Updated: 3/06/07

Baptist leaders call Baugh a ‘hero’ & a ‘giant’

By Barbara Bedrick

Texas Baptist Communications

WACO – A giant in the faith: That’s how Baylor University President Emeritus Herbert Reynolds described Texas philanthropist John Baugh.

“I thought the world of him,” Reynolds said. “He was one of the all-time heroes in Texas Baptist life, as well as for Baptists in America.”

Baugh, 91, died March 5 in San Antonio where he and his wife, Eula Mae, had moved last week to be with their daughter, Babs Baugh. Services have been set for March 8, 1 p.m., at Tallowood Baptist Church in Houston.

Reynolds remembered Baugh as a fierce opponent of fundamentalism and an ardent champion of religious liberty and the separation of church and state. Reynolds recalled the book Baugh wrote in 1996, The Battle for Baptist Integrity, which examined what he saw as the fundamentalist takeover of the Southern Baptist Convention.

“I really think it was an exposé in many ways,” Reynolds explained. “It was one of the best documented works I had ever seen.”

Baylor University dedicated the Baugh-Reynolds Campus of George W. Truett Seminary, a 24,000 square foot facility, in 2002, and honored him in 2005 with the Abner V. McCall Religious Liberty Award. Baugh was also instrumental in founding Texas Baptists Committed, a mainstream Baptist group that has opposed fundamentalism.

As a Baylor regent, Baugh worked diligently for the good of the institution, Reynolds said. Considering Baugh “like a brother”, Reynolds remembered him providing both spiritual and financial guidance and support because he felt strongly about Baptist institutions and agencies.

“He, along with Mrs. Baugh and their family, have likely undergirded the work of more Texas Baptist institutions than any family in Texas Baptist life,” Reynolds said.

Baugh had been a director for the Baptist Foundation of Texas, was a founding trustee for Houston Baptist University and a regent emeritus of Baylor.

Baylor trustee Emily Tinsley remembered Baugh as a “gracious giant in stature, a man of consummate faith, unyielding strength of character, and constant devotion to his wife, daughter and family.”

One of the great privileges of serving on the Baylor board was the opportunity to know him, she said.

“He was one of those unique people who set higher goals for you than you did yourself,” Tinsley said. “His vision enlightened the lives of many of us.”

His legacy also lives on at Baylor through the John F. Baugh Center for Entrepreneurship for both practicing and potential entrepreneurs. The center extends an arm of support to the local and national business community to facilitate new business and further the goals of established businesses.

It includes an Institute for Family Business, established in 1987, designed to support family business through programs, workshops, and forums that provide educational resources to help businesses survive and prosper through the generations.

Baugh is credited with a significant impact on the development of the George W. Truett Theological Seminary at Baylor. Baugh and Reynolds talked about developing the seminary in 1991, and Reynolds remembers paying Baugh a visit.

“I asked him for $10 million dollars—$1 million every year for 10 years,” Reynolds recalled. “We would not have Truett Seminary today without that initial commitment through the first decade.”

Baugh received many awards from Baylor including the W.R. White Service Award, the Alumnus Honoris Causa, The Herbert H. Reynolds Award and the Founders’ Medal.

But Reynolds emphasized these expressions of gratitude were not really something he sought at all.

“He was not the kind of individual who suggested he be recognized,” Reynolds noted. “He just did it. He loved Baptists and Baptist work.”

Tinsley echoed those sentiments, saying, “While he received many awards in his life, none could adequately reflect the countless number of men and women he mentored to become successful and meaningful in their respective fields of work.”

Born in Waco, Baugh was 16 when he received his high school diploma. Shortly thereafter, his father died, and Baugh hitchhiked from Waco to Houston to search for a job during the Great Depression. He worked his way up to become manager of an A&P grocery store.

 As American families began a new way of life in the post-War World II environment, Baugh had a vision.

“Baugh realized that women were not going to work back into the traditional ways of cooking, so he came up with the idea of frozen foods,” and named his company Zero Foods for zero temperature. When he was 30 years old, Baugh and his wife started the company in their garage, Reynolds said.

In 1964, Baugh decided to bring together a dozen companies who had worked through Zero Foods in the frozen food business, and he created SYSCO Corporation. Leaders of the 12 institutions elected Baugh chairman and asked him to divide their holdings.

