Partners in Kingdom Work (WNAC)

Partners in Kingdom Work

By Elizabeth Hodges, FWB Women’s Ministries Director

August 2021

Long before I became director of WNAC, I was involved in missions. My parents were college classmates of our pioneer missionaries, so we prayed for them in our family devotions. Mom wrote a missionary every week to keep them up-to-date with their classmates. Missionaries were hosted in our home and became our friends. Mom gave items to the Provision Closet and was very active in WNAC.

The cycle continued as Eddie and I was college classmates of our missionary force. We included them in our family devotions and hosted them in our home. Our children grew up “knowing” missionaries. Thank the Lord for missionary cards!

My brother, Paul, and Rhoda served a short term in Japan and then at ICA in Bouake, Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa. This gave our family an inside look at career missions.

It has been my privilege to visit many of our mission fields since becoming director of WNAC. What a joy to “see” the fruits of childhood prayers. I loved meeting people who were surprised I knew their spiritual mom or dad. To see the buildings for which our family helped raise funds. To experience the harvest for which we prayed many years. What a blessing!

Free Will Baptist women have partnered with International and North American Missions for many years. Our earliest records date back to the 1840’s. Women have financially supported missionaries, participated in various field projects, purchased vehicles (boats, horses), etc. But I feel their greatest impact has been accomplished on their knees. Our missionaries knew they were being undergirded by prayer. Many times the burden to pray was explained as the missionaries were sharing on furlough. God is not bound by time and space!

Over the past 11 years, WNAC has partnered with IM in a variety of ways as you will see. Faithful support is necessary for these Kingdom partnerships to grow. Although I am retiring, the mission carries on until the Lord returns.

I want to share with you a variety of ways WNAC has partnered with IM through the years so you get a glimpse of our partnership and the need for your continued support. Although I am retiring, the mission continues and will become an integral part of the next season just as in previous chapters of our history.

 

The Cleo Pursell Foreign Student Scholarship was created to support international students studying at our Bible institutes and seminaries. The majority of our international pastors and association leaders were trained in these institutions. What a blessing to have had a small part in the harvest that continues. WNAC also supported our stateside Hispanic Bible Institutes.

The Chamé Seminary in Panama (2011) needed upgrades in the kitchen. Industrial sinks were purchased allowing for separation of food preparation and dishwashing. A storeroom was converted to air-conditioned cook’s quarters.

IBLAC, the Bible Institute in Altimira, Mexico, hosts the annual convention. The ladies had a burden to provide bathroom facilities (2012). We helped financially so they could have facilities “like WalMart’s.”

The guest house in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire has been a haven of rest for our missionaries and mission teams for many years. In 2013 we joined forces with 1040i to replace appliances and provide needed household items.

We provided a keyboard for the Seminary of the Cross Bible Institute in Reynosa, Mexico which was also used with a church plant meeting in their facility (2013).

The Cuban Association of Free Will Baptists hosted a retreat to train leaders in their churches (2013). We sponsored 300 women.

WNAC sponsored a women’s ministry leaders’ retreat in Kazakhstan and another in Tajikistan (2014). Fifty leaders were invited to participate in each retreat. WNAC’s board and office staff ministered to these ladies. Various states provided requested items for the gift bags. How blessed we were to hear their stories, be challenged by their faith under such persecution, and experience their joy in service.

We began a laundry room project at the Cedars of Lebanon Seminary in Cuba in 2015. This enabled students to meet a basic need on campus once it was completed in 2017. We furnished their student lounge with necessary kitchen items.

French believers won through the JPense ministry wanted to bless a similar ministry in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire (2015). Missionary Lydie Teague had translated discipleship materials into French for seekers who had attended a JPense event. We helped the French believers purchase an entire set of these materials for the university ministry in Abidjan. This is a full-circle story!

Our FWB women hosted an Ivorian retreat for over 500 women (2016). Ladies came from our churches all over Côte d’Ivoire. Many would not have been able to attend had the fees not be underwritten by their American sisters. One of my favorite memories was watching these ladies see and experience the ocean for the first time. They were seeing enough water to visualize the parting of the Red Sea and Jonah being swallowed by a big fish.

The Oklahoma Women underwrote the Uruguayan Ladies Retreat (2016). We partnered with them by providing items for gift bags (2016 and 2017).

In 2016 we began raising money to provide airfare for the Cuban Medical Team to get to Côte d’Ivoire. Dr. Katuska, her church-planting husband, two children, and Lazara, the X-ray technician were commissioned by the Cuban Association as missionaries to the medical station in Doropo, Côte d’Ivoire. This is another full circle story….the harvest of our pioneer missionaries.

A Cuban Ladies Retreat was a decade-long dream for our Cuban sisters (2017). WNAC raised funds to underwrite the retreat providing for 400 women. We gave our retreat supplies luggage to the Cuban Medical Team meeting another need. Leaders from our Panamanian Women’s Ministry joined with us to provide most of the teaching. After the retreat, the three countries had a strategic planning session regarding the issues we all face in women’s ministry. Another full circle story involving partnerships between mission fields.

Panama captured our attention in 2018. We provided airfare for Keila Delgado, a featured speaker for the Panamanian Ladies Retreat. A month or so before the retreat, the director of the Panamanian Women’s Ministry sent an email sharing her burden for 40 unbelievers to attend the retreat. She didn’t want to charge them fees yet knew the costs had to be covered. State WAC groups joined together and raised those fees. Only 13 of these ladies came, yet 7 accepted Christ during the retreat. The Panamanian leadership hosted Ladies’ Day Events in the home areas of the 27 who did not attend the retreat. Six (6) who accepted Christ during these two events!

This same summer the director of the Panamanian Youth Camp challenged his teens to bring unsaved friends to camp. He budgeted for 12…..56 registered. State WAC groups again joined forces to cover the camp fees. 50 of these young people attended camp that week. 28 responded to Christ!

The Bulgarian Ladies’ Retreat was hosted for 35 women (2018). Two of our West Virginia officers assisted with the teaching. Seven (7) unbelievers attended and two began attending services afterward. As the missionaries shared, “This is unheard of in this ‘hard place.’” We have been able to provide gift bag items for two more of these retreats (2019 and 2021).

Women in the USA began supporting the ministry of the Women’s Center in Bondoukou, Côte d’Ivoire in 2013. The Ivorian women began raising funds in 2009. They received two grants of $100,000 each from the FWB Foundation. Their hard work culminated on March 7, 2020, with the dedication ceremony. We provided gift bag items that were added to those Mme. Solange purchased. The 13-member team was a joint effort of THP, IM, FWB Foundation, and WNAC.

Gift items were sent to France (2021) for their women’s retreat which was canceled in 2020 due to covid-19. Included were handmade dishcloths donated by a former missionary, Tom McCullough’s 92-year old mother. She wanted to bless the women in the country her son loved so much.

Philip Bonsu and his family have been approved for an internship with Connect Church in Russellville, AR. Philip received the Cleo Pursell scholarship as a student at the Bible Institute in Bouna, Côte d’Ivoire, and when he was in university in Abidjan. This year (2021) we partnered with IM and 1040i to provide airfare for this family.

FWB women are heavily invested in Kingdom work. This will continue until the Lord returns or calls us home. Retirement does not hinder involvement. It may just look different and I look with anticipation to how God writes this next chapter in my life.

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