The Smiths: Answering God's Call Pt. 1

Curious about the power of enduring faith and commitment? Elbert and Kay Smith share their transformative journeys that took them from the heartland of Oklahoma to Central America, and around the world, serving in ministry and missions. Learn how a World Missions Conference and a youth camp experience set the stage for their lifelong dedication to God's work.

Elliff Center: https://www.okbu.edu/elliff-center/index.html
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Transcript

Elbert's Introduction, Background, and Salvation

Kyle 0:05

Welcome and thanks for listening to the From Every Nation podcast, the official podcast of the Tom Ellef Center for Missions at Oklahoma Baptist University. I'm Kyle and I'll be your host as we learn to live as those sent out to spread the gospel. So welcome everybody to this episode of the From Every Nation podcast. We're glad you all are here with me today. I've got Elbert and Kay Smith. Elbert is our director of the Elf Center here at OBU and we're excited to sit down and talk to them about their life and their ministry through the years, and so I'll let them introduce themselves and we'll dive on in.

Elbert 0:47

Kyle. I had the opportunity to grow up in a home in northeastern Oklahoma, in Claremore, where both of my parents were involved in the church that we attended. As a matter of fact, they had been members who helped start the church. There wasn't a Southern Baptist Church on that side of Tulsa in the Vertigris area, and so they helped start Vertigris Baptist Church, first Baptist Vertigris, when I was six years old. It was at that church that the Lord made clear to me that I didn't know him, convicted me of my separation from him, and the pastor explained the gospel and I was saved and baptized. It was also at that same church when, at 13, they had something, what was it called Mission conferences, world Missions Conference, world Missions Conferences. And so our church had a World Missions Conference, which back then, once every five years, every church in the association was invited to participate, and then IMB, nam, state convention and the local association would coordinate to send five or six different speakers to that church. So, regardless of the size of the church, you had this whole array of practitioners coming into your church.

Elbert 2:11

Well, the night that the guy from the foreign mission board back then international mission board, now the night that he spoke, the Holy Spirit was just really clear that the Lord was speaking to me, and so I responded that night and the next Sunday said I felt like the Lord was calling me to special service. I didn't know what he was a foreign missionary so I thought that might be it. But also the ministry that I saw regularly was a preacher, and so I thought it might be that. So fast forward four years, finishing up high school and applying at Oklahoma Baptist University where they had a Pritchard scholarship which was half tuition, this awesome scholarship. Only, you had to say if you were a mission volunteer or a pastoral ministry volunteer. So I had to choose. Oh, I agonized. I talked to my pastor, I talked to the director of missions for the association, I talked to every guest preacher who came through. How do I know what?

Elbert 3:15

it is I talked to my dad, I talked to all these people and so actually I decided at the last, as it came time to get ready for school, I said, okay, I think I'm called to being a pastor. It's really funny to me, looking back now, that Kay and I were on the field with the International Mission Board 15 years. I was in the pastorate 13 and a half years and then we trained missionaries for 15 years and so you put it all together and you say, okay, no wonder I couldn't say it's this box, because it was none of the above. It was all of the above was still what the Holy Spirit was doing. So that was a little bit of background. Growing up, my mother taught the first, second and third graders for 50 years in that church. My dad was a deacon in that church and we would have to buy him a new leather Bible every few years because he had worn out the last one. So just an example of commitment to the church and commitment to God's Word.

Kyle 4:23

Gosh, that's awesome.

Kay 4:25

So I didn't grow up like Elbert at all, grew up in Oklahoma City. My parents loved me, my grandparents. I'm the oldest one, so you know what that means. But so I knew I was dear to all of them. But as far as going to church or talking about the Lord, not at all. But I knew the Lord was special and I wanted to have a relationship with Him since I was a little girl.

Kay 4:56

But Mother would drop us off at Sunday school, mayfair Baptist Church in northwest Oklahoma City. She'd pick us up after Sunday school. I had never even been to big church by the time I was a teenager, so. But one time she dropped us off was in July and the next day was the first day I would have been old enough to go to Falls Creek and I'd heard my uncle talk about it. So I persuaded my mother to let me go. I called the Sunday school department director and said I want to go, and they put things in motion and rode down to Falls Creek sitting right behind the pastor, and I knew some kids' names but I didn't know anybody. So when we were there, very shy, very, very shy and then beloved, mrs White in our cabin came through the dining area by myself in the middle of the afternoon and she said Katie, you know Jesus and boy, that had really been on my heart. There'd been some friends that had taken me to church and I thought there was a huge scale and if I was really good enough I could tip it. But during that week, during Falls Creek, I began to realize that is not how that works, and so once she asked me if I had Jesus in my heart, it kind of embarrassed me a little bit and I just picked up my step, ran to the dorm and said no, but I'll take care of that tonight. Well, she was right behind me, brought me back, talked to the pastor for a long time and they really helped me understand the gospel and that Jesus died for me, gave me a gift of eternal life. But I had to receive it and repent of my sins and ask Jesus in my heart. So all those kids that I thought I wanted to be like and be saved, they got saved the next night and so a whole bunch of us were baptized together when we got back that weekend on Sunday.

