During our 17th year of service in Nigeria, we continue to see encouraging firsts throughout our ministry. On September 16, 25 pastors joined me to dedicate with prayer the first-ever, fully equipped production studio for our independent Baptist churches in Africa’s most populous nation. Christian Media International raised the funds and sent a representative for the setup; then, a Pastors’ Fellowship was planned at Independent Baptist Church of Ibadan with singing, preaching, testimonies, and prayers. Announcements were made to let the preachers and church workers understand that the studio was for them to use media to get the Gospel out more effectively to their areas and around the nation.
In October, Daniel and Erin Lang, along with their two children, became the first FBMI missionaries to arrive in Abuja since our family came in June of 2005. They have already found a home in the same estate where we reside and will be working with our staff at Truth Baptist Church until they start a ministry of their own. Missionary Lang has been preaching at our seminary chapel, participating in soul winning and visitation, and speaking in TBC’s weekly youth meeting.
Since our inaugural enrollment in 2009, October of this year was the first time that Providence Baptist College & Seminary welcomed such a large group of new students. Our biggest-ever student body of 26 undergraduates includes 8 young men beginning their first semester. The orientation had been delayed for nearly two months because of our building project, but all the seminarians were excited to see the progress. The second floor of the dormitory has been completed, and enough rooms on the ground floor have been restored for accommodating the students. At the time this letter is being written, we have started extending the pillars and constructing the walls to reach the roofing level while we are trusting God for the remaining $25,000 that is needed to add the actual roof. For more information, go to fbmi.org/mpg/holmes.
We were pleased to witness both a Vacation Bible School and the last of our three 2021 Student Missions Institutes for Training in Evangelism conducted successfully at Truth Baptist Church in September. Forty-two churches in total were represented by the 241 youth who attended the 3 SMITE camps in Nigeria—55 Bible Clubs were conducted, 2,607 children were enrolled, and 1,540 were saved! We also had nearly 40 young people graduate from the four-year child-evangelism training program.
Believing God,
Mark Holmes, written 20 November 2021