“They accepted it (his decision) because of his acumen for business and fairness,” Reynolds said.

Baugh was chairman of the board of SYSCO from 1969 to 1985, when he became senior chairman – a post he held until 1997. SYSCO is the largest marketer and distributor of food service products in the United States.

“John Baugh was an amazing and inspiring man who emerged from modest means to lead his company to be an international model for sound business success,” Tinsley said. “In spite of his lifetime of unprecedented achievements, everyone has a personal story recalling his unfailing modesty and humility.”

Baugh received the Herbert Hoover Award for outstanding service to industry and humanitarianism from the American Wholesale Group Association. He served on numerous boards including the Bank of Houston and First City National Bank of Houston.

“His example will leave a legacy in the lives of others,” Reynolds said. “He taught us some very, very important lessons.”

Baugh is survived by his wife, Eula Mae; and by their daughter, Babs, of San Antonio; two grandchildren and several great-grandchildren.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 3/20/07

BaptistWay Bible Series for April 1

Reaching beyond the comfort zone

• Acts 8:4-8, 14-17, 26-36

By Leroy Fenton

Baptist Standard, Dallas

The late Curtis Vaughn, the brilliant New Testament scholar, was my teacher for Greek in seminary. In class, a student quizzed him about the characteristics of a New Testament church. Vaughn answered, “If you want to have a New Testament church then sell all of your buildings, meet in homes, and do away with the professional ministry.” The entire class chuckled as if to say, “That’s a novel idea, but who would want to do that?”

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God has more sense than all of us and already knew the complications of the tabernacle and temple as objects of worship and the complicity of a professional ministry that gives opportunity for jealousies, arrogance, competition, pride, selfishness, ambition, moral failure and conflict. Both pastors and laypeople need to chew on that one for many different reasons. Keep this in mind as we tackle our assignment as the apostles and believers move outside their comfort zones and adopt a new and natural strategy.

Stephen’s sermon in Acts 7 not only exposes a deepening insight into Pentecost but also an explanation of what happens in Acts 8. The sermon was perfect for the moment, proved his grasp of the history of the people of God, and moved to a conclusion that has pulsating, profound ecclesiological and spiritual ramifications.

Acts 7:44-48 contains the practical, powerful truth of Pentecost, the fulfillment of Acts 1:8, that releases God from the casket of the law, the tabernacle and temple. Read the verses and capture the impact expressed by Stephen that “… the Most High does not live in houses made by men” (v. 48). In other words, get God out of the four walls and into the world of sinners and unbelievers.

Stephen understood the message at Pentecost and was hated for what he preached. Stephen boldly said: “You stiff-necked people, with uncircumcised hearts and ears! You are like your fathers: You always resist the Holy Spirit” (v. 52). Notice the counterpart, “But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit …” (v. 55).

Now consider this question, “Have Baptists become stiff-necked people who resist the Spirit of God?” Christians mouth the Great Commission but worship God as though he lives only in the church sanctuary.

The expectation is that if anyone gets saved they will have to come to church, like what the church likes, dress like the church dresses, smell like the church smells, hear what the church hears—and if they don’t like it or feel welcomed, then it is their tough luck. Hell is for those who do not like what the church likes and who do not come to where the congregation meets. If the preacher wants to hold their hand, good for him. That is what he is paid to do.

The circumstances and times are somewhat different, but the resistance to the Spirit and the worship of God is about the same as it was before Pentecost.

Stephen preached his message and was killed, becoming the first Christian martyr, while Paul stood by, receiving the clothing of the “witnesses,” who cast the first stone as required by Mosaic law (v. 58). The Spirit moved Stephen to tell the truth regardless of the cost, confront the old structures of the temple paradigm, face the lions of Zion and shove verbal rocks into their blind minds.

When Stephen was martyred by stoning, his death motivated the first and greatest missionary movement in the history of the world. The Spirit of God no longer would be contained in the walls of the church but poured out into the streets of Jerusalem. It goaded the new believers into the highways and hedges, into the streets and homes, to other people groups, and into the widening circle of Judea and Samaria and the ends of the earth.

