Under the Radar

Several BBTI graduates that we must not identify serve in countries of the 10/40 window. Missionaries are most needed where they are least welcome, and we rejoice that they are declaring the Gospel in places controlled by atheists or religious fanatics. Because many of these countries have laws against proselytizing or even distributing Christian literature, missionaries must operate under the radar. We must be especially careful not to expose them as missionaries; our carelessness with social media or the internet could cause them to be expelled from their country or worse.

Brother C—— and his wife S—— were recently expelled from a large Muslim country. They are working and praying for visas to return. In the meantime, they are conducting Bible studies with their people by Zoom.

T—— and his wife C—— live in the Middle East and are currently helping individuals who are escaping from the Taliban. They are helping these desperate souls with food and of course, a Gospel witness. Their young son does not want the Taliban to be killed because he does not want them to go to hell.

P—— and L—— have worked very hard learning the language in their Communist Asian country. He was able to preach and teach over twenty times this last year, and L—— has also taught several lessons. C—— and K—— have worked in the same country for many years. C—— is busy teaching in a secular university, preaching in secret church services, and helping with a Bible translation project.

J—— and K—— work in a different Communist Asian country. They too have learned a difficult, tonal language. They have endured a severe lockdown, but they get out to visit people as much as possible without getting into trouble with government officials.

R—— reports that she is making good progress learning her new language. Her country is not closed, but she plans to work on a Bible translation project for a large people group in a neighboring Muslim country that is very unfriendly toward Christians. This means that R—— will need to learn two languages. We are praying for others to join this project in the days to come.

K—— and his wife Y—— have been in the states taking care of necessary family business, but they should be back in their country by now. Brother K—— is working hard to learn the language while Y—— already speaks it well. Their country is not closed to missionaries, but they hope to reach another nearby country that is very closed.

J—— and N—— desire to return to their field. They thought they had all the necessary paperwork together only to learn that the rules had changed, and they needed to show proof of the COVID vaccine along with their visa application. The next possible date to submit their visa request is in January.

C—— and B—— want to return to their Communist country in Southeast Asia to continue their language learning. Pray their new visas will be issued soon.

It seems to be the COVID restrictions that are hindering J—— and T—— from returning to their ministry. God has been using them there in a very special way, and the enemy does not like it!

S—— and M—— are doing unusually well raising their support, but the Communist country where they originally planned to work is completely closed. So instead, they are looking at Thailand. We will keep them unnamed because they might go to the Communist country in the future.

Winter 2021-22

Darkness and Death

To many in our world, sickness and death are never due to natural causes but always to some evil activity of spirits. People make sacrifices to protect themselves from sickness, to insure the fertility of the land and the women, or to bring the rain. There is usually a shaman or witch doctor who is the expert in communicating with the spirits. The spirits tell him or her what remedy is needed for healing or who is guilty of placing the curse that caused the sickness.

This is the world that a missionary comes to and the culture that he must understand and contend with. The following narrative was written by Mary Beth Snyder, who serves with her husband, Sam, in the remote mountains of Gulf Province, Papua New Guinea (PNG).

We have heard the hopeless sound of wailing off and on this past week, for the family across the road lost a son, a brother. Today, Leland said it reminds him of the man in Pilgrim’s Progress who was in a cage yelling, “No hope!” The young man who died, electrocuted in Lae, had adamantly opposed the mission, and Sam remembers it well. His father is a papa graun (landowner) who has consistently shown interest in gaining material possessions and may be involved in witchcraft. The young man who died has been mostly away from the village for the past several years, and it is sad to know that he was so close to the Gospel in the past but rejected it. We went over to be with family and friends this afternoon and sat on the ground with the grieving. A young child coughing with the ever-prevalent kus (mucus) and the dirtiness of it all is a stark reminder that the ground is cursed, full of disease and death. Tears dripped down my face.

