Texas-based missionaries offer ministry of reconciliation in Macedonia_53104

Posted: 5/28/04

Texas-based missionaries offer
ministry of reconciliation in Macedonia

By Charles Richardson

Hardin-Simmons University

ABILENE–Arville and Shelia Earl, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship workers in Macedonia, have spent the spring on home assignment in Abilene from their “ministry of reconciliation” to ethnic conflict in the Balkans.

Former Longview resident Sheila Earl is working toward a master of divinity degree at Hardin-Simmons University's Logsdon School of Theology with hopes of completing the program in 2005. Her husband, who claims Marshall as his hometown, has been working on a research project while in Abilene.

The couple have been living in a missionary residence furnished by Abilene's First Baptist Church. They are scheduled to return to their missions assignment in the summer.

The Earls were missionaries with the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board in Burkina Faso from 1980 to 1992. They were appointed by the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship in 1994.

They first were sent to Eastern Europe in August 1994. In 1997, there was an uprising in Albania, and all non-essential personnel were evacuated.

“We were in the States because of Arville's father's death,” she said. “Once things settled down, there was a huge influx of missionaries to Albania. … In 1997, Albania had more missionaries per capita than any other country in that part of the world.”

She said she and her husband decided to go to a place where Albanians had not been reached with the gospel message.

“In consultation with our Albanian Team and the CBF office, we decided to relocate to Macedonia and live in the western part of the country where the largest number of Albanians were located,” she said.

Soon, the Kosovo war began, and they found themselves located “a few miles from two of the refugee camps in Macedonia. We had tremendous opportunity to minister to Kosovar Albanian refugees, who prior to this time, had been isolated across the border from Macedonia,” she said.

Once the refugees returned to Kosovo, the Earls were able to help them rebuild their lives.

Team members of the Earls “had numerous opportunities” for ministry among the refugees, she recalled. “There is now a church established in Rrahovec (near Gjakova) that was started by a Kosovar-Albanian woman, Eliza, who returned home with the gospel message.”

Since 1999, they have been witnesses to ethnic conflict in their part of the Balkans.

“We have seen long-standing animosity seethe and boil, finally exploding into open warfare,” Mrs. Earl said.

“We have been involved in ministry to refugees who fled their homes to escape the ravages of ethnic cleansing.”

With the intervention on the part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the United Nations, the armed conflict ended. “We prayed for direction in terms of how to demonstrate the love of Christ in these circumstances, and after some weeks, felt a very decisive sense of calling to be involved in a ministry of reconciliation,” the CBF missionaries declared.

They opened a Center for Ethnic Cooperation in Gostivar in the fall of 2001.

“Since opening the center, we have had meetings on a continuing basis that brought Macedonians and Albanians, Turks and Gypsies (Roma), together around the table to talk in a non-threatening environment,” she said.

The Center for Ethnic Cooperation in Gostivar also offers English as a Second Language classes, women's-interest seminars, and a large array of volunteer-based ministries. Wilshire Baptist Church of Dallas has supported the ministry.

“Friendship crosses all cultural barriers, even language barriers at times, and is truly a gift of God. It seems that friendships grow deeper and more meaningful when trust and cooperation are part of the equation,” she said.

Her husband added: “We thank God that he has called us to this ministry of reconciliation and that he has given us the opportunity to see it come to some measure of fruition.”