Remember that Stephen was “just a layman” (servant, deacon). Others “had been scattered” and “preached the word wherever they went” (Acts 8:4). Stiff-necked people love to study these passages and go home after church and take a nap (the preferred Baptist hour of power). The most genuine evidence of the filling of the Spirit is the individual and congregational witness of their faith. The Spirit moves the followers of Christ out of their comfort zones to face a hostile, mocking, sinful world.

Preaching to spiteful neighbors (Acts 8:4-8)

I had a new adult Christian say to me recently, “Now that I am a Christian, I see people differently.” These new Christians looked at the Samaritans, typically hated by the Jews, and saw them as people for whom Christ died and part of the universal plan of salvation. The Samaritans were religious and were much like the Jews in worship and practice of the law. They, too, needed freedom in Christ.

With the Jewish leaders on the attack against the church, assumed to be led by Saul, the dispersion of the believers began as they scattered to protect themselves (8:1). Two words are used for preaching in Acts 8:4-5; one meaning to proclaim as a herald (kerusso) and the other to proclaim the good news (euaggelizo). Under duress and a storm of persecution (v. 1), the Holy Spirit gave them courage and boldness to keep on preaching throughout Judea and into Samaria.

Phillip, one of the apostles and not to be confused with Phillip, the evangelist, (Acts 21:8) is singled out for his success in preaching to the Samaritans, people with whom the Jews had spiteful and limited contact. Phillip is a Hellenist, a Greek-speaking, foreign-born Jew, and would have a more open mind to other peoples and cultures. Phillip was plowing new ground, seeing new vistas and opening new doors of opportunity. With the Lord in control of his life, he had a different worldview, and it came to him through the guidance of the Spirit of God.

Luke is careful to show the fulfillment of the words of Christ in Acts 1:8 and the impact that the filling of the Holy Spirit had upon these new believers who would share the gospel with anyone. Seeing the success of the gospel preached in Jerusalem, experiencing the blessedness of a common fellowship (koinonia), observing how the church loved and cared for one another, Philip wanted others to be so blessed, even those he had previously despised. Phillip saw that God accepted Samaritans as well as Jews. The Jews could never convince the Samaritans to merge, but the Holy Spirit could bring them together at the foot of the cross. The Samaritan revival began (vv. 6-8).

Preaching to Satan’s sorcerer (Acts 8:14-17)

In this Samaritan city lived a man by the name of Simon, a sorcerer who “boasted that he was someone great” (v. 9). Perhaps, Simon considered himself the messiah of the world and would set himself up as a divine emanation and would use money to buy himself prestige.

A sorcerer was one who believed he could use the power of Satan to his advantage. Simon was a kind of witch doctor who made his living by deceiving people and selling his craft. He created great excitement and the people were amazed at him because he could perform magic tricks (v. 11). Simon listened and, along with many others, became a believer and “was baptized” (v. 13).

Simon was amazed at the “signs and miracles” of Phillip. Simon thought he was a quack. Simon is not unlike many people from generation to generation who are charlatans, who become enamored with Satan’s ways and powers and pretend to have them as well.

The gospel is for them, also. The apostle, Phillip, did not hesitate to preach with Simon in the crowd. He knew the Holy Spirit was powerful enough to bring conviction and repentance. There was no fear of the bewitching Simon or the consequences of his wizardry. God could change the heart of Satan’s friends with the miracle of new birth.

This passage is a curious paragraph and difficult to understand. Apparently, the apostles in Jerusalem were so enthused about the Samaritan revival they sent their best leaders, Peter and John, down to assist (v. 14).

Perhaps, they were sent down to resolve the issue which they found—faith and baptism in the name of Jesus but no Holy Spirit (v. 16). The 120 gathered in Jerusalem were believers, but they had not the power of the Holy Spirit until Pentecost. The Holy Spirit was promised and the miracle of Pentecost had occurred without the laying on of hands.

The supposition was that anyone who believed received the gift of the powerful Spirit of God. Peter and John “prayed,” interceded in their behalf and “placed their hands on them” (vv. 15-16) “and they received the Holy Spirit” (v. 17, see also Acts 19:1-7).

