the baptist house of mercy
The Baptist Home/House of Mercy Project
By Dr. Roger Hatfield, Task Force Director
Sometime from 1909-1915, now almost one hundred years ago, the vision of what we know as The Baptist Home broke through the heavens to one called Milford Riggs who also was called of God. Milford and Mary pastored various churches in the Midwest, especially in Missouri. Because of his ability to influence the Baptists of this state to support the orphans’ work for which they had a love, they were then invited to become the financial agent or development officer for the Missouri Baptist Children’s Home next to Fee Fee BC in Bridgeton. His work there was successful and meaningful and blessed of God.
During the summer they began to attend the new Baptist Assembly programs near Ironton where hundreds gathered each summer for Bible study, training and missions’ emphases. During the evening services on Sunset Rock, God began to speak to Milford’s heart about a ministry for old people in the Arcadia Valley. Older ministers and families, if they had no children and if the churches did not care for them, were sent to the poor farms that each county had. On Sunset Rock the birth of The Baptist Home had occurred.
Now, 100 years later, nearly 300 residents are on three Baptist Home campuses around this state—Arcadia Valley, Chillicothe and Ozark. These elder Christian care communities stand as testimonies of God’s faithfulness and the faithfulness of many Missouri Baptists over the years. The road to TBH is strewn with joy and pain, famine and feast, support from the state convention and the withdrawal of support. The Baptist Home receives no government funding of any kind yet complies with all state regulations for the safety and protection of its residents.
The philosophy of ministry of TBH is found in Holy Scripture. Throughout the OT there is a deep-seated concern for the disadvantaged, the oppressed, and the weak. Leviticus 19.32 says, You shall rise up before the gray headed and honor the aged, and you shall revere your God; I am the Lord. Honor and respect to one’s parents is clearly taught, especially in Exodus 20.12, and TBH is a partner in that compassionate caring. The verse TBH likes to use in our ministry is Psalm 71.9, “Do not cast me off in the time of old age; Do not forsake me when my strength fails.”
While we do not have specific teachings about aging from the lips of Jesus, we have NT teachings that we can certainly apply. The Incarnation of Jesus Christ teaches us about the value and dignity of all life from birth to death. We have teachings about the value of the body as a part of our entire being. We see elderly people in a positive light in the NT from Zechariah and Elizabeth and Simeon and Anna, and the widows later in the epistles. Throughout Holy Scripture we see the themes of respect, material support for the elderly, and concern about widows.
As we turn to the present day and ministry of TBH, we see that this ministry has had such a profound effect that others from the United States and around the world have come to see it looks like. Naomi Feil from Ohio came to help teach the strategy of reality orientation to the staff. Long-term care staff from Scandinavia have come to the campus. TBH has helped begin a pastor’s retirement home in China within the past five years. Most recently of all, and the story I want to tell you about, is our invitation from BY to help them raise their version of The Baptist Home called the Baptist House of Mercy.
During some my time on staff at the Missouri Baptist Convention, I was privileged to lead the church leadership work of the MBC-BY partnership. This state had a 10-year commitment there. We worked with many, many wonderful people from this state and believers in BY. In 2005 after I had left MBC, I received a call from an American friend and Mennonite missionary whom I had met in BY. He had a friend who was a leader in the Kobrin Baptist Church who had had a vision for 10 years of creating a home for the elderly who, like in the Riggs’ day, had nowhere to go, nothing of this world’s goods, and only their churches were helping them to get by.
By September 2006, the Baptist Home board of trustees pledged to establish a 5-year program of help. This consists of helping them refurbish an old Soviet military building at Kobrin Camp so that up to 40 residents can have a new home. This is the same campus as the famed Children’s Camp.
These people have elected an administrator, Stepan Trubchik, the visionary who idea it was to establish this ministry. There is now a board of trustees to govern ministry. You need to recognize the significance of this from a former Soviet Union mentality to a democratic process. The board has been trained by Steve Jones, president and treasurer of The Baptist Home with more training to come. We will be training their nursing staff and activities leaders to care for the frail and disadvantaged of their society. They will be learning how to receive benevolent residents as well as those who have private pay. We are able to jump start this ministry in a sense over a five-year period that took TBH almost 100 years to bring to this level of influence. The Baptist House of Mercy is becoming a model for other Central and Eastern European countries as they consider that ministry. The European Baptist Federation of the Baptist World Alliance has been at the site. We have are in contact with Baptist long-term ministries in Moldova and Ukraine. All of their needs are not the same. Some require more coaching than others. Many already have buildings in place where residents are living. All of them have a vision for compassionate caring of the aging.
I would give anything for Milford Riggs to see today what the influence of his vision from God on Sunset Rock has brought about almost 100 years later. TBH is inviting churches and individuals from all over this state and those across our nation with a TBH connection to help us launch the Baptist House of Mercy at Kobrin, Belarus.
To present the challenge, I would like you to see the above windows presentation on the Baptist House of Mercy and know of the great ministry work going on even now around the world in Belarus and pray your hearts will be touched to take on this project even in the midst of a most difficult time both here and there.
