1959 Mission Update
This foreign mission news update about the work in Nalerigu was published in the March 1959 issue of the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board’s Commission magazine vol.22
First Baptism
Five candidates – the first converts resulting from Southern Baptist mission work in Nalerigu, in the Northern Territories of Ghana – were baptized on Christmas Day, 1958. Among the five was Georgie Faile, eight-year-old son of Dr. and Mrs. George M. Faile, Jr., first Southern Baptist Missionaries to settle in Nalerigu.
“We spent Christmas night going after a patient,” Dr. Faile writes. “This included a six-mile walk in the bush under bright moonlight. Still, a very Happy Christmas!” Dr. Faile began medical mission work in the Nalerigu area in the fall of 1957, and the Baptist hospital was opened last August.
On Christmas morning the Nalerigu Baptist Church, also organized in August, held the first service in its new location – the old state council assembly hall which Baptists have rented for a preaching center. Attending the service were the chief of the Mamprusi, predominant tribe of the region, his elders, and some 150 other persons. Rev. Douglas C. Cather, missionary in Tamale, capital of the Northern Territories, brought the message.
288 Accept Christ
There were 288 professions of faith and 1,445 rededications during a series of evangelistic campaigns in eight Baptist associations of Ghana last fall. Forty-three Baptist churches participated, and total attendance was estimated at 16,374.
Interest Expressed
While Dr. Faile examined a patient in Naglio, which is near Nalerigu, Ghana, a devout Muslim sat in the room reading from a well-preserved edition of the Koran. In the course of the examination some 40 or 50 people gathered.
Dr. Faile advised the patient and agreed to send him some medicine. Then he gave a gospel message to the attentive audience. The senior hadji (one who has made a pilgrimage to Mecca) said: “We hear what you tell us. We want our children to follow Jesus but it is hard for us. We cannot read your Bible. Can someone come to build a school for our people so that all can learn to read and understand?”
From 100 to 120 people attend services at the Naglio preaching station each week, Dr. Faile reports.