The Gulf Coast of Alabama is blessed with a usually warm, emerald-green ocean for swimming and sugar-white, soft-sand beaches for sunning. It’s a paradise that draws 6 million people a year, but 70 percent of them don’t know Christ.
Jeff and Thea Ford are North American Mission Board (NAMB) resort missionaries who head up Gulf Area Resort Ministries in the twin resort cities of Gulf Shores and Orange Beach. Jeff Ford’s ministry is supported not only by NAMB but also by Baldwin Baptist Association and the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions.
“Someone once told me that lost people are most open to the gospel two times in their lives,” Ford said. “The No. 1 time is during a crisis. And the second time is during times of recreation, leisure or vacation.”
The Fords are only two of nearly 3,000 NAMB missionaries in the United States, Canada and their territories supported by the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering (AAEO) for North American Missions. The 2007 AAEO’s goal is $57 million, 100 percent of which is used for missionaries like the Fords.
The couple’s ministry varies in focus depending on the season of the year.
Fall and winter on the Alabama Gulf Coast attract senior adults — “snowbirds” as Ford affectionately calls them — from the North and Midwest who come south to the Gulf for up to six months to escape harsh winters back home.
“During our snowbird ministry in the winter, we hold worship services at local campgrounds and have a bicycle club where Thea and I ride bikes with the snowbirds, just trying to build relationships,” he said. “We may have 200 of them at a worship service.”
But Ford’s busiest time of year is spring break and summer, when college, high school and junior high students — and kids with their families — swarm the Alabama Gulf Coast beaches. Starting with a Web site called www.barefootbelievers.com and a NAMB-developed program called Innovators, the Fords use a myriad of methods to creatively spread the gospel on the beaches. “Barefoot believers” comes from Romans 10:15, where Paul refers to a verse in Isaiah that says, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring the Good News.”
“We spend a lot of time barefoot on the beach — handing out bottles of water, Frisbees with the gospel message imprinted on them, setting up face-painting and hair-wrap booths or feeding people cold watermelon,” Ford said. “We just want to have a presence.”
Ford said his spring and summer ministry also uses worship services, Christian music concerts, backyard Bible clubs and other forms of beach evangelism.
“Last year, we worked with about 1,000 barefoot believers. These were senior adults, adults, families on mission trips and a lot of students — from college-aged down to junior high-aged.”
Ford also uses teams of Innovators, college students for whom he finds summer jobs in the Gulf Shores or Orange Beach areas. They may work most of the day in a local hotel, resort or tourist attraction and then spend the rest of their day supporting Ford’s ministry by witnessing or teaching Bible studies to children at a local hotel, condo or resort.
“A lot of college students say, ‘I can’t be a summer missionary because I have to work and earn some money for school,’” Ford said. NAMB’s Innovators program allows them to do both.
“A lot of the spring break and summer folks are dealing with addiction and the emptiness that comes from a life without Christ,” he said. “I remember that life — 10 or 12 years ago when my life was a mess. God can take such a messed-up life and make it beautiful. I’m able to share with them the hope that I found in Christ. I think that’s why God placed me here.”
Escape and denial are two traits Ford consistently spots in visitors to the Gulf. “People, of course, come to the beach on vacation to try to find a little peace and quiet — some peace of mind. … But the fact is, if they don’t have a relationship with Christ, they’re not going to find that real peace,” he said.
Ford said the emptiness people feel in their lives can actually grow stronger while on vacation because they have fewer distractions and more time to think.
How important is the AAEO to the Fords and their ministry?
“I don’t have to worry about the money or the food on the table or the clothes on my back … ,” he said. “I think God has allowed the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering — through Southern Baptists working together — to accomplish mighty things. The hearts and minds of missionaries are freed up so that we can be more effective and healthy in our ministry and in our families.” (NAMB)
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