Our Papua New Guinean surroundings boast abundant natural beauty. While hearing tropical birds sing and enjoying occasional butterflies floating by banana trees in the midst of lush mountains surrounded by misty clouds, I can imagine what the paradise of creation may have been like. Reality sets in when I hear the cries of children in the clinic, when I assist mothers in childbirth, when pouring rains drench the clay-like ground making it hard to grow food, and when our feet are habitually coated in mud. Today, the curse was more evident than other days as I sat and watched our friends sobbing, wailing, and falling on the casket. Actually, it is a blessing that there is a casket. This young man died in a coastal town many kilometers from here, and it took over a week to fly his body back to our airstrip. Sam then drove it here in the ATV. Another haus krai (funeral) I attended several years ago involved the typical practice of people wailing over and hugging the dead body.

We have heard reports that Covid is hitting hard in the towns the past two weeks. On top of that, its spread is even more inevitable because of the large town gatherings to honor the recently departed Grand Chief Somare. As I watched people hug and sob face-to-face today, the nurse in me saw how easy it is for sickness to spread. We customarily shake hands with those who offer their hand, make sure we wash our hands well when we get home, use vitamins and oils, and pray for protection from disease. Our good friend and only believer in that family had just returned with his dead brother’s body from a major town, and we shook his hand. Some things are just too culturally important to shun, for after health teaching is done and customs don’t change, it is best to avoid stumbling blocks. One consolation is that the temporary mourning tent, church building, and clinic are all airy.

Reminders of the curse are everywhere the past few weeks. Another elderly man, the papa graun of the mission property took another wife. He has had multiple wives in the past and many children, but he has not taken care of them well. Before our arrival, he made a profession of faith, but he has not attended church for a while now, blaming it on a sore leg. His wife and daughter attend church regularly. It is sickening to find out that he had his eye on a young girl from another village and that he and her family went through with the arranged “marriage.” It is child abuse. He must feel that he is powerful enough to take or buy what he wants, no matter the cost to others. It is sickening and infuriating and has been heavy on my mind this week. While I battle with anger, I really do pity him. How many sermons has he heard? How many verses has he listened to? How many chances has he had to follow the light? Yet, he seems to delight in darkness. He also lives almost across the road from the church buildings. Incredibly sad. Marriage is sacred and the first institution God ordained, and, of course, our enemy attacks it in any way he can.

After the children and I were back home from visiting the haus krai, a man, carrying an old lady who had been brutally bitten by a pig, came to the clinic. The pig unexpectedly bit off many of this poor woman’s fingers. The nurses gave her an injection of pain medicine, and Sarah drove her in the ATV to the small hospital at the airstrip. Tommy quickly mentioned that it could be that an evil spirit had entered the pig. Witchcraft is a reality in some situations.

In PNG, it is a common belief that grief shown at a death can assure that the dead spirit will not be angry, but instead, will bring blessing on the living. The Bible teaches that when we die, our spirit goes to heaven or hell; it does not linger around the village. Do our believers not understand that, or are they wailing to simply show their grief culturally, or do they wail because they realize the man was not a believer?

Sam is getting over a respiratory virus. His nose has been bleeding off and on, which could be from the infection or because he was hit there several months ago by an angry man who came up behind him when he was working on the road. God protected Sam and others and the situation was finally resolved. This morning, a woman came to the clinic with a severe knife wound to the back of her head, inflicted by her husband. She was returning up the mountain from the haus krai and was attacked by her jealous older husband when she did not hand over enough money she was supposed to have made at market. Later in the day, someone came running and said that when they were digging the grave at the village about a mile from here a man fell into the hole and was injured.

Our children are not completely sheltered from violence, anger, greed, decayed wood breaking and causing a bridge to collapse, nor from the sting of death. Though the sadness is a little sobering for our children, it has opened up good discussions on sin, sickness, Satan, and salvation. We can enjoy the beauty of God’s creation, but it is groaning.

