Crofton—New Palestine Baptist Church in Crofton, Sinking Fork Baptist Church in Hopkinsville and Crofton Baptist Church joined in an outreach effort to area Hispanic, migrant tobacco farmers. Approximately 125 migrants attended the event, which is one of multiple outreach efforts planned for the next several months.

“It’s a process of building relationships for the sake of spreading the gospel,” said Ken Cummins, bivocational pastor of New Palestine Church, which hosted the event, “It’s our obligation to reach our neighbors.”

The idea for this ministry effort began with an idea from David Daniel, a church deacon and Sunday School teacher at New Palestine, who suggested a mechanical bull be provided for recreational use at the outreach events. The proposal was met with approval by church staff.

“The migrant ministry has been going on for years. We had been hosting an ongoing Bible study during the week,” added Cummins. “Many of these migrants are struggling on the tobacco farms this year due to the heavy rain we’ve had. We just felt like this event would be an effective tool for area churches to come together to reach this community.”

After the worship services on Aug. 14, the three churches provided a meal, a gospel presentation and Spanish New Testaments to the migrant workers. The mechanical bull was available for use and local WMU provided gifts to be distributed.

To the disappointment of leaders, there were no responses to the gospel presentation, but that won’t deter future evangelism efforts.

“The Lord is always at work around us. He uses us as his witnesses,” explained Cummins. “He is working on the hearts of the migrant workers here for the season as well as those who live here.”

Going forward, the Christian County churches know it will take commitment, hard work, cooperation and prayer to reach their neighbors.

“(These efforts) have been demonstrative of how the body of Christ reaches out to all nationalities, especially the Hispanic migrant works in our nearby communities,” said Cummins. (WR)