ESL ministries provide Alabama Baptist churches with way to reach internationals

ESL ministries provide Alabama Baptist churches with way to reach internationals

Kristy Kennedy said she doesn’t have a number. She doesn’t even have a ballpark figure.

“I just kind of hear about it as I travel around visiting churches,” she said.

But what she hears, she loves.

“What I’ve really enjoyed seeing is that some of our smaller churches and small towns are really catching the vision for ESL (English as a Second Language) ministry,” said Kennedy, a state missionary who leads ESL ministry efforts for the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions. “Internationals are all over the state right now. It isn’t just a big-city opportunity.”

As a result churches from all corners of the state are calling and asking about how to start ESL ministries, she said.

“Word is getting out that it’s a great way to reach and share and just meet needs,” Kennedy said. “They have so many other needs with learning English, like helping children in school — it’s a never-ending list.”

In areas like Greenville with several companies that make car parts, populations of immigrants have swelled to significant numbers over the years.

And the opportunity is great, said Mary Bertha Zorn, a member of First Baptist Church, Greenville.

“Our ESL ministry originally started when we had two Spanish speakers come to the church to get some help,” she said. “Between the pastor and I and the little bit of Spanish we had together, we managed to get them what they needed. But that was as far as we could go that day.”

So Zorn decided they needed a more organized effort.

“It’s probably been 10 years since that first language class, and it’s waxed and waned over the years,” she said.

The Korean population in the area greatly increased, and they also picked up students from Mexico, Guatemala and other places.

“I don’t know how the word got out, but slowly it did,” she said.

Their classes always stayed small but over time they became more friends than teachers and students. Over time their English got better.

And eventually Zorn began to see them understand the gospel too.

“We see the growth. We see the questions,” she said. “They need me to be their friend first, then it’s easier for them to accept my faith and my beliefs. It’s a beautiful thing to watch them understand it and come to see it for themselves.”

It’s something that’s happening all over the state, Kennedy said.

First Baptist Church, Montgomery, is still running a strong ESL outreach, including ministry to the Mixteco people (see story, this page).

And Mobile is a refugee city with a lot of opportunity, Kennedy said.

But the truth is that immigrants are in every corner of Alabama, and Kennedy said she’s glad to see that ESL ministry is “spreading like wildfire.”

“You can see internationals everywhere,” she said. “I hear them talking and I know they need help with their English. To me English is the most effective way to reach internationals in the U.S. with the gospel.”

It’s an instant need they have when they show up in Alabama, Kennedy said.

“And helping them learn can open doors to make friends we might not otherwise be able to make.”