Sarah Oyama is currently the 11th-grade Bible teacher at Heritage Christian, but what is her life story? Mrs. Oyama grew up in a Christian household her whole life, along with her parents and two siblings. Her family attended Hillcrest Christian Church, which is now the North campus, and because of this, she and her siblings attended Hillcrest Christian School. Although her family wasn’t insanely rich, her parents made it a priority to have a Christian education. After high school, she went to College of the Canyons to obtain her associate’s degree and later completed her bachelors at CSUN. She’s currently working to get her master’s as well.

Mrs. Oyama has an older sister and a younger brother that she grew up with, and she later met her husband. Kenny Oyama had also gone to Hillcrest Christian School but was a few grades below Sarah, so they had never talked. However, Kenny’s mom actually used to work at Hillcrest, so Sarah did know about the family. Both their dads are friends, and a friend of theirs decided to start playing matchmaker to get them together. For a whole year, he tried to get them to talk, and eventually, both their families got involved to help as well. Finally, they had their first date the day after Christmas at JOEY’s in Topanga Village. Over time, Sarah realized that he was the one for her when, “he was the first person that I would think about throughout the day.” They eventually got married, and she became Mrs. Oyama.

Some of her hobbies include singing, hiking or just being outside, spending time with family, and playing pickleball, even playing with Pastor Dudley a few times. Something you might be surprised to know about her is that she is really competitive when it comes to sports and is kind of a tomboy. She also played softball in high school.

Her faith in Jesus had always been a part of her life. She says, “From a young age, my parents really instilled those (Christian) values in us.” She also got to see her parents live out their faith in Christ. Throughout her life, she realized that, “every single aspect of my life was just like all centered around Jesus.” After she graduated from Hillcrest, she had a defining moment in her life, a crisis of faith, where she wondered, “Do I actually believe?”

It’s not like she lived a crazy life during this point; she just pushed God away for about a year. “I wasn’t acknowledging Him at all, like, not praying, not reading my Bible, nothing. I was still going to church and stuff, but it was all very distant. I just felt very disconnected.” She says that before this time, she was always joyful and loving, but by the end of the year, she had become a cold person and didn’t feel any love toward people. It was around this time that she met up with an old friend. Her friend noticed something was off and said, “Why don’t you love me anymore?” Mrs. Oyama says, “I looked at her and just broke down because I was like, you’re right, I don’t feel any love in my heart,” and it was then they had a long talk about her life with God. This was the moment she decided for herself to follow the Lord.

Leading up to her job at Heritage Christian, Mrs. Oyama had always worked at Shepherd Church. More specifically, she worked on the event team right after high school for six years. After that, she worked in the global outreach department at Shepherd, which focuses on missions. Speaking of mission trips, Mrs. Oyama has been on about 13 mission trips.

Her first mission trip was in high school, where she went with the school’s choir to Chile and got to live among the families there. Throughout her 20’s, she has been to Indonesia three times, the Dominican Republic twice, India, Mexico, Nicaragua, Colombia, Israel, Tanzania, Africa, and Ecuador, where she met her sponsor child. She met her sponsor child through a company named Compassion. Through this company, you can write letters to a child every month and give a set amount of money to take care of them, teach them about Jesus, and meet their hygienic needs.

Why did Mrs. Oyama begin to work at Heritage? While working at Shepherd Church, her previous job, she felt, “The phase of my life was starting to change.” Her husband was volunteering with a college group at Cal State Northridge called Young Life and was going on a trip that needed a female leader. Mrs. Oyama volunteered to go and felt a draw to this generation. She says, “I just recognized, like, wow, this generation is so open and looking for God, but they just need someone to show them.” One student in particular, named Miriam, asked to meet up for lunch because she was interested in joining a life group. Before meeting Mrs. Oyama, Miriam had never even heard of one. However, this conversation ended with Miriam accepting Jesus.

Mrs. Oyama says, “Three weeks after that, I just couldn’t stop crying, and I was like, why am I crying so much? Every time I would think about the college students or just Gen Z in general, I was like, God, what do I do?” As she felt things at her job closing down, Heritage just started popping up everywhere, in places and random conversations, but there weren’t any openings. She felt as if God was pushing her to come here, and then, a position randomly opened up. She says, “I kind of took that as God’s direction.” She has worked as the Bible teacher for a few months now and has found that the most rewarding part of the job is when any student feels comfortable talking and opening up about their life. She loves getting to listen and encourage them or give advice.

Matthew 6:33: “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” This is the Bible verse Mrs. Oyama lives by, because she wants to do everything she can in God and for Him, saying, “How can I, with the time that I have right now, unattached, with no responsibilities, what can I do right now for the Lord?” Her piece of advice for our generation is to use the time that you have to be effective for the kingdom of God.