 20 years, in 10 countries and on 4 continents in war zones, brothels, bushes, and Ivy League campuses, from Hollywood to Mozambique. It chronicles the power of one life fully yielded to God and the truth that love wins. “When you discover the beauty of who He is, then nothing’s hard,” says Heidi. She gives Jesus all the credit for the ministry that cares for many thousands of orphans around the world, has established many churches in Mozambique and inspired thousands of people to give their lives to missions. The film, released in January 2014, was made by Shara Pradhan, a former personal assistant to Heidi and narrated by Reverend Reinhard Bonnke.
EARLY YEARS
The film documents Heidi and Rolland’s early years in the ministry. Heidi grew up in a privileged environment in Laguna Beach, California but always loved Jesus. She had an experience at the age of about 16 that set the course of her life. Rolland was inspired by his grandfather who was a servant-hearted missionary in China and at the center of a revival that still influences the underground church in that nation more than 50 years later.
Heidi and Rolland were married in May 1980 and two weeks later they left for the mission field with simple instructions from the Lord, one way tickets and thirty dollars in their pockets. They went to Asia and founded Iris Global where they worked with the poor in the slums of central Jakarta, Indonesia and central Kowloon in Hong Kong. Jackie Pullinger’s work among the drug addicts was a major influence in their lives. Heidi and Rolland spent 12 years in Asia and saw thousands come to Jesus. In 1992 they left to do their PhDs at Kings' College, University of London, but could not stop ministering to the poor.
In 1995 they were drawn to Mozambique, the poorest country in the world at the time. They were offered a horribly neglected and dilapidated orphanage with eighty miserable orphans in rags. Alone and without support, they took over the center. Within months the children were saved and filled with the Holy Spirit, weeping while still in rags with gratitude for their salvation. Jesus provided miraculously as the children prayed night and day for their daily food. Eventually, with help they improved the center and took the children to the streets to testify to more orphaned and abandoned children. After they got up to 320 children, the government evicted them and denied the children permission to pray and worship on the property.
The children marched off the property barefoot without a home. Heidi and Rolland lost everything, but they were only beginning to taste the power of God in Mozambique. Land was donated by a nearby city and they received tents and food from South Africa. Provision came in from supernaturally touched hearts all over the world. Soon Heidi and Rolland were able to build dorms for the children. Bush pastors longed for a Bible school, and to receive what the children had received from the Holy Spirit. Graduates went out and began healing the sick and raising the dead. Church growth in the bush exploded all across Mozambique’s ten provinces.
Throughout their ministry Heidi and Rolland have endured poverty and hardships. They have been shot at and stoned. They both suffered life-threatening illnesses and were healed by God. Indeed, miracles of healing and provision are a daily feature of their lives in Mozambique. Heidi and Rolland are quick to testify that all of their success flows out of intimacy with Jesus.
IRIS GLOBAL
Today Iris Global has networks of churches and church-based orphan care in all ten provinces in Mozambique in addition to their bases in main cities. In recent years they have concentrated on the Makua, a people group of four million in the north who were listed by missiologists as “unreached and unreachable.” With tremendous help from missionaries and nationals, around two thousand churches have been planted among these people in the last eight years. Heidi is now “Mama Heidi” to thousands of children, and oversees a broad holistic ministry that includes Bible schools, medical clinics, church-based orphan care, well drilling, primary schools, evangelistic and healing outreaches in remote villages and a network of thousands of churches.
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