October 30, 2000
Baptists milk chicken farm for ministry
___ACUNA, Mexico--A former chicken farm now is instrumental in helping Mexicans gobble up the gospel.
___Gethsemani Camp, located near Acuna, Mexico, just across the Rio Grande from Del Rio, used to be a 28-acre chicken farm until Baptist layman Francisco Lopez donated it to the Baptists seven or eight years ago, reported Jack Calk, director of missions for Del Rio-Uvalde Baptist Association.
___The camp is available for use by Baptist churches in the Mexican state of Coahuila, and it's used by the Baptist General Convention of Texas' River Ministry about three-quartersof the year.
___The dining hall is a converted hay barn, made useful thanks to the work of volunteers from First Baptist Church in San Antonio and Tallowood Baptist Church in Houston. Texas Baptist Men retiree builders constructed a 135-bed dormitory.
___One of the camp's most important functions is an annual theological training school. Teachers from about 40 Bible schools up and down the Rio Grande arrive every April for help in teaching fellow Baptists how to minister in their villages and colonias, Calk said.
___The camp is a gift from God, through a faithful layman, which couldn't have come into Baptists' hands any other way, he noted.
___"A lot of property in Mexico is traditional family property," he explained. "It's very difficult to obtain property here. And we must maintain agricultural activity to keep the property."
___So, the camp is home to a goat program. Camp workers raise goats for distribution to isolated families along the Rio Grande, providing them with a steady source of milk via hardy animals that can survive in desert conditions.
___As far as Baptists connected with Gethsemani Camp are concerned, God took some chickens, turned them into goats and used them to spread the gospel.
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