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07411 July 10, 2007
'Here am I, send me'
Presbyteries complete funding to send a new missionary to Sudan
by Emily Enders Odom MIJHH Associate for Communications
PULASKI, PA and LEXINGTON, SC - Two Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) presbyteries with a long-standing commitment to the church and the people of Sudan have united to bring new help and hope to that war-torn nation by completing the funding needed for a new mission position there.
Trinity Presbytery [http://www.trinity-presbytery.org/], comprised of 68 congregations in central South Carolina, and Shenango Presbytery [http://www.shenango.org/], encompassing 69 churches in western Pennsylvania, have together pledged over $118,000 to the Mission Initiative: Joining Hearts & Hands [http://www.pcusa.org/joiningheartsandhands] to send a new education officer to rebuild and strengthen the country's educational infrastructure, particularly in southern Sudan.
Joining Hearts & Hands is the PC(USA)'s five-year campaign to raise $40 million for new international mission personnel and for church development in the U.S.
Previous gifts and pledges from individuals and churches - including First Presbyterian Church, Santa Fe, NM, Morningside Presbyterian Church, Atlanta, GA, Starmount Presbyterian Church, Greensboro, NC, Village Presbyterian Church, Prairie Village, KS, and Saxe Gotha Presbyterian Church, Lexington, SC - exceeded $113,000 toward the estimated cost of $230,000 for a new mission co-worker's three-year appointment through the World Mission program area of the PC(USA). Redstone Presbytery, based in Greensburg, PA, has also pledged its support.
Bill Andress, moderator of Trinity Presbytery's Sudan Ministry as well as co-moderator of the national Sudan Action Advocacy Forum (SAAF) [http://www.sudanadvocacy.com/], said that Trinity Presbytery has had a partnership with the Presbyterian Church of Sudan for over twenty years.
"During the war in the South, when we took trips into southern Sudan and asked how we could help, without exception people asked us to pray for them and not to forget them," said Andress. "Now that the war is over and security is much improved, when we seek to understand the priorities of the Sudanese people, they invariably tell us that their number one priority is education. In a very real way, they understand that their future depends on education."
In partnership with the Presbyterian Church of Sudan, the Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church and ACROSS (the Association of Christian Resource Organizations Serving Sudan), the new education officer will help implement plans to expand the church-sponsored school system in Sudan, improve its administrative capabilities, and strengthen its teaching methodologies.
When the inevitable question arose - "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?" - Andress had the answer on his lips in the person of Ingrid Reneau, an emerging academic, experienced administrator, and published author with a heart for the Sudanese people.
"Had it not been for Bill Andress of the Sudan Advocacy Network, I would not be the one fulfilling this call," Reneau said. "Through the updates that I receive from Bill, I have kept abreast of the situation in Sudan, and what my options have been to hasten the coming of Christ's kingdom on earth, especially in places like Sudan, where our brothers and sisters would remind us that as members of His one global family, we need each other now more than ever."
Reneau's personal testimony and passionate sense of call reached further to touch the congregations of Shenango Presbytery when she visited in May at the invitation of Executive Presbyter David Dawson and the presbytery's Sudan Committee.
"A partnership of more than ten years with the church in the Sudan has impressed the churches of Shenango Presbytery with the amazing activity of the Holy Spirit in Africa," Dawson said. "This experience has made the support of Ingrid Reneau a natural response in which over half of our congregations have enthusiastically offered their commitment."
Dave Lower, co-chair of Shenango's Sudan Committee, was not surprised by his presbytery's generous response. "It just proved to me that where there is a demonstrated need, people will give."
With her funding now completed, Reneau will attend the PC(USA)'s orientation for new mission workers from July 14 through July 31 in anticipation of an August departure for Sudan.
Carol Scholl, a member of Shenango's Sudan Committee, described Reneau's spirit as "beautiful, delicate, and fresh." Scholl, who was herself called to Sudan as a mission volunteer to help build a church there in January 2006, returns in spirit with Reneau.
"It moved me so much that God would bring Ingrid from all the places that she has been to be with us and to do this for us and for God," Scholl said, "and to continue this witness to the people of Sudan."
Dawson added that Reneau's "authentic and deep piety" reminds him of what the members of his presbytery have discovered in their Sudanese brothers and sisters. "I am sure that we will be profoundly blessed in supporting Ingrid and that our partnership will be enhanced beyond anything that we can presently anticipate," he said. "I pray that every congregation in the PC(USA) may experience the blessing of this kind of direct involvement with someone like Ingrid."
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