WEST AFRICA – Going “on mission” with the gospel for many Missouri churches often means a weekend project or week-long trip with a partner church.
However, First Baptist Church Troy began going on mission 3-1/2 years ago in a work that will last a generation. First Troy’s commitment to a “generational missions” program involves a 40-year focus on a community in western Africa.
The village of about 1,000 is “completely Muslim,” according to First Baptist’s pastor Richie Rhea. For its protection as well as the safety of church members, Pathway is not identifying the African country or the village.
Rhea says that when the church undertook this mission it understood that a different approach was necessary.
“The people in the village have been Muslim for centuries,” Rhea says. “It may take a whole generation of people going until the light turns on and the gospel is understood and received.” First Troy teams committed to make three to four trips a year to the village.
Church member Diane Campbell – wife of Twin Rivers Baptist Association Director of Missions Brent Campbell – has been to the village twice and is going with a team in this month, the second of three trips the church plans this year.
“The village has no electricity, no running water,” Campbell says. “It’s really a slow moving life. We sit around and we do a lot of talking and visiting.”
She said the solitude required an adjustment for her. “For hours we would just sit and talk. Or just sit and not do anything. It was hard because in America we don’t just sit and not do anything.”
However, the times of inactivity provide opportunities to build relationships and talk about their lives, she says.
Campbell says that the women of the village and the church often have similar stories when talking about their families and husbands. “No matter what the culture we have a lot of the same thoughts.”
Sharing stories not only builds relationships, it’s also the way the mission teams speak about the gospel in a place where the Bible hasn’t yet been translated into the local language.
“We’ve put together two dozen stories from the Old Testament,” Campbell explains, “creation all the way to the crucifixion. We memorize about six stories and we share them.”
For example, Campbell says that since water must be drawn and carried from a well that provides an opportunity to talk about the woman who met Christ at a well in John 4.
Rhea says that the church teams have met no resistance in discussing Christ with the Muslims. Actually, it’s not difficult to share the gospel in the village.
“We’re sharing the gospel every time we go,” Rhea says. “They have a lot of respect for Jesus. He’s a prophet to them.”
Some villagers are open to more understanding about the Bible. “The ladies in particular seem to be extremely hungry for the Word of God,” says Rhea.
The idea of the generational missions ministry began a few years ago after Rhea heard David Platt, pastor at The Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham, Ala. speak at an SBC convention about taking the gospel to places where it hadn’t been heard.
That statement supported themes by the Missouri Baptist Convention and International Mission Board that already had Rhea thinking about a long-term work. He found First Troy receptive to the idea when it was discussed.
Church members connected him to a former missionary in west Africa who then put First Troy in touch with the village.
Once the ministry began, Rhea says, he felt it important to involve the whole church. The church gets updates 3-4 times a year from returning teams, and the ministry is integrated into other church programs.
“Children who are in Vacation Bible School now hearing about (the village) may very well be the ones one day who will be sharing the gospel as adults in the village and seeing the fruit of that,” Rhea says.
The regular work in the African community is building relationships, he says.
His daughter, Allie McMullen, befriended a woman in the village during a trip. “When my daughter married,” Rhea says, “the lady in the village sent home a wedding gift for her and some advice.”
“We’re praying so much for that first convert,” Campbell says. “It will open a whole new thing when we have that first convert in a Muslim town.”