While we see some encouraging progress in the lives of several believers, in the Bible Institute, and in the growth in new church music, Satan is not content to lose a foothold here. Spiritual oppression is evident. We are in a war. But we know Who the Victor is, and we are on His side. Greater is He that is in us than he that is in the world. As I recently taught in Sunday School, Jesus is more powerful than Satan and his demons. This is evidenced by Jesus’ sinlessness and victory in trials, by His performance of many miracles and casting out of demons, and by His death and resurrection. He has crushed the head of the serpent and will ultimately cast him into the lake of fire. Jesus is more powerful than witchcraft. That is what we need to be talking about in our houses at night.

Satan is the father of lies and delights in destroying lives. It can seem hopeless at times, but we are not without hope. We rest in the work that only the Spirit of God can do, and we continue to give out His Word. We are here for His glory and because of His grace. He is the Light of the World. He gives eternal life: joy in this life no matter the trial, and everlasting life with Him in heaven. Those who live for the things of this world sadly only have an imperfect ground to enjoy for a short time.

White Harvest in a Dark World

Papua New Guinea is the world’s second largest island and the home of over 850 languages and people groups. In many ways it is a very beautiful country, but with its superstitions, witchcraft, vengeance, violence, and religious confusion, it is also a very spiritually dark place. Fortunately, it is considered a Christian nation with complete religious freedom, and many missionaries are taking advantage of the opportunity to preach the Gospel of Christ to its people. Among these are Joshua and Rebecca Florence, 2012 graduates of Baptist Bible Translators Institute (BBTI). On an eight-week survey trip in 2010, God broke their hearts for this dark place and showed them that Papua New Guinea was their place of service.

The early lives of both Joshua and Rebecca were blessed by godly parents, Baptist churches, Sunday School, Christian education, youth groups, summer camps, and mission trips. Rebecca was saved at age five, and Joshua, who was adopted into a Christian home at age six, made a final and effective profession of faith at age fourteen. At age seventeen, he announced his call to preach and his desire to be involved in fulltime Christian service. He graduated from Pensacola Christian College (PCC) with a Bachelors’ degree in Bible and youth evangelism and then earned a Master’s degree. It was there at PCC that he met Rebecca who became an RN, earning her Bachelors’ degree in nursing.

The Florences arrived at BBTI with baby Abigail. Later, Ruth, Titus, and Josiah were added. They continued raising support on weekends while students and finished deputation after they graduated. They survived a serious automobile accident in Tennessee without injury but totally ruined their car. However, they drove through a giant redwood tree in California with no injury or damage to their car! (Missionaries on deputation have many experiences, some wonderful, some not pleasant at all. Pray for missionaries!)

They arrived in PNG in February 2014 and live in the Western Provence city of Kiunga, a port city on the Fly River. They have established a church there, and in June 2020, they began a new church in Ningerum, located two hours north. They also began the Western Baptist Bible School which currently has ten male students. Ten pastors represent the beginning of ten churches and probably many more in the days to come! Students study tuition-free but are required to work about twenty-five hours each week developing the school campus. Joshua and the men cut the trees in the jungle and mill the lumber.

The Florence family faithfully serves in a place of spiritual darkness. They must be covered daily with the armor of light as good soldiers in spiritual warfare. God is blessing with many souls saved and lives changed. They are bringing the light of the glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ to the people and reaping a field that is white unto harvest. Thank God they are there! Pray for thousands more like them to go to thousands of other places and shine that light on those sitting in darkness and damnation.

Spring 2021

Kamea Literacy in PNG – Formerly Unwritten Language

Cherith began literacy work among the Kamea in 2009 as a single woman. Today, she continues that ministry along with her husband, Jason Ottosen. She wrote the following report of their ministry during the early days.

The four Kamea primers were finished, and I, Cherith, was introducing and testing them in local villages where they had never seen their language written. Two men, Nicodemus and Lazarus, immediately became immersed in the excitement of reading the primers. I started them both in primer one and left to visit some other villages. When I came back several hours later, they were still reading. They made it to primer three before they headed home.

