MISSIONS IS MINISTRY OF PRESENCE

Missions is often a matter of simply being present, says the Rev. Lauren Bethell.

This 1985 graduate of ABSW travels extensively around the world as a global specialist for the Board of International Ministries.

Her charge is to work with American Baptist partners to address the exploitation of women and children. She says she can’t predict what will happen when she goes to a country. “I just know it’s important for me to be there,” she says.

“I really feel what I do is a ministry of presence.”

That’s been Bethell’s work for more than 20 years. She directed the New Life Center in Thailand, caring for girls who have come out of prostitution. The center provides literacy and vocational training. It began in 1987 with 18 girls, and now serves anywhere from 170 to 200, Bethell says.

Requests for Bethell’s expertise in other parts of the world led to a decision to devote all her time to consulting with organizations at the grassroots level. Her home is now in Prague at the International Baptist Theological Seminary. This year she will travel to Chile, Brazil, Congo, India and Bangladesh, among other countries.

Bethell has witnessed a major shift in how prostitution and sexual abuse are addressed. In the last decade, these “shadow” issues have “come into the light,” she says, noting that in some countries where exploitation has been pronounced, governments are now writing legislation to protect women and children.

Bethell believes that God is going to put her in places where others need her mentoring. Together, she says, they are going to do new things. Her approach is not all that different from mission work of the past, Bethell says. She recalls that early Baptist missionary Adoniram Judson used to sit on his porch and talk to people as they passed by. Doing missions in this manner is nothing you can plan, she says. And it means giving up the desire to control outcomes.

So Bethell is also "living on the porch," but hers is a “global porch.” In simply being present with others, she says she finds herself "always being amazed at God’s action."