LOUISVILLE, Ky.—Participants at the 2009 Woman’s Missionary Union missions celebration June 21-22 conducted the mission organization’s business and heard challenges to “change a life” and “change the world.”

Kaye Miller, a member of Immanuel Baptist Church of Little Rock, Ark., was unanimously re-elected president. Rosalie Hunt of Guntersville, Ala., president of Alabama WMU, was elected recording secretary. It is the first time both national WMU officers have been children of missionaries. Miller’s parents were missionaries to Thailand and Hunt’s parents served in China. Hunt later served as a missionary.

Miller, in her presidential address, focused on love.

Gerald and June McNeely, missionaries to Spain for 32 years with the International Mission Board, listen as their granddaughter, Lisa Hoffman Clark, explains how the McNeelys’ involvement in missions influenced her desire to serve in missions. (BP Photo/Jon Blair )

“Even the Southern Baptist Convention theme has love in it—‘Love Loud!’ WMU is in its second year of our emphasis ‘Called to Love.’ So, it seems love is in the air,” she said.

Jesus commands his followers to love him with all their hearts, soul and minds, and then to love their neighbor as themselves, she noted.

“When we offer him our passion, our being and our strength—not with just part of it, but with all of it—he gives us the amazing capacity to see through his eyes, to hear with his ears, to touch with his hands, to think with his mind and to feel with his heart,” Miller said.

She urged WMU to train the next generation to have hearts for missions and be urgent about the Great Commission.

“If a life is changed, then the world can be changed. Change a life. Change the world,” she said. “We are called to love because we are called by love. And love has a name—a name above every name. His name is Jesus.”

WMU Executive Director Wanda Lee reported WMU has helped Liberian women re-open a children’s camp following years of civil war that put some of their ministries on hold. Through Pure Water, Pure Love, WMU has provided water purification systems so Liberian WMU once again can provide Christian camp for boys and girls.

“Our Liberian sisters love you even though they’ve never met you,” Lee said.

WMU celebrated the missions legacy of the Gerald and June McNeely family. The McNeelys, emeritus missionaries to Spain, credited their mothers, both Girls in Action teachers, with inspiring them to share the gospel with others.

The McNeelys’ eldest daughter, Linda Hoffman, and her husband, Rusty, are long-time missions educators at St. Matthews Baptist Church in Louisville, Ky., the WMU annual meeting’s host church.

Their youngest daughter, Marsha Smith, and her husband, David, are Southern Baptist missionaries to North Africa.

The McNeelys’ granddaughter, Lisa Hoffman Clark, is a former missionary Journeyman to North Africa and now a GA teacher. Clark’s eldest child recently joined Missions Friends.

“One leader can change a life,” Hoffman said, noting that Christ’s calling requires some Christians to “pack a bag and a passport,” as her parents and sister did.

At an awards luncheon, Margaret Brown of Mountain Rest, S.C., received the Martha Myers award. Brown, WMU director at Mountain Rest Baptist Church, started the church’s Girls in Action organization and previously served as a GA leader.

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