WMU today

The mission of Woman’s Missionary Union (WMU) is to radically involve believers in the mission of God. In other words, WMU exists to draw people into missions. Throughout history, this has been the unchanging purpose.

Since its inception, WMU has worked to educate generations of Southern Baptists about missions. Today WMU involves Southern Baptists in missions and missional living through its organizations: Mission Friends, Girls in Action (GAs), Royal Ambassadors (RAs), Children in Action, Acteens, Challengers, Youth On Mission, myMISSION, Women on Mission and Adults on Mission.

WMU actively promotes giving to the two missions offerings, which supply approximately half of the annual budget for the International Mission Board and the North American Mission Board. In 2012, WMU helped raise $149.3 million — the third-highest total in the offering’s history — for the Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions. Since initiating the first offering in 1888, WMU has helped raise more than $3.7 billion through this effort. Also in 2012, WMU helped raise $57 million for missions work in North America through the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering. Since 1907, when official reporting began for the home missions offering begun by WMU, receipts total more than $1.4 billion through 2012. All of the funds raised through these two missions offerings go directly to the missions boards to support field personnel as they share the gospel. WMU also continues to actively promote giving through the Cooperative Program of the Southern Baptist Convention.

WMU identifies a critical issue through its Project HELP initiative in order to educate individuals about the issue and mobilize them to address it. Past issues include AIDS, hunger, illiteracy and child advocacy, among others. In response to Project HELP: Restorative Justice, camps and ministries to prisoners and their children began in multiple states.

The current focus is Project HELP: Human Exploitation, which includes human trafficking, bullying and pornography. WMU is calling 1 million men to commit to living pornography free and calling 1 million women to pray for the men and boys in their lives.

WorldCrafts is a division of WMU that develops sustainable, fair-trade businesses among impoverished people around the world. A WorldCrafts contact writes of the women she works with, “They’ve had consistent work, which is really what they need, to have an income that they can count on, that’s reliable, that is consistent. WorldCrafts has been able to help us do that.”

WorldCrafts has partnered with more than 60 artisan groups in more than 30 countries. Each product represents a life changed by the opportunity to earn an income with dignity and to hear the offer of everlasting life. Visit worldcrafts.org for more information about artisans, products, party themes and more.

Pure Water, Pure Love (PWPL) — a ministry of WMU — provides water filters for missionaries’ home and travel use, providing a consistent clean water source. Because PWPL is funded through donations from adult and children’s WMU groups, these filters are provided to missionaries at no expense. One missionary writes, “We are so grateful that WMU has always cared for us. As a physician, I know how important good water is. Every day I see and treat kids and adults [who] are suffering from bad water. A sad reality is that something as preventable as this happens.”

Within the past year, PWPL ministry provided in excess of 1,200 filters and parts. Since 2005, donations to PWPL have enabled WMU to provide more than 50 grants totaling more than $500,000 to churches, Christian organizations and missionaries for water projects. Visit wmu.com/pwpl for details.

Christian Women’s Job Corps (CWJC) and Christian Men’s Job Corps (CMJC) are faith-based, welfare-to-work ministries of WMU. Overall, there are 159 registered and certified CWJC and CMJC sites, and several of these serve participants in multiple locations at satellite sites. In 2012, 11,080 staff and volunteers served approximately 4,250 participants. Participants include Marceia Bonin-Turner, of Tennessee, who escaped a life of domestic violence and alcohol abuse to obtain her GED, enroll in college and work with other women suffering from addictions; and Krissy Thompson, of Arkansas, who lived in her car with her child and worked as a nightclub entertainer, now in school and an active member of her church.

According to independentsector.org, the estimated value of volunteer time for 2012 is $22.14 per hour. With more than 3.7 million volunteer hours served in 2012, CWJC/CMJC had an economic impact of more than $82 million based on this estimate. Visit wmu.com/jobcorps for more information.

Visit wmu.com for more information about involving members of your church in missions through WMU. For resources, visit wmustore.com.

EDITOR’S NOTE — Jean Roberson, MSW, LCSW, is a ministry consultant for national Woman’s Missionary Union. She serves as team leader for the adult team and director of Christian Women’s Job Corps/Christian Men’s Job Corps.