Hog’ ride leads to missions awareness

TYLER?For Kerry Baxley, hogs were key in getting some adults in his church interested in missions.

The pastor from First Baptist Church in Splendora conceived the idea of having a bike ride?the “hog” kind of bike?from his church just north of Houston to Mercy Ships, a Christian ministry in northeast Texas, to benefit the ministry.

“The Bike Rally got our men excited about missions,” Baxley said. In all, 21 bikers, including the pastor, made the 200-mile journey that started at 6:30 a.m. and ended at 1:15 p.m. on a Saturday, Sept. 11. A combination of ministries from various churches actually started the project by collecting materials and money to send to Honduras through Mercy Ships and a Southern Baptists of Texas Convention Mission Service Corps volunteer, Collene Myers, who works with Mercy Ships.

First Baptist’s girls and women’s missions groups started promoting the project. “Then I sent out letters to all of the churches in the Tryon Evergreen Baptist Association and other churches,” Baxley said. “In all I sent out 109 letters for churches not only to send motorcycle riders but to share with the project.”

First Baptist, Splendora used money raised by elementary-aged students and its Vacation Bible School. Other churches helping in the project included Woodland Place Baptist Church in Magnolia, which used their VBS mission offering, and First Baptist Church Patton Lakes.

The project as a biker ride started out informally, and then as interest grew, “we started recruiting.” It eventually extended beyond Baptist churches, including the Ark Family Church in Conroe, which has a motorcycle fellowship ministry in its church.

Baxley then partnered up Myers, a North American Mission Board MSC volunteer through the SBTC, who works through Mercy Ships in Honduras, the Dominican Republic and Belize.

The churches from southeast Texas collected $5,000 worth of merchandise to make 350 hygiene kits and 11 cases of Spanish New Testaments.

Explaining how the kits would be used, Myers said she would be teaching a total of 32 health classes, emphasizing nutrition, how to treat fever, diarrhea, dehydration. She added that the Bibles provided helps as she teaches about the spiritual element of health.

In her teaching, she uses verses like Luke 2:52 to talk about the whole person, not just the physical. When talking about nutrition, she uses verses that talk about spiritual food too.

As a MSC volunteer missionary, Myers is self-funded, but is associated with NAMB.

“I know I’m getting prayed for and it also helps that I have an account through the North American Mission Board.”

Along the way, the bik