Toby & Sara Shannon

Sara serves as OIC’s first coordinator of soul care for missionaries and relief workers. As such, she helps global servants to connect with certified biblical counselors who also have significant cross-cultural experience. Introduced to biblical counseling in 2007, she earned her MABC through Faith Bible Seminary and has been counseling since 2012.

With a heart to edify Latin American believers, Sara is also an adjunct professor of biblical counseling with both the Lima Baptist Theological Seminary and Support and Leadership Training, SALT. “Our lives have been transformed with unprecedented healing, growth and joy in the Lord! It is such a privilege to come alongside others through counseling and training in the power of the Gospel.”

Our Story

I never dreamed that I would meet my soul mate in the Peruvian Amazon… Toby, an engineer, was working with a small mission organization and I was a short-term intern with a larger mission when God brought us together in the Peruvian jungle. We married in 1983, have 4 adult children who grew up in the US, Peru and Mexico. After God led us to adopt our Peruvian daughter, Nellie, we taught in U.S. public schools for ten years.

Overseas we have served in discipleship and vocational training, more recently branching out to include adults with disabilities. Additionally, Toby directs a motorcycle adventure tour ‘business as mission’ in Peru and we both serve on-call with Samaritan’s Purse International Relief: Toby in logistics and I as a chaplain. Currently, we are extremely blessed to be able to fulfill our responsibilities primarily online, dividing our time between the U.S. and Peru.