There is much here that cannot be explained. For our purposes, it is enough to say that we should not categorize how the Spirit comes upon us, for the Spirit comes as he wills and will not be limited to human understanding. Clearly, the apostles expected every believer to possess or be possessed by the Spirit of God.

Simon’s affirmation of Phillip’s message and baptism was not sufficient for genuine faith, probably an intellectual decision only. Acts 8:18-24 explains Simon’s mistake of trying to buy the Holy Spirit with money and Peter called for him to “repent of this wickedness” (v. 22). The story of Simon, the sorcerer, may be included to show us that true believers will receive the Spirit of God as a gift and man must not be tempted to perpetuate the Spirit of God any other way. The Spirit of God will not be used or exploited to anyone’s advantage, and especially those who use the Spirit to make money, a problem even today.

Preaching to internationals (Acts 8:26-36)

Peter and John go back to Jerusalem while Phillip responds to God’s direction and goes south to Gaza (v. 27) where he meets the African man from Ethiopia. This man represents the extension of the gospel to the “ends of the earth.” Phillip, undeterred, preached in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and extended his proclamation internationally.

The circle gets wider and wider. Phillip was a local evangelist who preached in town and state, in Samaria to despised half-breeds as a home missionary, and to a black man from Ethiopia as an international missionary. The gospel was for every race, people, country and nation of the world. The Jewish mindset had been changed by Christ to include anyone of any race.

There are many facets to this very human story of the eunuch who believed, but our interest is in the movement of national and international appeal. I do not consider him a Jew born in Ethiopia but actually a native son of Africa, a black man. He had been in Jerusalem and was on his way back home, interested but ignorant of the Scripture and of Christ. The Scripture and the Spirit prepared the Ethiopian to hear and receive the truth that Phillip taught. That is the heart of the mission strategy. He believed, was baptized immediately and “went on his way rejoicing” (v. 39).

In 1983, I went from Waxahachie to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on a partnership mission trip. At the Gloria Hotel in Rio, I witnessed to my waiter who stood at the table and bowed his head to receive Christ. The waiter was a black man, from Africa, a practitioner of witchcraft, who had come to Brazil to seek a better life. We both went on our ways rejoicing at the power of the Spirit of God.

The missional church seeks to be empowered by the Spirit of God and to move out of convenient comfort zones to take the gospel to every mission opportunity possible.

Discussion question

• Who are the people beyond your church’s comfort zone whom God is calling your church to reach toward?

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 3/16/07

How you can support ministries in Africa …

Give time.

Personally share the love of Christ with children and individuals in need of physical, emotional and spiritual aid. The Buckner missions’ office can arrange a trip for members of one church, or individuals can partner with another church group. Ministry opportunities include:

• Spend time caring for the 20 babies who will reside in the Buckner Baby Home

• Plan activities to engage foster children in Addis Ababa or children of Bantu

• Repair homes of foster parents in Addis Ababa

• Offer medical aid to children and families in Bantu

Give money.

Churches and individuals can help Buckner’s ministries by designating gifts to the Ethiopia fund at Buckner Foundation. Church members can specify their desire for donations to be placed in the Ethiopia fund, and 100 percent of their contributions to Buckner will be designated to the specified ministry. For more information, contact Margaret Elizabeth Perry at Buckner Foundation at (214) 758-8049.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 3/19/07

Pure Religion:
Volunteers export hope to African orphans

By Ken Camp

Managing Editor

NAIROBI, Kenya—Peter sat shoulder-to-shoulder with other children on a bare wooden bench. Like his classmates, he was dressed in blue and white—the uniform of the Kariobangi Baptist Youth Center.

The children’s uniforms were anything but uniform. Some students wore blue and white checked shirts or dresses. Others wore blue and white stripes. In spite of the warm day, others wore sweaters—often frayed at the cuffs and neckline—in varying shades of blue.

Children join in Bible study and worship at the Munyao Memorial Baptist Chapel on the campus of Nairobi’s Baptist Children’s Center.

But the students were uniformly bright-eyed and smiling, in sharp contrast to the many toddlers, children and teens who aimlessly roamed the streets of the surrounding Korogocho slum.

Children at the youth center come from Korogocho, one of six clearly identified slums in Nairobi. Estimates of its population range widely from 350,000 to 600,000. It’s hard to count people who don’t have homes, and hard to keep track when scores die daily from AIDS, tuberculosis and other diseases, observers noted.