As the day wore on the women got closer and closer to me. Eventually, I was able to pull out the primers and explain that the purpose of the primers is to teach them to read so that they can read the Bible. At first, they did not respond. But then I started reading to them and asked them to help me make corrections if I said anything wrong. Page after page, they got more interested, delighted in the black and white drawings and thrilled that I was speaking their talk. Every time I stopped they would say, “anta fi”(some more). They finished my sentences and often would retell the stories to new ladies walking up.

That night as we sat around the fire, Rosalyn, the pastor’s wife, spoke with tears in her eyes, “The men will learn how to read, my sons will learn to read, but who will teach the women to read their Bibles?” As she continued, I thought through a typical Kamea woman’s day—work the garden, carry heavy bilums, fetch water and firewood, fix dinner, care for the many children, do laundry, etc. Pray the Lord gives us a way to implement reading for the ladies that will make it achievable. Before heading down the trail the next morning, I sat with Rosalyn for about a half hour and told her that she could learn to read. When I opened the primer, an irreplaceable smile swept over her face. We worked through the first five pages, and if you had asked Rosalyn, she would have told you that she was learning to read.

Winter 2020-21

Whiskey Bottles in the Window

On May 10, 1968, the pastor’s wife and another lady from Beacon Hill Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas, were visiting new arrivals in their area. The house they planned to visit had whiskey bottles in the front window. The intended message was “Bad people live here; don’t mess with them.” The residents, Robert and Linda Huddleston, had bought the house and recently moved in. They had met at the Player’s Lounge where Linda was a bartender. The church ladies considered skipping this house, but they didn’t. Instead they won Bob and Linda to Christ!

Bob was born and raised in Oregon. He served as a Korean language specialist in the United States Air Force and was also trained in data processing. Linda, born and raised in Dallas, Texas, was a high school dropout but later earned her GED at Baptist Bible College (BBC) in Springfield, Missouri, where she and Bob prepared to serve the Lord on the foreign field. While a student at BBC, Bob began Maranatha Baptist Church in nearby Richland. Some of the missionary students from the nearby linguistic training school of New Tribes Mission (NTM) attended their services. The NTM people told the Huddlestons about the many unreached, Bibleless tribal people of the world, and God began to burden their hearts to reach them. At NTM, they met Baptist missionaries George and Sharon Anderson. The Andersons had left Mexico to attend the NTM Boot Camp and Language School with the stated purpose of learning all they could from NTM so they could begin a similar school to train Baptist missionaries.

That school, Baptist Bible Translators Institute (BBTI), began in September 1973 in Forth Worth, Texas. Bob and Linda were in the first class along with the Andersons and two other families. Early in 1976, the Huddlestons went to Colombia, South America, and began learning Spanish. Their BBTI training, especially the phonetics, helped them to speak the new language much better than most foreigners. Their goal was to work with unreached jungle tribes, but unfortunately, the communist guerrillas were making major inroads and controlling the jungle areas. The Huddlestons were allowed to stay in Colombia but were forbidden by the government to work in the jungle. They began churches in Villavicencio and the Llano (plains). They also began a Bible institute. During the beginning days of their ministry there, they adopted a Colombian baby girl whom they named Jody Lynn. After approximately ten years in Colombia, Bob and Linda were denied visas and were forced to leave. Jody became a US citizen at age nine.

The Huddlestons did not quit serving the Lord; they just changed locations. For the next ten years, Bob pastored the Trinity Baptist Fellowship Church in Phoenix, Arizona. During those years, Bob finished his BA and got his MA and CPE. After that, he became a chaplain in the Texas State Prison system. His bilingualism was a great help in these places. Linda also was hired by the prison to work in the mail room. All prison correspondence, entering and leaving, must be read by prison officials, and her ability in two languages was especially useful. During his tenure in the prison system, Bob began pastoring a church in the East Texas city of Jacksonville. There he taught the people why we hold to the Authorized Version of the Bible and established a faith promise missionary giving program that still continues. Bob stepped down from the full-time pastorate in 2009. He is a Trustee of Baptist Bible Translators Institute and continues to preach and serve the Lord in East Texas, witnessing in both English and Spanish as the Lord gives him open doors. The Huddlestons are helping to home school their ten-year old granddaughter. It has been over fifty-two years since they kept whiskey bottles in the window!

