She left home to be a domestic helper, but returned to plant churches, feed the poor and foster 15 kids

When her father passed away, Inda* made the difficult decision to come to Singapore to work. All her older siblings – four sisters and a brother – were married and she was the only one left to support her mother and younger brother.

“I could make more in Singapore than in Indonesia. Everyone in my country knows that if you go to other countries to work, you can earn a lot more money.

“I was proud to be able to do this. It was for our future. We could buy a house.”

So despite the fact that she was frightened because she had heard “a lot of news about girls not treated well by employers”, Inda, then only 22, became a domestic helper in Singapore. It would be the first time she had even travelled out of Indonesia.

That decision would forever change her life.

A home of love  

The family with whom Inda worked – a husband and wife and their two daughters – was nothing like what she had feared.

“Before I went to Singapore, I met other domestic helpers at an Indonesian agency. They were all returning to Singapore to work and they shared with us what it was like. They told me that in Singapore, you can’t eat with the employer.

“But I ate with my employers at same table. If we went to restaurant, they put food on my plate. They serve me like they serve their children. They speak nicely to me and treated me with a lot love,” said Inda, 47.

Her Ma’am was particularly kind to her. Inda knew no one in Singapore. So her Ma’am became her confidante.

“If things happen, she would tell me to pray. She likes to pray and she is very close to God. Ma’am would also tell me about God.”

In turn, Inda loved her young charges, aged two and one at the time she started working with the family.

A heart ready for God

Three years into her employment, Inda unexpectedly encountered God. She was in the cry room caring for the younger of the two girls when she witnessed the speaker miraculously healing people.

“I thought it was so great, the healing. I had never seen anything like that before. I saw them praying and becoming so free. I suddenly had questions: Why can this thing happen?”

Then she burst into tears.

Asked why this particular worship service impacted her so much, Inda told Salt&Light: “My situation this time was not good. I just didn’t feel good.”

The year before, after completing a two-year contract, Inda had gone home for a break. Her mother had arranged for her to marry the village chief’s son. Inda had demurred. She’d wanted to return to work in Singapore.

“I was scared these two girls would be bullied by the next helper. My ma’am advised me to go home, but I love the children.”

Against the wishes of her family, she signed another two-year contract with her employer. Her mother was furious and gave her the cold shoulder. It broke Inda’s heart.

“I thought that if this God can perform healing miracles, He can give me back my family.”

No longer alone

Someone saw her crying and told her employers. They took her aside and shared the Gospel with her. Inda did not receive Jesus then; the years of being raised in another religion held her back.

“So they prayed for me and then told me to ask God to help me whenever I felt lousy.

“I tried to do that, but every time I called on God, a voice inside me would tell me to call on another god instead.”

After that, her employers prayed with her every night.

In a testimony she shared with friends at a church, Inda said: “Every day as I did my work in the house, I would feel like there was Someone with me all the time. I knew it was God because it was a good and peaceful feeling.”

One night when her employers came to pray with her, Inda asked to receive Jesus into her life.

“I felt peace like I can face things more strongly than before. Not so poor thing. I felt I had Someone caring for me. It was nice that I first saw Jesus through my employers’ love.”

A few months later, God showed up for Inda personally. She received a call from her mother saying that she missed Inda. 

“I knew then that God is indeed real.”

And God was just getting started.

God the matchmaker

After becoming a Christian, Inda joined the Indonesian Fellowship at the church where she had made friends with other domestic helpers. She read the Bible and prayed with them regularly.

“I was really happy to be there. I grew in my faith.”

In 2005, three years after becoming a Christian, Inda went on a mission trip to Batam with the Indonesian Fellowship. On the itinerary was a visit to a Bible school and delivery of groceries to the people living in the slums. One of the students of the Bible school was asked to be their guide.

When Inda saw the young man who was studying to be a pastor, she felt “a very special feeling”.

“It was not a normal feeling. The feeling was from God. He was showing something to me.”

She could not stop thinking about him.

“I prayed and I cried to God and asked Him, ‘Who is this man? Why is he special to me?’

“God said, ‘This is the man for you.’ He showed me that this was the man He had prepared for me.”

Inda confided in the leader of the Indonesian Fellowship in her church who called her Indonesian contact, the head of the Bible school in Batam, who gave Inda the man’s contact.

“I contacted him first.”

The man is question was Berkah*. He, too, had noticed Inda.

Said Berkah: “I had no idea I would marry her. I just liked her.”

The two started texting each other. On occasion, Inda would visit him in Batam with the people in the Indonesian Fellowship as chaperones.

Two years later in 2007, they got married at the Bible school in Batam.

