ATLANTA (ABP) — Two best friends and registered nurses from Wilmington, N.C., left Jan. 12 for India as some of the first tsunami-relief volunteers sent to South Asia by the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.
Cokie Westfall and Linda Marie Jones will be working with Sam Bandela, one of CBF's missionaries, in medical clinics for tsunami survivors in India. Both are members of Winter Park Baptist Church in Wilmington.
Westfall, a Campbell University Divinity School student preparing to do medical missions in India, heard about the disaster on television and e-mailed friends in India she knew from a previous mission trip to the area. “Immediately my heart was there. It dawned on me an hour later that I need to go,” she said. “This is what God has wired me to do.”
After coordinating the trip with Bandela, Westfall told Jones of her plans to volunteer. “When I heard that she was going, I wanted to go. But it didn't seem like a possibility, just a first reaction,” Jones said.
A love offering collected by Winter Park church members financed the 10 days of medical relief the women will provide.
Jones has traveled to Southeast Asia twice and is aware of the “amount of devastation a tsunami would bring,” she said. In addition to meeting medical needs of tsunami survivors, Jones hopes to find future ways for her church to connect with relief efforts. As Winter Park's associate pastor of missions and outreach, she is accustomed to organizing and partnering in mission work.
Also aiding in relief efforts is Reed Kennedy, who left last week for Indonesia. Kennedy, who works at Radford University, takes with him 20 years of experience as a hospital administrator. He also was a missionary in Colombia, where he worked with a Baptist hospital.
CBF has sent five volunteers to South Asia and will continue to send limited numbers of volunteers to the area, according to Timothy Wood, CBF volunteer missions program manager. Currently, potential volunteers must have either medical skills or be a water-filtration specialist and have prior experience in a Third World country, and be able to pay project costs.
Though current CBF relief opportunities are limited, the need for volunteers will not diminish over time, leaders say. In fact, as the immediate needs of water and food are addressed and relief gives way to reconstruction, volunteers with a more general skill set will be needed. Wood said he is collecting information on potential volunteers, who could be called on in about six months.
The CBF had a presence in South Asia prior to tsunami destruction Dec. 26, and the organization has committed to staying in the region even after immediate relief efforts subside.
“We have a commitment to be there as long as we are welcome to be there,” said Barbara Baldridge, CBF Global Missions acting coordinator.
With such massive destruction leaving many people unable to obtain food and other necessities, one of the Fellowship's strategies for long-term impact is microenterprise development, which involves starting sustainable small businesses with small amounts of money, said David Harding, the Fellowship's international coordinator for emergency response and transformational development.
“The long term gives us the option to build trust and to have a meaningful relationship with people over time in order to meet their holistic needs,” Harding said.