Fall 2020

A Postage-Stamp Call

Nathan Fritz was born into a Christian family. At age six, his father, Rocky, became pastor of First Baptist Church in Amboy, IL. Even though he heard the Gospel over and over, it was not until age twelve that Nathan truly believed on Christ as his Saviour. Tina knew nothing about Jesus until age eight when her mother first took her to church. It took Tina several months to understand her need of salvation, but when she saw herself as a lost sinner, she trusted Christ.

Nathan became interested in various countries through his hobby as a philatelist. His church supported many missionaries, including the Mumfords in France. (They served there for fifty years!) Brother Mumford, Nathan’s pen pal, sent stamps from various places, among which was a place unknown to Nathan, Cape Verde. He had no idea where this country was, but he made it a point to find out. Nathan learned that Cape Verde is a group of fifteen islands located off the western point of Africa. He now wonders why the Portuguese explorer, Dinis Dias, called it “Verde” (green). Maybe it was green in 1445, but today, with only ten inches of annual rainfall, it is anything but green. Although it is located nearly four hundred miles from the African continent, the sandstorms from the Sahara Desert cause many problems for the people of Cape Verde. As Nathan’s interest in the country grew, so did his burden for the people. Their lives are dominated by African and Roman Catholic superstitions. Several of the islands have no gospel witness.

Cape Verde was a strategic station for Portugal’s African slave trade. Portuguese involvement in slavery continued into the 20th century, but world-wide slavery to sin continues until this very day. The Fritz family is working to end spiritual slavery in Cape Verde by extending the invitation of Jesus Christ. “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). They proclaim, “If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (John 8:36).

Nathan and Tina grew up playmates and competitors in Bible quizzes. Tina became the church pianist, and they worked together in children’s ministries. Nevertheless, they did not become interested in each other until Nathan’s junior year at Crown College where he majored in missions. He graduated in 2006, and they were married a month later.

When they arrived at BBTI in 2016, Nathan and Tina had four beautiful children: Andrew, Lydia, Ruth, and Grace. Anna was born just before Christmas 2017, four months before they left for the field. Sent by their church in Amboy, IL, and aided by Baptist International Missions Inc. (BIMI), they are completing their first two-year term in Cape Verde. They are learning Portuguese, the official language, and then will learn the common Creole language. Nathan preached his first sermon in Portuguese after eight months. He teaches in a seminary and also in a chronological Bible study. Both he and Tina conduct individual Bible studies. God allowed Nathan to take part in distributing the New Testament to 13,000 school children, putting God’s Word in nearly every home on the islands of Fogo and Brave.

As the Fritzes neared the end of their Advanced Missionary Training at BBTI, they said, “We couldn’t imagine going to the field without the many things we have learned here.” Later they wrote, “We are hard at language study.  I cannot begin to tell you how much we have used all the knowledge you tucked in our toolbox” (July 2018). “We were just saying AGAIN last night how much BBTI prepared us for being overseas.  Thank you both SO much for your investment in our lives” (April 2020). Pray for the Fritz family and for the many more like them that are needed right now in Cape Verde!

Summer 2020

Waiting and Working

Nat Williams FamilyNathaniel ‘Nat’ Williams was born into a Christian family in 1978 and grew up near Rochester, New York. At age five, he prayed a prayer, asking God to take him to Heaven when he died. That was his hope for the next eight years. Finally, he realized that salvation was not in a prayer or in living right, but in the sacrifice of Christ on his behalf.

When Nat was a young child, his parents became serious about serving God. The family worked together in neighborhood children’s clubs and Vacation Bible Schools. All of this was on-the-job training for foreign missionary service. Nat taught English in Taiwan, took part in literature distribution at the Asian Games, and traveled for two years with the Institute In Basic Life Principles. He planned to serve in foreign missions, but in reality, he was a missionary already. He worked while he waited.

