I will be returning to Vietnam in a few weeks, where I will be giving lectures to art students at five different universities. I will be speaking about how art was given by the Creator to show how we can experience wholeness and how we can experience healing in our lives. I will be using my own art to illustrate the lectures and will answer many questions.”
Pastor Cuong Ngo was born in South Vietnam in 1970, where his family experienced war, violence, starvation, and fear. It was a terrifying time. They were often hungry, hiding, and running from danger. He does not have many good memories from those years.
Pastor Cuong’s father was an artist, and the government put him to work painting victory murals and portraits of Ho Chi Minh all over town. Father needed a helper, and Cuong got the job.
“I learned quickly, and painted whole walls with victory murals, and so many portraits that I could almost do them in my sleep.”
As the American army left Vietnam, they organized a rescue for Vietnamese who had worked with their army, and for the Vietnamese children who had American soldiers as fathers. Cuong had an adopted brother who was half American, so his entire family was taken to a refugee camp in the Philippines. At the camp American soldiers tried to teach the refugees how to speak English, and to help them know what to expect when they would land in America.
“Douglas Kellum, an American soldier who had become a Christian pastor, came to our camp to teach us about Jesus. I wanted nothing to do with him. I rejected him many times, refusing to listen to his Bible words. I turned away from the pastor and refused to listen to what he was saying.”
Pastor Kellum spoke fluent Vietnamese and was able to explain the Bible verses clearly. Cuong’s mother loved hearing the stories about Jesus, and about love, grace, and hope. Every day, often many times each day, she urged Cuong to join her and be baptized as a follower of Jesus. Again and again he refused, but after almost six months Mother’s love finally broke through his angry heart. Cuong agreed to listen, and to be baptized in the muddy river near the camp.

Hearing God’s Voice
Cuong and his family were finally released from the camp and sent to their new home in Oregon, USA. When they landed at Portland International Airport, their baggage was very light, and they did not know enough English to read the airport signs.
“At the airport we were met by a Vietnamese Seventh-day Adventist pastor who spoke both English and Vietnamese, and who quickly brought us into his church. Before long he had all of us in the pews singing hymns.”
Yet Cuong wasn’t happy. He often stood alone, observing, painting, empty, seeing nowhere to go. Finally, unhappy with his unsettled heart, and knowing that he needed to find himself, he slipped away from home and traveled to San Francisco, searching for something to fill the empty hole in his life.
“I found it there,” Cuong smiles. “Not in the stores or the buildings or the culture, but in the flowers, the trees, and the beaches. They spoke to me of Jesus, and the more I listened, the more I felt He was talking to me, loving me, and giving me reasons to accept Him fully.”
Back home with his family, he developed a passionate commitment to Jesus and was eager to learn even more. He dreamed that someday he might even be able to be like Jesus, bringing healing and transformation to the lost.
“I was always drawing,” Cuong says, “using art to describe how I was hearing God’s voice.”
Service at Home and Abroad
Cuong earned degrees in theology and art at Walla Walla College and Andrews University. After completing his Master of Divinity degree at Andrews University, he returned to Oregon to serve as pastor of his own Vietnamese church in Portland, a position he has held for 22 years. In 2015 he wrote his dissertation for a Doctorate of Ministry in preaching.
“Of special value to me are the seven years I spent doing prison ministry in a maximum-security penitentiary. Those weekly visits and Bible studies inspired my love for Jesus and added new depth to my preaching, my writing, and my art.”
In 2010 the country of Vietnam gave Pastor Cuong permission to hold a seven-sermon evangelistic series in old Saigon, the first Adventist public evangelism since the end of the war. He preached several more series during the next several years, and in 2023, universities in Hue and Saigon invited him to give lectures to the art students. The pavilions were packed full, with students, professors, and administrators in attendance. Everyone stayed longer than expected, and the faculty was pleased.
“The university president in Hue has told other universities about our experience together, and now I have been invited to give professional lectures at five universities in my home country. They are also asking that I do an art show while I am there.”
Pastor Ngo’s ministry includes four weekly Zoom programs that have more than 1,000 subscribers from around the world participating each week. His classes are often about the beauty of God’s seven days of Creation, teaching students how to use art therapy to help heal hearts and guide listeners to follow God’s map to wholeness.
“I teach about how you can have freedom in your heart, freedom from your conscience, freedom to become whole and to thrive. The people are eager to learn, and crowds follow me to talk about my art and to hear more of God’s message.”
The carefully painted details in Pastor Cuong’s portraits tell stories, revealing truths about the person’s choices, challenges, and hopes. Look deeply into the eyes, and you will see God’s transforming love.
“I am very optimistic about life today, despite all the troubles in the world,” Pastor Cuong says. “I see life as beautiful. Whenever I feel discouraged, I walk into God’s nature, and there He heals me. It’s as if the flowers, grass, and birds all speak His love to me. That gives me hope and makes me whole again.”
“I want to go to heaven.” Pastor Ngo leans back in his chair beside his paints and brushes for a moment, allowing his mind to travel far away. “But while I’m here, I want to care for my brothers and sisters around the world, to help them see the beauty that God has placed all around them. Seeing that beauty will help them see how God is also growing His wholeness within them.”