Liberia Missions Trip

June 12 – 24, 2008 Trip to Liberia, West Africa
In cooperation with El Dorado Baptist Church
www.ricksonline.org

Medical Mission Opportunity Liberia, West Africa June 12-24, 2008 The Ricks Institute Community Health Clinic, located on a beautiful 1200 acre campus some 15 miles east of Monrovia, Liberia, is awaiting your “hope” this summer. “Hope” was the operative word for the medical mission trip to Ricks Institute in July, 2007, and hope remains the great need for the people of this war-torn country.

Ricks Institute is a Christian faith and learning community for students in kindergarten through 12th grade. The campus facilities were severely looted and vandalized as a result of the brutal Liberian civil war, which started on the eve of Christmas 1989. The campus served as a battle ground during the 14+ year war. Significant areas of the campus were destroyed, while portions of the campus served as a refugee camp for thousands of internally displaced people from around the country.

Following the end of the war and the arrival of Principal and Chief Administrative Officer Olu Menjay in 2004, Ricks has taken great strides in resurrecting from the ashes of destruction, looting, bloodshed, and pain. The school, both boarding and day school, is now in session with 450 students. Additionally, the Ricks Institute Community Health Clinic is operative with a staff of two full-time nurses who provide medical care not only for the school students, but also for those in the many surrounding villages and communities.

In the summer of 2007, a small medical team from the First Baptist Church of El Dorado, Kansas, traveled to Ricks to conduct a five-day medical clinic. The clinic building had been renovated in the spring of 2007, and in late summer received 6,000 pounds of supplies and equipment from Hospitals of Hope in Wichita, Kansas, to fully service the facility. During the medical clinic held in July 2007, villagers traveled as far as 12 miles by foot, arriving as early as 12:00 a.m. to 2:30 a.m. to have an opportunity to be seen in the clinic. 363 persons received medical care, while hundreds more were turned away due to the team’s inability to care for so many.

The summer of 2008 holds great promise for reaching in a far greater way to the people of Liberia. Plans are to take a combined evangelistic/medical/construction/teaching team to Ricks from June 12-24. The possibilities are limitless in the midst of these people who are in such great need of help and hope. Last summer over one-third of the people seen in the clinic were saved and now have Bibles in their hands after gospel presentations each morning. “I trust that [these] are just the beginning of the multitudes of people who will be saved and healed and touched in Jesus’ Name,” stated Wade Graber, senior pastor of FBC.

If you are interested in inquiring further about this mission opportunity, please contact Hospitals of Hope in Wichita, or Pastor Wade Graber at First Baptist Church, El Dorado. Further information about Ricks Institute and the health clinic may be found on its website: www.ricksonline.org