India (MNN) — For the past three years, Baptist Global Response has partnered with teams of national women to teach preventative health, productive farming, nutrition, sanitation, and how to access safe drinking water. The women focus on three rural villages and three urban communities, teaching techniques and then training local teams to carry on what they've learned.
BGR trained 126 local partners in 2011. This year, they'll reach three new communities for Christ.
"He commands us to go and help, and it's an effective way for the Gospel to go forth," said BGR Executive Director Jeff Palmer.
Many rural communities face challenges like limited or no access to clean drinking water, poor infrastructures, poverty, a variety of health issues and ethnic clashes. The vision of BGR's Community Development Projects is to see entire communities experiencing holistic transformation. Palmer said most projects start successfully by teaming up with women nationals.
"They make a lot of decisions for the family; the healthcare issues of the family and things like that," he explained. "Usually they're the ones who follow through with microfinance, microenterprise, and the projects."
Women form deep relationships through community development projects, and believers get a chance to share Jesus. Pray that good relationships are formed in these 3 new communities.
"People begin to say, 'This is a great ministry, why are you here?'" said Palmer. "And therefore you've got an easy segue into sharing the love of Christ."
Keep outreach teams in your prayers.
"Pray for them to have wisdom and knowledge to minister physically and spiritually to those that they're coming in contact with."
Click here to contribute to BGR's Community Development Fund.
