Randy and Janet Adams

Medical Evangelism and Church Planting in Taiwan

At the age of 16, Randy, a North Carolina native, gave his life to Christ. God not only transformed his heart, but led him to give up his interest in engineering to study medicine. Ministering to people had become a priority for Randy. As a doctor, he felt he could more easily care for people’s physical, emotional and spiritual needs. During his college years at UNC-Chapel Hill, Randy got involved in Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship. At the 1976 Inter Varsity Urbana Missions Conference, he signed up to do a short-term mission trip in Alaska. It was also at this conference that Randy and Janet became more than just friends.

Janet was born in South Korea where her parents served as medical missionaries. Meeting Christians as a student at UNC-Chapel Hill, brought Janet back to Christ after years of spiritual wandering. Randy was one of these influential Christians she met, and they were married in 1978.

After medical school and residency, Randy worked as a Family Practice doctor in a rural community in North Carolina. On a trip to Taiwan in 1984, the Adams were deeply burdened by the spiritual darkness they saw on this island. They began exploring and praying about opportunities to serve in Asia as missionaries.

In 1987, Randy and Janet with two sons, Nathan and Josh, joined OMF International and began serving in the rural community of Hengchun on the Southern tip of the island of Taiwan. Their third son, Isaac was born in Hengchun.

Randy volunteered in local hospitals in Hengchun, sharing the gospel with patients and hospital staff. Besides medical evangelism, the Adams did church youth work, Bible teaching, discipleship and, in 2003, started a house church. In 2008 Randy and Janet moved from Hengchun to Taipei in the North of Taiwan to continue house church planting.

Their vision is to see working class people of Taiwan come to Christ through planting lay-led house churches. The Adams hope to train new believers to share their testimonies and teach chronological Bible stories in everyday Taiwanese. As people come to faith, they hope to train house church leaders who can, in turn, train future leaders.