By Karen L. Willoughby, Managing Editor
BALL – Missions is reaching out with God’s love to people across the street, down the block and around the world, heard the nearly 230 people who registered for the 2011 WMU Missions Celebration and Annual Meeting.
The event took place April 1-2 at Kingsville Baptist Church in Ball. It included missionaries from Louisiana, North America and across the globe. Featured ministries included, among others, Kingsville’s truckers ministry and the North Rapides Baptist Association’s two ministries: Hannah’s Plea pregnancy center, and Main Street Mission to the homeless and struggling in Pineville.
A ministry fair Friday afternoon and during an extended break Saturday morning helped familiarize WMU participants with these and other ministries, including Baptist Nursing Fellowship, Cast the Net of volunteer opportunities, and more.
[img_assist|nid=7260|title=WMU Officers|desc=After serving a maximum of four, one-year terms as Louisiana WMU President, Glenda Hofius of Broadmoor Shreveport passed the gavel to incoming President Salli Perry of Calvary Monroe. Re-elected (at Hofius’ left) were Margaret Freeland of First Gueydan as vice president for her fourth one-year term; Diane Blair of Simpson Baptist in her second year as secretary; and Jeannette Terrell of Calvary Bayou Chicot, in her second year as assistant secretary.|link=none|align=left|width=640|height=424]Special guests at the WMU annual meeting included Jean Roberson of WMU SBC as speaker, and the Voices of LC leading in praise on Friday. Saturday, Tobey Pitman and John Hebert spoke, with the LBC Praise Team leading in worship.
With “Unhindered” as the theme, participants heard from people taking the gospel across Western Europe, across Central Asia and across Louisiana.
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, from Hebrews 12:1 NIV, was the scriptural watchword for the event, which covered the gamut of age-graded emphases.
The new curriculum for Girls in Action was explained. It’s GA Journey, a newly-designed achievement plan that could be done individually or in age-graded groups, one journey with eight steps for each of six years. GA Camp is set for July 18-21 at Tall Timbers.
An announcement was made for this summer’s Blume, the missions gathering for teen girls sponsored by WMU’s Acteens that takes place just once every four years. It’s set for July 13-16 at Disney’s Coronado Springs Resort in Orlando, Fla.
See blumeforgirls.com for more information including purpose, costs, and activities.
Three recipients of WMU scholarships described the mission work they have done to date, and their thoughts about college-era and lifetime ministry.
Women were told about four opportunities: The national WMU Missions Celebration is set for June 12-13 in Phoenix. Women’s Enrichment Leader Training is set for June 18 at Tall Timbers. Connected – formerly WMU Church Leader Training – is set for Aug. 13 at Trinity Heights Shreveport, Aug. 20 at First Lafayette and Aug. 28 at First Amite. A 13-day trip to Thailand and Cambodia costing $4,469 from Atlanta is being offered by WMU SBC for 30 women nationwide.
One of the things WMU directors are doing across Louisiana this year is compiling a list of all the places people from the state go to do missions, and that includes in-state as well as across North America and around the world.
Tobey Pitman recently retired from the North American Mission Board, but he continues on active duty with Northshore Baptist Association.
His expertise is in community ministries, he told the WMU annual meeting participants. In his current role as community ministries liaison, he teaches people to study their community and the needs in it, and to develop ministries to meet those needs.
“North America is the third-largest mission field in the world,” Pitman said. He fired off statistics: 258 million people – three out of four – people in the United States don’t have a personal relationship with Jesus. Across the nation, 245 languages are spoken.
“We’ve got to find ways to cross the cultural divide in order to share the gospel with our world in North America,” Pitman said. He gave three simple steps to missions work:
1. Tell the story.
2. Tell the story.
3. Tell the story.
Jean Roberson of WMU SBC told the story of an elderly woman who rocked a small, dirty, smelly child for 45 minutes as the teacher repeated over and over again, “God loves you.”
Her mother was that child, Roberson said. What if that elderly woman had not taken 45 minutes to instill in the mind of an unkempt child the greatest of all good news, that God loved her?
“We are never too old or too young to shape a life,” Roberson said. “… God grant that we live unhindered – not perfect … but faithful.”
The 2012 WMU Mission Celebration and Annual Meeting is set for March 23-24 at Sale Street Baptist Church in Lake Charles. These events are partially funded by churches’ Cooperative Program giving to the Louisiana Baptist Convention.
Janie Wise is LBC Women’s Missions and Ministry strategist.