Baptist Global Response

The first container of BGR In-Home Care Kits will be arriving in Johannesburg, South Africa, this week. They have been pre-cleared but the Health department wants to inspect some of the items before the buckets can be distributed.

Please pray that this inspection will happen quickly and that the Health Department will be satisfied so that all items can enter the country. Many hurting people are waiting.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Rebekah Naylor, an emeritus Southern Baptist missionary who served for 35 years at Bangalore Baptist Hospital in India, has joined the staff of Baptist Global Response as a U.S.-based health care consultant.
 
Naylor will play a key role in connecting health care personnel with people in need around the world, said Jeff Palmer, BGR’s executive director.
 
“We are excited about Rebekah’s joining the Baptist Global Response team. She is a household name for anyone who has even the slightest familiarity with the past three decades of Southern Baptist international medical work,” Palmer said. “Thanks in great part to her leadership, Bangalore Baptist Hospital has been a shining example of living out the compassion of Christ among people in need and helping them discover the meaningful, purposeful life God created them to enjoy.”
 
Naylor’s name recognition and credibility among health care professionals both in the United States and abroad makes her a valuable partner for mobilizing medical workers to help people around the world who suffer with little or no access to medical care, Palmer added.
 
“Having a medical professional of Dr. Naylor’s caliber working with us creates instant access with medical/health care communities in the USA,” Palmer said. “Her history and standing with Southern Baptists give her immediate access and networks into the mainstream Southern Baptist health care communities.”
 
A 200-bed acute-care general hospital, Bangalore Baptist Hospital has over the past 36 years treated hundreds of thousands of patients both at the hospital and in villages. The hospital’s educational programs have trained hundreds of doctors, nurses, allied health personnel and chaplains. The spiritual dimension of its ministry helped hundreds of people each year personally experience the love of God and learn how to share that abundant life with others. 
 
International Mission Board President Jerry Rankin sees a natural transition in Naylor’s move from hands-on medical work overseas to mobilizing medical professionals for overseas service.
 
“Medical missions has been and continues to be a significant strategy for Southern Baptist mission work around the world. More than 200 overseas personnel use their medical skills as they minister to those in need and share about the Great Physician. In many places, the need is at a crisis level,” Rankin said. “Dr. Naylor’s work with medical missions groups like the Global Medical Alliance has laid a great foundation for this new role mobilizing health care professionals for overseas service. Baptist Global Response is a key 21st-century partner for IMB in ministering to human needs and suffering around the world, and this addition to their team will enhance work on both acute and chronic medical needs. Dr. Naylor understands how medicine can bring hope – now and for eternity – to people in need.”
 
BGR’s focus on relief and development work naturally gravitates toward medical work, Palmer added.
 
“From the very beginning, we have been thinking how best to incorporate the medical aspect we have needed into the work,” Palmer said. “Health care issues come up all the time. Out of 500-plus projects administered by BGR this past year, about a third had a significant health-care component. Having Rebekah come on board at this time in this role is a valuable strategic addition to what BGR is trying to do.”
 
For her part, Naylor is pleased to continue focusing on overseas medical needs after retiring Feb. 1, 2009, from a career at the Bangalore hospital that included serving as a surgeon, chief of medical staff, administrator and medical superintendent.
 
“I am excited about this transition in ministry. God has clearly directed this step on all sides and affirmed the decision made,” Naylor said. “I feel so privileged to have an ongoing role in international missions and meeting human needs through medicine. Because God has asked me to do this, I am full of anticipation as I look ahead.
 
“I hope Southern Baptists can become more aware of what God is doing today through overseas medical projects. I hope that they will respond with investment of time and resources,” Naylor added. “I am delighted to have an opportunity to connect people here in the U.S. with needs overseas. Especially among people groups that have heard nothing about Christ’s love, I pray that more doors will be opened for meeting human needs and helping people discover the abundant life God wants them to enjoy.”
 
A native of Arkansas, Naylor is a graduate of Baylor University, Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. During her tenure in Bangalore, she founded programs in allied health training and medical residency, a one-year diploma in pastoral healing ministry and a school of nursing that was named in her honor. She continues as a consultant with the Bangalore hospital, serves as an attending surgeon at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas and is an active member of the staff at UT Southwestern University Hospital, also in Dallas.

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Rebekah Naylor may be contacted at rnaylor@gobgr.org; postal address: Baptist Global Response, 402 BNA Drive Suite 411, Nashville, TN 37127.

BGR prayer strategist Lori Funderburk reports:

Praise the Lord that the paper has arrived in Zimbabwe for the 300,000 exercise books we are printing. The covers have all been cut and printing on them has begun. In one afternoon 4,000 covers were folded and the insides inserted! The widows who have been receiving some of the BGR food parcels are coming to help staple the exercise books together.  Pray that the exercise books will be finished in a timely manner and that many children will be blessed by them!

BGR’s international prayer strategist, Lori Funderburk, shares this prayer request:

BGR partners have been struggling to get three new water wells at the Sanyati Hospital in Zimbabwe.  The large pumps pushing water 7 kilometers from the river are working when there is electricity but we need these three drilled wells in production so we can use a generator to provide water when public electricity is not on.

Partners are drilling the boreholes but seem to get jammed at 25 meters.  Please pray that the men using the drilling rigs will overcome whatever it is that is jamming the bits.  Pray that in just a few days there will be wells pumping water that will pump for many years!

In this new BGR iWitness video, Jeff Palmer takes you to Delhi, India, where pastors and church planters are learning hands-on skills for community development projects in their home countries.