Southern Baptists Remember Slain Missionaries During Week of Prayer for Kurds
One year has passed since anonymous gunmen attacked five Southern Baptist humanitarian workers near Mosul in northern Iraq, killing four and injuring another.
One year has passed since anonymous gunmen attacked five Southern Baptist humanitarian workers near Mosul in northern Iraq, killing four and injuring another. To honor the service of the slain workers, Southern Baptists are encouraging believers to participate in a Week of Prayer for the Kurds they were trying to reach this Mar. 15-21.
“As we remember those of our own mission family who gave their lives, let us pray that the Kurds might join us in God’s eternal kingdom and through faith in Jesus Christ become a part of His family,” said International Mission Board (IMB) President Jerry Rankin, as reported by the Baptist Press.
It was on Mar. 15, 2004 that four Southern Baptist workers who were researching needs for humanitarian projects in northern Iraq were killed in a drive-by shooting in Mosul. According to police reports, unidentified assailants wielding automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades sped alongside the workers’ vehicle, ambushed them, and then sped off.
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Of those attacked, Larry T. Elliott, 60, and Jean Dover Elliott, 58, of Cary, North Carolina, and Karen Denise Watson, 38, of Bakersfield, California, were immediately killed.
David E. McDonnall, 28, and Carrie Taylor McDonnall, 26, of Rowlett, Texas, who joined the International Mission Board in November 2003, were critically injured from the ambush.
Although four U.S. military surgeons had worked six hours to save David McDonnall’s life, he eventually succumbed to the wounds later that night, raising the death count to four.
Carrie remained in critical condition until later that week.
According to the IMB, the Elliotts were members of First Baptist Church in Cary, N.C. and had served with the IMB in Honduras since 1978. They transferred to the Middle East in February 2004.
Watson, who was a member of Valley Baptist Church in Bakersfield, Calif., had been with the board since March 2003.
BP reported that the Southern Baptist workers were trying to help Kurds in Iraq rebuild their lives, gain access to clean water–and discover that God deeply loves them.
“As you pray, thank God for those who gave their lives in the hope that these people would one day know our Lord Jesus Christ,” Rankin said. “Pray especially for the Kurdish people – neglected, oppressed and lost. Christ died for them as He did for all the peoples of the world, and He desires that they too have an opportunity to know Him.”
This week also marks the seventeenth anniversary of “Black Friday ”—the most infamous of many attacks that damaged or destroyed thousands of villages in northern Iraq and killed up to 100,000 people. On Mar. 16, 1988, up to 7,000 men, women and children were killed in a chemical attack by Saddam Hussein’s regime on Halabja, about 150 miles northeast of Baghdad.
One young survivor of Saddam’s 1988 chemical attack on the Kurds of Halabja, who has become a follower of Jesus, was befriended by the Southern Baptist workers who were killed last year. In an interview soon after their deaths, he expressed the special relationship he had with them. Tearfully, he told how the day before their deaths, Larry Elliott hugged him and said, “You are my son.” David McDonnall had been “like a brother” to him, he added.
To download free resources that will help your church or small group effectively pray for the Kurds, visit http://imb.org/kurds. The site also includes: a seven-day prayer guide, a video featuring International Mission Board President Jerry Rankin, a video tribute to the fallen Southern Baptist workers featuring a message from Carrie McDonnall, and a PowerPoint "virtual prayerwalk."
[Source: The Baptist Press]