Visitors with a Buckner International mission vision team brought students at the Kariobangi Baptist Youth Center large duffels filled with new sweaters in assorted sizes, as well as a variety of school supplies. But upon their arrival, the volunteers from Texas and Tennessee received disappointing news.

They brought more than enough sweaters and supplies for the 60 children known to be enrolled in the center’s classes, but when the team arrived in Feb-ruary, 210 children filled the center’s cramped wooden buildings.

The enrollment exceeds what the center can accommodate comfortably, but administrative director Euticauls Wambua Nzengu—better known as “Pastor Eutychus”—finds it hard to turn children away when their needs are so great.

The mission team sorted sweaters by size while Pastor Eutychus selected a representative group of children who immediately—and discreetly—received their prized new sweaters. Others would receive theirs as soon as a shipment could be directed to the center.

When Jay Abernathy, pastor of First Baptist Church in Palestine, led a devotional for the mission team earlier that morning, he mentioned it was his birthday. Sorting sweaters in a dark room and helping a child try one on for size, he remarked, “I can’t imagine a more meaningful way to spend the day.”

Abernathy and 14 other Baptists from the United States participated in the 10-day mission vision tour of Kenya and Ethiopia at the invitation of Buckner International President Ken Hall.

The Buckner International missions vision team found their reason for traveling to Africa in the eyes of Kenya’s children.

Buckner, a 130-year-old children and family services agency related to the Baptist Ge-neral Convention of Texas, has worked since 2002 in Kenya—home to about 1.7 million orphaned children.

Through a merger with Bright Hope ministries, Buckner is expanding its operations in Ethiopia, a Sub-Saharan nation with about 4 million orphans—about 500,000 of them affected by HIV/AIDS.

“I want you to see what is being accomplished in Kenya and what we have the potential to do in Ethiopia,” Hall told the group.

The team began their trip with a visit to the Baptist Children’s Center in Dandora, an impoverished area in eastern Nairobi. The center is a 13.5-acre complex that includes a 48-bed residential facility for orphaned and abandoned children.

“Most have been orphaned because of AIDS,” said Dickson Masindano, director of Buckner’s work in Kenya.

Most of the children—who often have been rescued from the streets—live at the Baptist Children’s Center long enough to stabilize their lives and then move into foster care.

Masindano, an Ethiopian national who earned his master’s degree in counseling from Hardin-Simmons University, developed the national foster-care system for Kenya.

In addition to the residential care for orphans, the Baptist Children’s Center includes a school; a church, the Munyao Memorial Baptist Chapel; a medical and dental clinic; and a vocational and technical-training program.

• Pure Religion: Volunteers export hope to African orphans • Buckner Kenya leader pours himself into poor children • “If it cost me my life to save 1 child, I still would come” • How you can support ministries in Africa … • See Ken Camp's original Africa dispatches here.

Tim Watson, pastor of First Baptist Church in Longview, preached at the on-campus church the Sunday the missions team visited, and he joined other volunteers in leading crafts activities for the children that afternoon.

“One of the highlights of the whole trip was seeing the joy of the children at the BCC,” Watson said later. “Knowing just a bit about their stories and what brought them there, it was wonderful to see them so full of joy and knowing their lives were changed.”

A couple of days later, the mission vision team visited the Kariobangi Baptist Youth Center in Korogocho. The center provides primary education—pre-kindergarten through fourth grade—for children from the slums. It also offers the children a hot meal at noon—the only meal most are guaranteed any given day, Pastor Eutychus noted.

The Oaks Baptist Church in Grand Prairie has begun construction on a stone dining hall that will replace the small wooden cooking shed currently used.

First Baptist Church of Lee’s Summit, near Kansas City, Mo., is making plans to work with Kids Heart Africa—a partnership involving Buckner and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship—to construct additional buildings at the center.

In addition to the school for children, the center also provides teenagers and young adults with vocational training programs—hairdressing for women and woodworking for men.

Before the Buckner group left the center, someone asked Pastor Eutychus how they could be most helpful to him.

“Keep coming,” he replied. “Your presence brings us so much hope.”