After graduation from BBTI in 2004, Nat moved to Allentown, PA, for further training in ministry and missions at Lehigh Valley Baptist Church (LVBC). He helped organize their Missions Research Center and worked with their ministry to international students. (Later, in 2013, LVBC would send him to the field.) Nat made a ministry trip to Chile and several trips to SE Asia during these years. This was all GMT (Good Missionary Training).

While working, Nat was also waiting for something else that a missionary needs. He met her at LVBC, and again in Thailand, where she assisted in ministry for fifteen months. Anne was born in Pennsylvania in 1983. Like Nat, she made an early, but empty, profession during VBS. Outwardly, she was mostly good, but she knew something was wrong inside. She attended the Christian school but was often in trouble for cheating and lying. On one occasion she was sentenced to a two-day suspension followed by a four-week Bible study with a lady from church. The Bible study didn’t change her, but it did show her that she was lost. At age fifteen, Anne finally truly trusted Christ and was born again.

Nat and Anne were married in July 2010, and little Paul arrived two years later. (Ellen followed in 2014, and Rachel in 2017.) God had already shown Nat that he should serve in Myanmar (formerly Burma). But Myanmar is closed to foreign missionaries. How could they reach the people there?

Thailand is not closed, and it is a very strategic place for literature distribution in restricted neighboring countries. So, in 2013, the Williamses moved there. (In 2014, Nat and his team received 2,000 boxes of Burmese Scripture to distribute in Myanmar! In 2018, 25,000 Burmese Bibles arrived!) Nat and Anne went to work, learning the Thai language. They didn’t say, “We are headed for Myanmar, why learn Thai?” They are also learning the Burmese language. They continue ministering in Thailand in church planting, Bible studies, literature development and distribution, and reaching people by teaching English.

The family makes frequent trips into Myanmar even though they cannot live there yet. It is a place of much Christian nominalism. Most people have no idea what real salvation is. Nevertheless, Nat has met and helped some faithful Baptist preachers. Besides the Burmese, the Williamses also want to reach the people of other languages and ethnic groups there; many of them are Bibleless and unreached.

Nat and Anne are team players. They may not minister to thousands, but they strategize and labor, teaching individuals who may very well reach the multitudes. They have learned that God leads by opening doors and sometimes by closing them. Their record shows that they are interested in people, not places. They are working in Thailand while waiting for an open door to Myanmar.

Spring 2020

Ten Years Later

The Jason Ottosen Family—serving faithfully in the mountains of Papua New Guinea since 2012Ten years ago, we featured the Ottosens in the Winter 2009 issue of Lift Up Your Eyes. Cherith Stevens spent ten months in Papua New Guinea, and then, rather unexpectedly, God gave her a husband worth waiting for. She became Mrs. Jason Ottosen, and the two were on their way to PNG to help reach the Kamea tribe in the mountains of Gulf Province. Today, there are six Ottosens ministering there in the village of Komako! The newest missionary is nine-month old Josiah. In March 2012, Jason and Cherith went to PNG with their first daughter, Grace Elisabeth, who joined their team in September 2011. Melody Joy followed in September 2013. Their third daughter, Hannah Faith, arrived the last day of September 2016 and soon began helping to win the hearts of the Kamea people. A lot can happen in ten years!

The Ottosens began adjusting to life in PNG and learning two languages (Melanesian Pidgin and Kamea) in the village of Kotidanga where other BBTI graduates serve. A young man from Komako, a village ten hours north, walked to Kotidanga several times to attend church services and to ask for a missionary for his village. (Ten hours for a Kamea man was a twelve-hour hike for Jason.) Many others have arrived in Kotidanga, begging for church-planting missionaries for their villages. The Ottosens have made Komako their home since 2013 and have established the Komako Baptist Church.

