Baptist Mid-Missions has announced the appointment of Dr. Jeff Newman as the Administrator for Missionary Soul Care. Please pray for Dr. Newman and his wife, Sherry, as they make the transition to their new roles! The following article was posted on the BMM website:

With the continued goal of gospel advance, Baptist Mid-Missions is excited to announce that Dr. Jeff Newman will fill the position of Administrator for Missionary Soul Care, and will be the head of our newly launched Safe Haven Department. Dr. Newman, a longtime faculty member of Faith Baptist Bible College and Theological Seminary in Ankeny, Iowa, will complete the 2019–2020 academic year before assuming his new role with BMM next summer. 

As the new Administrator for Missionary Soul Care, Dr. Newman and his wife, Sherry, will work as a husband-and-wife team to build relationships, provide counseling-discipleship, and offer soul-care training. They will tailor these ministries to the unique challenges of our missionaries ministering in the complex ministry environment of world missions. In addition to their direct service to missionaries, the Newmans will also work with churches that desire to develop more intentional plans for caring for their missionaries. The Newmans were chosen because of their godly testimonies, their proven track record in biblical counseling, and their ever-deepening understanding of BMM through previous teaching assignments and other on-field interaction with our missionaries. 

Helping missionaries thrive long-term

The creation of the Safe Haven Department has been a growing burden for BMM President Vernon Rosenau. Since the majority of missionary attrition happens by the end of missionaries’ first terms, Dr. Rosenau sees member care as a top priority for helping missionaries not only stay in ministry but also be successful in ministry. Because of ministry demands, missionaries pour themselves out for others but don’t always take the time to care for their own souls.

The Safe Haven Department is designed to be a spiritual and emotional refuge for BMM singles, couples, and families, with the goal of strengthening and refreshing their love for God and for others. As the name “Safe Haven” implies, this department was built with appropriate confidentiality in mind. The Newmans will live in a location away from the BMM home office so missionaries can be assured of privacy. 

Soul care is an essential prerequisite for the Great Commission. Missionaries will be fully effective in ministry only when they are caring for their own souls. Having a designated soul care administrator is one more advance in our efforts to protect our missionaries’ welfare—an advance that will have an eternal impact. 

Please join us in praying for this newly launched department and for the Newmans as they raise support and transition to this ministry. 

Please pray for Faith Baptist Bible College and 99.3 The Truth Network as they partner together to air a new radio program!

Faith Baptist Bible College and Theological Seminary is excited to announce a new 30-minute radio program that will air each weekday on 99.3 FM The Truth Network in Des Moines, Iowa. This pre-recorded program will debut Monday, October 21, and air each weekday from 7:00 a.m. to 7:30 a.m.

Faith Comes by Hearing will replace the Charles Swindoll Insight for Living segment during peak listening hours of the morning and will feature archived chapel messages and occasional interviews with special guests. We are thrilled with this opportunity to share the amazing preaching that we get to hear on campus every day from our own faculty, and from pastors and missionaries around the world, with thousands of listeners. This new radio broadcast will help fulfill our mission of sending The Word to the World.

99.3 FM’s coverage spans a 60-mile radius from Des Moines through central-Iowa. You can view the entire 99.3 FM programming schedule and also listen live, online, at the following link:  http://www.truthnetwork.com/stations/ktia/

Cole Glanzer was recently called as the Associate Pastor at First Baptist Church, Waverly. We asked Cole to share with us how God led in his life and we think you’ll find his testimony very encouraging!

“When I was nearing the end of high school and thinking about what I wanted to do with the rest of my life and where I wanted to go to college, full-time ministry and (for sure) being a pastor were nowhere on the radar. The main thing I wanted to do was coach either basketball or soccer at a small high school like what I grew up in. I wanted to teach young people the fundamentals of the sport, as well as teach them how sports can build up really good habits. I also wanted to take opportunities to teach life lessons through whatever sport I would be coaching.

The Bible teacher at my high school, who eventually became my pastor in my junior and senior year of high school, asked me if I had ever thought about being a pastor. He suggested many times after that I should at least consider it, and each time my response was, “No way! Not me!” To do what I wanted, which was coach at a small high school, I knew I could not just coach. Most small schools cannot afford to hire someone who just coaches. They have to be able to either teach or be an administrator in addition to coaching, and so I decided to pursue secondary math education since math had always been my favorite subject in school.

I enrolled at South Dakota State University and met a friend there who had just finished a two-year Biblical Studies degree at a Bible college in Michigan. That was the first time I had ever heard of a Bible college. I thought that after I finished my math degree, I would go and study the Bible for two years and do the same thing that he did. That sounded awesome to me. After the school year finished at SDSU, I realized that teaching math was not really what I wanted to do. I enjoyed my classes, but I could not see myself in that role, at least not for the rest of my life. That was when I started to consider other options and was thinking about switching majors. About halfway through that summer I counseled at a camp called Royal Family Kids Camp, which is a nationwide Christian organization that puts on summer camps for abused kids. This was the third summer that I had done this, and after that week was when I felt God working on my heart to lead me towards full-time vocational ministry.

I applied to Faith Baptist Bible College in July of that summer and was accepted about a week before classes started. Through my classes, professors, Christian service at my local church, and various other factors in my four years at Faith, God confirmed in me the call to full-time vocational ministry.

During my senior year at Faith, I started looking at possible jobs that I could apply for to start working right after my internship that summer. The internship that I was going to be doing that summer offered me a year-long opportunity to help in their church (as a pastoral intern), at their camp (as a program assistant), and in their school (as a coach or substitute teacher when needed). My high school back home was looking for a new Bible teacher, as well as coaches for both basketball and soccer. So, I was trying to decide between these two and was leaning heavily towards going back home to South Dakota. That is when Pastor Eloe called me and offered an associate pastor position to me. At first, I turned it down because I was planning to go teach at my high school. That ended up not working out, though, and so my choices were either a year-long internship in Colorado or a full-time position in Waverly with Pastor Eloe. With my fiancé finishing her senior year at Faith this year and since it was a full-time position and not just an internship, and after much prayer and consideration, I chose to move to Waverly.

I know God’s hand was at work through all of this because I was not looking for this position at all. Pastor Eloe’s son was actually the one that got us connected and Pastor Eloe reached out to me, first. Also, I know God’s hand was at work in all of this because one of Pastor Eloe’s main reasons for bringing me on was so that he could give a young guy some “hands-on” experience as a pastor. He also wanted to give me an opportunity to put what I learned at Bible college into practice, while also having some guidance along the way. I really do not think there is a more ideal situation for a young pastor to step into other than the one I find myself in here at First Baptist Church in Waverly, and I know that it was 100% by the hand of God. “

-Cole Glanzer

This past summer, Pastor Josh Robinson transitioned from the Assistant Pastor role to the Senior Pastor role at Altoona Regular Baptist Church. Pastor Robinson grew up in Greenville, South Carolina and met his wife, Krista, while counseling at Camp CoBeAc in Michigan after his senior year in high school. The couple dated long-distance for 4 years before getting married in 2012. Pastor Robinson got an Associate’s Degree in Christian Ministries from Bob Jones University in 2012 as well. The couple ministered at Good News Ministries Youth Center on the near east side of Indianapolis for 2 years before the Lord called them to Iowa. In 2015, Pastor Robinson was called as the Assistant Pastor at Altoona Regular Baptist Church. He graduated from Faith Baptist Bible College with a Bachelor’s Degree in Local Church Ministries earlier this year. On June 30, 2019, Pastor Robinson was called as Senior Pastor of Altoona Regular Baptist Church. Praise the Lord for His leading and provision!