Next, the Buckner team visited the New Life Home for abandoned babies in the Kilimani area of Nairobi. Buckner does not sponsor the New Life Home, which is affiliated with Barnabas Ministries, but it has a close working relationship with the home. Some children who aged out of the home for babies have have moved to the Baptist Children’s Center. Buckner, in turn, has referred infants to the New Life Home and provided limited financial support.

Sick and malnourished babies often are abandoned by parents who cannot care for them. The New Life Home admits infants up to 6 months old, with priority given to those who are HIV-positive.

By weaning the babies off tainted mother’s milk, giving them a high-protein diet and providing the proper medication, the home has seen a sero-reversal rate of about 90 percent among more than 260 HIV-positive babies admitted in the last eight years, the Buckner group learned.

The Buckner team members cuddled babies and played with toddlers at the New Life Home—a welcome respite after witnessing such suffering in the Korogocho slum, several volunteers noted.

“I wanted you to see here what we want to do in Ethiopia,” Hall told the group.

Children at the Kariobangi Baptist Youth Center in Nairobi, Kenya, come from the streets of the city's Korobocho slum area.

Buckner is building a three-story temporary home for orphaned and abandoned babies in Addis Ababa—one of several ministry sites the mission team visited when they flew from Kenya to Ethiopia.

When the mission vision team arrived at the airport in Addis Ababa, Getahun Tesema from Bright Hope and a representative from the Ethiopian president’s staff escorted the group through customs.

The next day, the group traveled by bus one hour from the capital city to Bantu, a rural area where President Girma Wolde-Giorgis has given 10.2 hectares—about 25 acres—to Buckner to build a community development center.

The eight-building campus envisioned for the village—the president’s hometown—includes a school offering education from kindergarten through eighth grade. Like the Baptist Children’s Center in Nairobi, the center in Bantu also will serve as a location to hold church services and provide a variety of community services, including educational programs to halt the spread of HIV/AIDS.

Buckner/Bright Hope also will have access to an existing—but largely unused—government-owned health center where volunteer teams can provide medical and dental services.

During a dedication service in Bantu that made national news broadcasts in Ethiopia, Wolde-Giorgis set a plaque in concrete in the cornerstone of the community development center’s first building.

Hall announced Bright Hope was merging with Buckner as an Ethiopian-led ministry, received title to the land and pledged construction would begin using local labor as soon as building materials could be secured.

“In accepting the title to this land, we give it back to the children of Bantu,” he said.

Tesema hopes the community development center in Bantu can become a model that will be replicated elsewhere. He told the Buckner team his dream is to see 20 centers in 20 districts within 10 years, benefiting up to 1 million children and youth.

When the group returned to Addis Ababa, Tesema showed them the three-story baby home under construction in the western part of the city. The home will accept abandoned and orphaned children up to age 3. Buckner will have an adoption office at the home, handling both domestic and international adoptions, he explained.

The mission team also met a group of foster children and their caregivers. Tesema explained Bright Hope’s philosophy has been not only to get children off the streets and into the homes of Christian families, but also to help those families become self-sufficient by offering micro-enterprise loans to help them start small businesses.

The Buckner team also saw an inner-city vocational training ministry—a vital ministry in an area where 80 percent of the people lack stable employment. In the front part of the small facility, cobblers learn to make shoes. In a larger room at the rear of the building, women learn to sew.

“Some of the women used to be prostitutes,” Tesema said. “Some are destitute mothers who have been living on the streets.”

All of the ministries of Bright Hope—and now Buckner—in Ethiopia have the blessings of the nation’s executive branch. In fact, Wolde-Giorgis insisted on holding a reception and state dinner at the presidential palace to honor the visiting Buckner mission team.

Buckner team member Kyle Henderson, pastor of First Baptist Church in Athens, compared the situation in Ethiopia to the Old Testament story of Daniel, where God’s representative found favor in the court of a nation’s ruler.

“This seems like a historic opportunity in Ethiopia,” Henderson said. “The president of the country has opened the door and handed us the keys, inviting us into his country. This is a pretty pivotal moment, and I believe we will be judged by how we respond to that open door.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 3/19/07

Buckner Kenya leader pours
himself into poor children

By Ken Camp

Managing Editor

NAIROBI, Kenya—Children surround Dickson Masindano as he walks the 13.5-acre campus of the Baptist Children’s Center in the Dandora section of Nairobi, clamoring for his attention.