Missionary work in Komako is not all fun and games! A church member named Ems recently died, leaving a wife and five sons. Some members of his clan blamed another clan (also with family members in the church) of killing Ems by witchcraft. Many from the two clans continued to attend services, albeit with the wrong motive. But the Word of God began to work in their hearts. Paimba, Ems’ oldest brother who was leading the conflict, got saved, as did Suwanas, another of Ems’ clan who is the oldest and most respected witchdoctor. Here, as in other places, sickness and death are not seen as the result of natural causes. There is always a hidden spiritual reason. If death is believed to be caused by witchcraft someone must pay! Only the Gospel can break this vicious cycle of ignorance and revenge.

Why would a missionary family endure such isolation and primitive living conditions in a place with no roads or electricity? Why would they pay exorbitant rates to fly in and out of their village? Why would they hike ten hours to the nearest Baptist mission to use wi-fi? Once a church member, upon hearing a missionary lady tell of the living conditions on her mission field, said, “I would not live there for a million dollars!” The missionary responded, “I wouldn’t either; but I will live there for Jesus!”

In the midst of such debauchery, superstition, violence, disease, and enormous spiritual darkness, God is at work. Scripture is being translated. Souls are being saved. Lives are being changed. And the church of Jesus Christ is being built in places where Satan has reigned supreme for centuries. We have received exciting prayer reports from the Ottosens over the last ten years. (A book needs to be written about God’s blessings!) There is much more to do.

The Ottosens desire to see men trained, serving, leading, and spreading the Gospel throughout their mountainous area. Raford Bart is one such man. He is small in stature and the youngest of several brothers, but has been very faithful to church. His faith has been strong despite being tested through discouragement from his brothers and ridicule from his wife. Recently Raford raised his hand to follow the Lord’s leading anywhere. Pray for the Ottosens as they disciple and train men like Raford.

Winter 2019-20

Missionary Grandmother

Katie always serves with a smile.It is common for a young missionary to leave his parents and take his children to the foreign mission field. In doing so, he is taking the grandchildren away from their grandparents. Occasionally, a middle-aged missionary will leave his grown children at home and go to the mission field. It is rare, however, for a grandparent to leave both children and grandchildren and go to the mission field. Many grandmothers have watched their grandchildren leave, but Kathryn Walker did it in reverse. Her grandchildren watched her leave. No doubt, this widowed grandmother loves her grandchildren as much as any grandmother could, but she felt God leading her to Africa. She left her own grandchildren safe in the care of their parents and went to help African children come to Christ.

I’ll never forget the day we met Katie. She showed up at our school at the end of a chapel service. We had a guest speaker that day, and there was a lot of activity. I was able to give her only half of my attention. She said, “I am Katie Walker. I’m going to Kenya, Africa, and some people have told me I need to attend BBTI. What do I need to do?” I found her an application and said, “You just need to send us this.” With that she was gone. I would never reveal a lady’s age, but that was in the fall of 2008, and she was fifty-six at the time. I said to myself, “We will never see this lady again.” But we did! She sent her application and was sitting in the classroom in August 2009. She did well in the classes and graduated the following May.

Katie did not grow up in a Christian home, but her parents allowed a neighbor lady to take her and her sisters to church. She was saved at age twelve or thirteen at a church camp. She recounts, “I will never forget how I felt His love, and I knew that something in me was different!” Without the help of godly parents, her spiritual growth was slow. She laments, “I did not know about giving myself fully to Him. I thought being saved was all I needed. Oh, if only I had known and understood then how much more there is, my life would have been so different!” It was not until she was married and had three children that she was baptized and began attending church consistently. Not long after, her husband was killed in a car accident.
Katie did not have the opportunity to attend college. Actually, she did not quite finish high school. Nevertheless, she did well at BBTI and kept up with the younger missionary students. She claimed no great talents or teaching ability. Katie said, “If I can do it, anyone can do it!” She did have, however, confidence that God would help her learn, and she knew she could be a servant. With that, Katie left for Africa in February 2011 and served the Lord with the Luke Shelby family in Kisii, Kenya, for the next eight years. She discipled ladies, cooked for Bible school students, did office work and tract and scripture distribution—anything to lighten the load of her fellow missionaries. Katie retired and left Kenya in June of this year. Before leaving, she prayed for her replacement. That person is at this moment sitting in the BBTI classroom, preparing to serve the Kenyans. Kathryn Walker will probably not be listed with Mary Slessor, Amy Carmichael, Gladys Aylward, or Lottie Moon as a famous missionary lady, but she has been a faithful witness and servant of Christ. She has also been a mother and grandmother to many precious African children; she will be greatly missed by them.

