It wasn’t that Melodie Lyons was purposely keeping secrets from her husband, Alan. But when she revealed during a joint interview that she had been called to be a missionary as a young girl, she realized it caught him off guard.
“I’d felt called to be a missionary ever since I was saved at GA (Girls in Action) camp but I never really said anything about it,” Melodie Lyons explained. “My husband had told me he felt called to be a pastor before we married so I just felt if God was calling me to missions, He would call Alan as well.
“During an interview for his first pastorate,” she recalled, “I was asked if I felt called to be a pastor’s wife and I said, ‘No, not really.’ I told them I had always felt called to be a missionary but felt I could fulfill that call at the mission church they were looking to call us to. But all Alan heard was the part about being a missionary and he was a little surprised.”
That was the beginning of two years of discussion, prayer and seeking scriptural guidance that ultimately confirmed for the Lyonses they were being called to serve God through international missions. A call to the International Mission Board set into motion the process that resulted in their 1992 appointment.
After Spanish language school in Costa Rica, the Lyonses were assigned to Panama where they remained until about a year ago. They are now serving in Guatemala as part of a Chronological Bible Storying (CBS) team working to reach indigenous groups in Guatemala as well as other Central American countries.
The CBS program, according to Melodie Lyons, is gaining momentum in countries such as Guatemala where people convey information largely through the spoken word.
“It’s been a good tool for the people there because there are so many oral communicators,” she said. “Missionaries have been working in Guatemala for years, but with all the indigenous groups, the people haven’t truly understood the gospel because they haven’t heard it in a form they can understand.
“We train the nationals to use Bible stories in evangelizing and planting churches using their own languages,” she explained. “There are so many different languages — 20 or more in Guatemala — that we can’t possibly learn them all.”
Working with a team led by fellow missionaries Keith and Penny Stamps, the Lyonses spend most of their time developing stories and then going out to train people to use the stories. An average day for the Lyonses may have Alan Lyons going out to do training while Melodie Lyons spends her day at the computer developing stories and running the household.
“Our evangelism set has 25 stories that are completed,” said Melodie Lyons, “but we’re constantly adding discipleship stories and church planting stories so that in the end, we’re looking at hundreds of stories.
“It takes about a day to develop a story, putting it in very simple, easy-to-understand language while staying true to the Scriptures. We want to give an oral Bible to people who may never be able to read,” she said.
When not developing stories, team members travel around to different churches and associations for training sessions.
They may go into an area for three days and do a complete series of sessions or they may go once a week over a period of time and teach a couple of stories per session.
But before training can begin, said Melodie Lyons, an enormous amount of preparation is required. The stories must be tested to ensure they are in an understandable format to be effective in spreading the gospel.
And since training consists of teaching the nationals to tell the stories from memory, the team members must also learn to tell the stories from memory.
The Lyonses first met while both were students at the University of Alabama.
Alan Lyons grew up in Decatur attending First Baptist Church, Decatur; Melodie Lyons grew up in Panama City, Fla., attending First Baptist Church there. Married since 1980, they have four children: Krista, 21; Ben, 17; Thomas, 12; and Jessica, 5.
“We’re on the 20-year college plan,” Melodie Lyons joked.
On stateside assignment since July 2003, the Lyons family is currently residing in Cullman where they will remain until Ben’s high school graduation this spring. They will then return to their work in Guatemala.
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