For nearly five years, they—and the other 1.7 million orphaned and abandoned children of Kenya—not only have had his attention, but also have captured his heart.

Masindano serves as Kenya national director for Buckner International, a children and family services agency related to the Baptist General Convention of Texas.

“I never imagined I’d be doing this kind of thing,” said Masindano, who developed the first foster-care program in Kenya and continues to hold a governmental post on the Children’s Council, in addition to his responsibilities with Buckner.

When Masindano was a student at the University of Nairobi, he dreamed of continuing his studies at the graduate level and then establishing a counseling center in a rural area like Kiminini, the village in northern Kenya where he grew up.

Through a missionary, he learned about the graduate school at Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene. He moved to Texas and earned a master’s degree in counseling.

Shortly before he graduated, he talked with a friend at school whose parents were involved with Buckner.

“I found out Buckner was looking for an opportunity to do something in Nairobi, and they were looking for someone to lead the program in Kenya,” Masindano said.

Buckner Vice President Mike Douris traveled to Abilene to interview Masindano four days before he was scheduled to return to Kenya. Douris offered him the job, and Masindano extended his stay in the United States to spend two weeks training with Buckner in Dallas.

• Pure Religion: Volunteers export hope to African orphans • Buckner Kenya leader pours himself into poor children • “If it cost me my life to save 1 child, I still would come” • How you can support ministries in Africa … • See Ken Camp's original Africa dispatches here.

“When I first came here (to work with Buckner in Kenya), I was the only social worker, the accountant and the recruiter. I began the foster-care program. And for two years, I didn’t even have an administrative assistant,” he recalled. “But now they have sent people to help me out.”

Recently, Tom Okore joined the Buckner Kenya staff as mission director, working directly with volunteer groups who travel to Kenya to work with Buckner’s community development centers and other ministries to children and families.

Another worker who assists Masindano—Joseph—originally worked as a house parent with boys at the Baptist Children’s Center until he married recently. His bride, who came through the Baptist Children’s Center and later foster care, works with Masindano at Buckner’s office at the Nairobi Baptist Center.

Joseph had grown up in the city’s slums, and he was able to empathize with the challenges the children face.

“I feel God called me to minister among children who struggle as I did,” he said.

With additional help, Masindano spends less time working on clerical chores and on the logistics of providing transportation and lodging for visiting mission groups. That allows him more time to focus on the overall work of improving the lives and spiritual wellbeing of Kenya’s children—a job that has become his life’s passion.

“My greatest satisfaction is when I see a child succeeding in life,” he said. “When they come here (to the Baptist Children’s Center), most never had a mind of ever succeeding. All the odds were against them.

“These are the poorest of the poor. But they see they are the equal of anybody’s children. They are able to get an education, pass exams, go on to college, maybe even become a doctor.

“When they come here, three meals a day does not seem imaginable. This is a fresh beginning for these kids. They are able to see life from a different perspective.”

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 3/19/07

‘If it cost me my life to save
1 child, I still would come’

By Ken Camp

Managing Editor

ADDIS ADABA, Ethiopia—Getahun Tesema successfully escaped from Ethiopia during civil war 20 years ago. But he could not escape a single image that gripped him on a return visit to his homeland.

“I saw a child in a dumpster, eating what he could find. I couldn’t stop crying. The Lord moved me and used that to call me to Ethiopia.

“I determined that if it cost me my life to save one child, I still would come back,” he said.

True to his word, he returned to Ethiopia to found Bright Hope, a ministry that offers shelter, foster care and educational opportunities to orphaned and abandoned children. Bright Hope recently merged with Buckner International.

Tesema grew up in Shashamane, a small city in southern Ethiopia. When civil war escalated and the communist government conscripted young men for the front lines—essentially using them as cannon fodder—he escaped to Kenya at age 22.

• Pure Religion: Volunteers export hope to African orphans • Buckner Kenya leader pours himself into poor children • “If it cost me my life to save 1 child, I still would come” • How you can support ministries in Africa … • See Ken Camp's original Africa dispatches here.