Fall 2019

Something to Smile About

The Hernandez family can be described as cheerful people. How appropriate for them to serve God in the Land of Smiles! Ahmet received Christ as his Savior at the age of seven. Unfortunately, as many young people do, he drifted away from the Lord, wasting precious years in the world. Rachael always believed in God. As a child, she would look at the clouds and imagine seeing Jesus coming—on a surfboard! (She lived in Pensacola, Florida, where surfing is a big sport.) It wasn’t until after she married Ahmet that she understood the Gospel and was saved.

Ahmet served in the United States Navy. While stationed in Guam, the family attended a church that was started and pastored by a missionary. Rachael remembers thinking, “I could never be a missionary!” (Strange, isn’t it, that men and women serve overseas in the military in difficult or dangerous places but going to the mission field scares them to death!) Today, Rachael feels very much at home raising her family in a foreign culture and speaking another language.

After leaving the Navy, Ahmet found work in a nuclear power plant near Zachary, Louisiana. The Hernandez family aslo found Grace Baptist Church, a very mission-minded church that was pastored by Tom Schreeder, a former missionary to Ukraine. (Today Brother Tom and his wife, Linda, are missionaries to Armenia.) It was there in Louisiana, with a wife, three children, and a good job, that God began dealing with Ahmet about missionary service. By 2008, the Lord had shown him that Thailand was the family’s place of service.

The Hernandezes began raising support and then continued deputation while attending BBTI. They graduated in May 2013. Knowing that they were facing a very difficult, tonal language, they took seriously the Advanced Missionary Training they were receiving in phonetics, linguistics, and language and culture learning. It was drilled into them, “Get the language first. Don’t get too busy in ministry and neglect your language and culture learning. Don’t rely on a translator. Language learning is your ministry!” God abundantly blessed their pre-field ministry as they worked hard and traveled many miles. They did not endure deputation; they enjoyed it! They departed for Thailand in December 2014.

The Hernandez family went right to work learning the language. Mistakes are inevitable; we call them bilingual bloopers. Rachael sent us one for our Summer 2016 issue. She wrote, “I have really come to appreciate the difference between ‘learning’ a language and ‘using’ a language. All this ‘using’ has produced an even higher amount of language funnies! I wanted to buy a notebook (sa-moot) but asked for a brain (sa-ong). I asked our new helper to wash the mattress (tee non) instead of saying sheets (paa bpoo tee non). She had no idea what I meant!” Shortly after their arrival in Thailand, the government enacted a new policy for obtaining a missionary work visa, and Ahmet had to pass the Grade 6 Thai Competency Test. He said, “I didn’t realize how fluent 6th graders are in a language until I started studying for this test!”

God gave this family opportunity to teach English at a university where they followed English classes with Bible studies. In slightly over a year, Rachael began teaching children’s Bible stories in Thai, and in a year and a half, they began the Hua Mak Baptist Church in Bangkok. Because it is an international area, they held both Thai and English services. Besides teaching English, Ahmet and Rachael have found innovative ways such as community night and basketball tournaments to reach their people. The entire family studied hard learning the language, and they work together in ministry. Grace Baptist Church did not send one missionary to Thailand, it sent five: Ahmet, Rachael, AJ (Ahmet Junior), Sarah, and little Rachael. They are giving the people of Thailand something to really smile about!

Summer 2019