Said Berkah: “She’s very pretty and this girl can do ministry with me, go for mission trip, very caring to people. Wah!”

Open doors  

Inda remained in Singapore for another two years to finish her contract, working 12 years in all with the same family.

Berkah became a pastor in Batam, preaching at the youth service, leading worship and ferrying members to and from worship services. Inda joined him in 2010 to pursue a Bachelor of Theology.

But within a year, tragedy struck. While pregnant with their first child, Inda contracted rubella. She became very ill and lost her baby.

“I felt so sad. Why did this happen to me? But I didn’t blame God. I had faith. My husband also never blamed me. He said, ‘Just go on. No baby also happy.’”

Added Berkah: “I believed God had a big plan for us.”

Indeed, God would give them a family far bigger than they could ever have planned. But first, they had to move to another part of Indonesia.

In 2015, Berkah was asked to pastor a church in Borneo.

“We said we would pray,” said Berkah. “We told God, ‘If You want us to go, open the door so it will go smoothly.”

And it did. To move to another part of the country, they needed to get a transfer letter from the government. This was usually a tedious process that took a long time. When Berkah showed up to get the letter, it took less than an hour. Others had waited all morning and still had not received their papers.

Said Inda: “When he got home, we said, ‘Praise the Lord.’”

In Borneo, they experienced another open door. They needed a new identity card which usually took a month. They got theirs in less than an hour.

Said Berhan: “After that, we said to God, ‘Enough confirmations.’”

The Lord added to their numbers

The church in Borneo was tiny, just about 15 people. Nearly a decade hence, it has grown to almost 100 strong.

The couple also plants churches in other parts of Indonesia whenever they can get a building in which the people can worship. They then train graduands of the Bible school in Batam to pastor those churches. They have three church plants.

“We prepare a new pastor to run the church plant, mentoring him. We pray for the place, go to the place and prepare it.”

They have a feeding programme as well.  

It started with visiting the homes in the area to share the Gospel. There was one particular household of an elderly couple and their two granddaughters that caught their attention.

“The parents had divorced and left them with their grandparents. We passed by their hut. It wasn’t even a proper house.”

The couple began by giving this family food once a week. News of this spread and soon they were feeding 25 to 30 needy people every week.

From the feeding programme came the fostering of children.

“We meet children, we see the need. I asked a boy, ‘What grade are you?’ He said, ‘I don’t go to school.’

“Another girl, we asked, ‘How is school?’ She said, ‘I don’t go to school. I stopped a few months ago.’”

Husband and wife decided to take in these children from homes too poor to provide for them.

“The parents are willing. They tell the children, ‘This is your papa, mama. You must listen to them.’”

They now have 15 foster children, aged eight to 28, from troubled or impoverished homes, as well as a five-year-old they adopted. Berkah’s belief that God would give them a big family has become a reality. One of the boys they took in has a mother suffering from mental illness. His father left the family for another and so Inda and Berkah care for the boy’s mother as well.

“He has graduated from secondary school. Now he helps us to do ministry, playing the guitar and keyboard. My husband taught him.”

As early as 2003, the year that Inda got baptised, God had already prepared her for this ministry.

“I saw a picture of these children with dark skin on the calendar in the room of my employer’s children. They were poor children.

“I cried and bowed my head and prayed, ‘Lord, I want to be like those people in the picture. I want to feed these children, too.’

“Now I understand because I am feeding a lot of people physically and spiritually.

“It is God who has given us hearts like that, able to love children. To us, they are our children.”

The God who gives

In the past 10 years, they have seen God’s hand firmly on their lives. In the beginning, money for the feeding programme came out of their own pockets. From 2020 to 2023, they had a sponsor.

“In 2024, nothing yet. But God will provide,” said Inda confidently.

They have seen enough of God’s providence to not be fearful. In 2020 as Covid overcame the world, a company learnt that they were caring for many children. They donated so much rice, oil and groceries to the couple that it lasted them two years. They were even able to share the supplies with the local community.

On another occasion, they needed a bigger fridge to store food for their feeding programme and also to feed their growing brood. A company donated one to them.

Recently, they needed new shoes for the children and new foldable mattresses.

Recounted Inda: “We fasted and prayed. Then a community leader came to ask us what we needed. We asked him if it was okay to ask for more. He said it was. So we told him we needed mattresses, shoes, a fan, a gas stove and a freezer.

“A week later, all those things came to our house. We were so happy, we cried. And they gave even more. We asked for five mattresses, they gave us 10. We asked for a fan and they gave us three.

“God has always provided for us. He knows our needs even before we know it.”

*Names have been changed for reasons of protection and privacy.

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