Tesema spent the next two and one-half years in a refugee camp outside Nairobi.

An American missionary-evangelist befriended him while he was in the refugee camp, and that is when he committed his life to Christ.

Since Kenya did not allow all the refugees to resettle in their country permanently, Tesema applied to the United States and was accepted there. Working his way through school as a taxi driver in Dallas, he first attended the Christ for the Nations Institute and then earned a degree in Christian management from Dallas Baptist University. He also served as a minister at the Ethiopian Baptist Church in Dallas.

When he returned to Ethiopia with his wife to tend to some family affairs, he saw the needs in his home country, and he felt an unmistakable calling to help meet the needs of the most helpless and vulnerable—particularly orphaned and abandoned children.

He and his wife, Tegist, started their ministry with 20 children they rescued from the streets. They rented a house, a sewing machine and shoe-making equipment, and then they began training the youngsters as seamstresses, tailors and cobblers.

Tesema holds dual citizenship in the United States and Ethiopia, but he and his wife have chosen to invest their lives in caring for the needy of their country. Three years ago, they adopted three abandoned girls, each from a different family of origin. Their adopted daughters now are 4, 8 and 12.

“I think God is happy with us because we keep our attention on the needs of the poor,” he said.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.

Posted: 3/16/07

RIGHT or WRONG?
Gospel 'of' or 'about'

I just read about a distinction that has been made between the gospel of Jesus and the gospel about Jesus. I’m still puzzled. What’s the difference?

The difference between the two ideas is in the prepositions “of” and “about.”

“Of” is used to describe the whole, the entirety of an entity. “About” can be used to refer to or describe something that is nearly, almost or around an idea but is not the essence of the matter itself.

Therefore, the gospel of Jesus is what Christians consider to be the true, actual core matters of the gospel, as recorded in the Bible, particularly in the four New Testament Gospels—Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The gospel about Jesus is an interpretation of the gospel of Jesus, an attempt to determine the meaning of the biblical writings and apply that to life.

The core matters of the gospel of Jesus are found especially in the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus. The gospel of Jesus is lived out for us as Jesus is Emmanuel, God with us, calling us to transform our lives through the approach that he sets out.

This approach calls us, for example, to love those around us because we ourselves are loved by God (Matthew 25:31-46, John 13:34-35) and see the world and our place in it in a radically new and different way because the kingdom of God is at hand (Mark 1:14-15, Luke 9:23-27).

Someone’s gospel about Jesus—mine, yours or anyone’s—on the other hand, may be done with the best of intentions. But it is still, even at its best, an interpretation, not the gospel of Jesus.

At their worst, many gospels about Jesus have turned out to be gross misinterpretations of the gospel of Jesus. One such example is the cruelty poured out upon the world by the Ku Klux Klan, which bases a good deal of its belief system upon the gospel of Jesus, as well as some of the Bible. For instance, the symbol of the Klan includes a blood drop, which is thought by some to represent the blood of Jesus shed for one particular race of people. This interpretation, of course, runs contradictory to the message of Jesus.

The gospel about Jesus that the Ku Klux Klan has created teaches us a couple of important lessons. One is we should never blindly accept the interpretations of others as being faithful to the themes of the gospel of Jesus. In his book, Spirit Ethics, Paul Jersild cautions us along these lines, noting that too often Christian organizations base their identities upon what they think are solid, biblical truths but actually end up being far from what Jesus intends for his followers to look like.

Another lesson is that we cannot select certain parts of the gospel of Jesus we like but then ignore other parts, missing out on what the gospel of Jesus is as a whole.

We must be careful to avoid the danger of twisting the gospel of Jesus to look as we want it to. Rather, the gospel of Jesus should influence our lives and our gospels about Jesus.

The fundamental values of the gospel of Jesus are to direct and guide all we are and all we are about.

Brian Edwards

Minister with youth

First Baptist Church, Hamilton

Right or Wrong? is sponsored by the T.B. Maston Chair of Christian Ethics at Hardin-Simmons University's Logsdon School of Theology. Send your questions about how to apply your faith to btillman@hsutx.edu.

News of religion, faith, missions, Bible study and Christian ministry among Baptist churches, in Texas, the BGCT, the nation and around the world.