WMU elects new president, emphasizes what is ‘meant for the mission’ • Biblical Recorder

ORLANDO (BP) — Carolyn Fountain was elected the 25th president of Woman’s Missionary Union (WMU) during the WMU Missions Celebration and annual meeting on June 7 in Orlando, Florida. She is the first African American woman to serve in this role. Held in the Valencia Ballroom at the Orange County Convention Center, this year’s WMU Missions Celebration also hosted theme interpretations, missions testimonies and Bible reflections to highlight how each person is “meant for the mission.” The emphasis “Meant for the Mission,” being introduced in WMU’s fall curriculum, is based on John 15:1-17. Presidential election A native of Tallulah, Louisiana, Fountain and her husband of 48 years, Leroy, are members of the Well of Monroe, a church plant of First Baptist Church of West Monroe, Louisiana. Together they serve churches in Northwest Louisiana by helping pastors of church plants and revitalizations incorporate missions into their strategy for church health. The Fountains were appointed as church planters by the Home Mission Board (now North American Mission Board) in 1983-1996 and 2006-2013. Over the years, Carolyn organized and/or facilitated WMU, taught Sunday school, codirected youth ministry, led Acteens, sang in the choir, served on committees and as a trustee and was a pastor’s wife for 11 years. She served as president of Louisiana WMU/Women’s Ministry (2020-2023) and served on the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) committee on order of business. Additionally, she served as campus minister at Alabama State University and led students on missions trips to Detroit, Nashville, and Atlanta. She was also an educator for 15 years. Currently, she works with the Women’s Learning Center, a ministry of the Louisiana Baptist Children’s Home and Family Services in Monroe, Louisiana, where she tutors women in reading and writing as they strive to achieve their HiSet (GED). The Fountains have three daughters and five grandchildren. ‘Meant for the Mission’ Expounding on the theme, Sandy Wisdom-Martin, executive director of national WMU, and Connie Dixon, WMU president, shared eight brief theme interpretations. In one, Dixon recounted a busy fall when she “had one 18-day trip to nine states, went to three state conventions, with 10 speaking assignments, and drove 550 miles with (Wisdom-Martin) while planning the January board meeting.” She also attended the SBC Executive Committee in Nashville, the all-staff meeting in Birmingham and traveled through seven airports. “I was not made for living out of a suitcase!” Dixon said, noting Christians are not “accidents, spectators or backups” in God’s kingdom story. “But I know I was meant for the mission.” “Every personality, talent, experience and season can become a tool in His hands,” Wisdom-Martin agreed. “The mission is not merely something we support — it’s something we were made to carry.” Noting WMU has always been known as “an army of prayer warriors,” Dixon shared an example of what can happen when WMU leaders and participants pray for missionaries by name through their prayer calendar. She recounted how she met the father of an International Mission Board (IMB) missionary whose son, when young, had been celebrated as a Missionary Kid (MK) in all their missions materials that year. His birthday was on February 29. One day his son came home from school to find the entire kitchen table was covered with birthday cards from GA, RA, and WMU groups around the world wishing him happy birthday and letting him know they were praying for him. The boy then looked at his dad and said, “Wow, Daddy! I’m famous, and I haven’t even been saved yet!” Now all these years later, that featured MK was commissioned to go to some of the darkest places of the world to tell them about Jesus. Wisdom-Martin shared about visiting one of those dark places in Rome where the apostle Paul had been imprisoned. “The reality of what the apostle Paul experienced … was vivid and painful,” she said, explaining where prisoners were dropped through a hole in the rock floor into their cell. From this “cold and damp and dark and brutal” setting, Paul wrote his second letter to Timothy knowing his time was short. “A single transformed leader can influence countless lives. His ministry reminds believers that the greatest kingdom impact often comes not from what we build for ourselves, but from who we equip, send and inspire for the sake of the gospel,” Wisdom-Martin said. Missionary testimonies Lisa Jones, president of Arkansas WMU, and Amy Jo Girardier, women’s minister at Brentwood Baptist Church, were among many who offered mission testimonies. Jones shared her family’s harrowing experience 20 years ago in Kenya when violent robbers invaded their tent, and she and her husband had to shield their children from the men with machetes. The men left them unharmed after pillaging through their personal items. Crediting God and prayer for their protection, she thanked those who were praying in the spring of 2005. Girardier coined the term “elbixelf” (“flexible” backwards) to describe her mission experiences, most notably to Kazakhstan, where she and team found themselves at a remote airport with a plane that had no fuel. They had no food but there was a group of “mop ladies pushing dirt from one end of the airport to the other.” Her team gave the ladies scarves and a Russian Bible. The ladies immediately left and came back dressed and made up. The ladies took the team to the back of the airport where there was a feast of food (and an American businessman interpreter) waiting for them. “God is not limited by what you have in a suitcase,” especially to those who are “elbixelf,” Girardier said. Historical missions monologues Throughout the meeting, WMU leaders and friends, some in period costumes, presented several historical missions monologues. Sandra Hughes, president of California WMU, highlighted Lilias Trotter, a former artist and single woman turned missionary to Algeria who in 1888, the year WMU was organized, traveled to a distant land with no promise of success. She spent nearly 40 years there. “There were days I wondered if anything was changing at all,” Hughes characterized. “But I stayed. I listened. I learned. I walked alongside the people of that land, loving them as best I could, sharing the hope of Christ that had captured my own heart.” Reverend Leroy Fountain portrayed George Liele, who in 1782 became a missionary to Jamaica, “a land still heavy with chains,” where slavery was strong and opposition was stronger. “But the gospel … the gospel cannot be imprisoned,” Fountain said. “They called me the first Baptist missionary to Jamaica,” Fountain recounted. “But I was simply a man who knew what it meant to be set free — and could not keep that freedom to myself.” Liz Encinia, executive director of Kentucky WMU, shared about Mildred McWhorter, who spent 30 years doing ministry at the Houston Baptist Centers in a city with rough streets made dangerous from gang violence. “You don’t have to go far to be on mission. Sometimes, the greatest calling is right where you are — among the people you pass every day,” Encinia reminded. “The question is not whether there is need … but whether we are willing to meet it with compassion, with faithfulness, and with love. Because when we do, even the most ordinary place can become sacred ground.” Finally, Brad Gill, director of Baptist collegiate ministry at Louisiana Christian University, portrayed Dr. Roswell Graves, a medical doctor who gave his life to the work of the gospel in China in the 1800s. He stayed in China 56 years and became one of Southern Baptists’ longest serving missionaries. “Missions is not about imposing — it is about patiently, faithfully sharing truth and building relationships over time,” he said. “The call of God may lead you far from what is familiar. It may ask more than you expect. But when you give your life to His purposes, you become part of a story much bigger than your own.” Other b