Kay 6:58

But the ladies in church knew that I needed to be discipled and I hadn't been at all. And so they put me in ACT Teams, that mission organization for teenagers, never thinking I'd go to the field but thinking that they could spend more time with me. So it was two or three leaders, five or six girls and we did a lot of stuff but it had Scripture memory in it. They just really walked me along. So another group of ladies said where are we going to send her to school and what's she going to study? So they just kind of decided that I would go to OBU and I would study nursing and probably by them saying that made that come to my mind. I never would have thought of that had they not said that. And so they really helped me come visit OBU, get to know people at OBU, helped me know what to do to get financial aid. And so I came to OBU as a freshman and Elbert and I met our freshman year, so studied nursing.

Kay 8:08

After my freshman year I was a summer missionary at the mission center it was called Mission Exchange with 19 other college students Went to Glorietta Student Week and the IMB made a presentation and I thought that's what I'm supposed to do. I'm supposed to work in the river ministry with children on the border with texas. And so I came back, declared that I was a mission volunteer. I also got the pritchard scholarship and really began to grow going towards that direction. And then, after Elbert graduated, then I graduated and we got reacquainted and I was convinced that he was the one the Lord wanted me to marry. But he wasn't called to missions. I thought, oh, okay, I'll be a pastor's wife, which is really what I wanted to do anyway, pastor's wife, which is really what I wanted to do anyway. So we got married and I would say we'd been married two or three years.

Kay 9:11

We were at the state convention. Guy came in from the mission board and he said the missionaries in Central America are saying come over here and help us. And Elbert nudged me and he said I think he's talking to us. I thought, ah, the beginning of the end, because I'm not very adventuresome, Elbert is. And I thought I knew the Lord was going to make good on that call. He was going to circle back around to that. It's just a matter of time. Anyway, we were appointed for Mexico, went our first term, no kids, and it was a very difficult time of full surrender. But God was good, he's really really good. Came back and I would say from those early days to today he who calls you is faithful, he'll do it days to today.

Elbert 10:09

He who calls you is faithful. He'll do it. Kyle, when I think about the way our paths have gone, kay and I, over the years, have read thousands of mission biographies, short versions that are given as people apply to the IMB. And so, as we have reflected on how people are called, and so, as we have reflected on how people are called, actually, I'm pretty positive. There's not a cookie cutter approach.

Elbert 10:32

Our testimony is obey what you think God is saying wholeheartedly, and then he'll take care of tomorrow. And so, at the same time that we want to caution people if you know you're going one direction and young man or young woman is going a different direction, then be really sensitive to the Holy Spirit. But what we watched is God puts things together, and if indeed this is the person that you're supposed to be married to, then he knew all of those things before he called you, and then he's going to be able to put those details together. So our experience is is God gives us a guide, his name is the Holy Spirit, and and the goal is not to have a clear plan of here's what I'm going to do, but a strong commitment that I'm going to follow his leadership, because he knows what should be done.

Kyle 11:34

Yeah, so help us piece together that timeline a little bit. When at OBU did you all meet? When was graduation, when was getting married and starting the pastorate? So kind of help us there. I got a little lost.

Kay 11:55

We went out our freshman year in the spring.

An OBU Love Story

Elbert 11:58

But that fall we had been going on Fridays.

Kay 12:01

Oh, we had been going to Mission Exchange on Friday nights and Elbert asked me to ride in his car because I was from Oklahoma City and I knew the way.

Kyle 12:10

Very nice.

Kay 12:12

I did not know the way. We got lost more than once. But the group that used to go to Mission Exchange would do that be with students, play basketball, have a devotional. But then we would go to someone's house, have fellowship every Friday night and then by the spring Elbert asked me out and we went to see Rocky here in Shawnee.

Kyle 12:38

Which Rocky At the.

Kay 12:39

Ritz no numbers.

Kyle 12:41

Wow, okay, the OG, that's it.

Kay 12:44

No Long time ago, but anyway it was really sweet. I was a summer missionary that summer. Elbert was youth and music minister in southeastern Oklahoma. His day off was Monday and he would come to the mission center just going to drop in, bechalant, not act too interested, way before cell phones and um, it was also my day off and I had gone home to my parents so um tried to figure it out but it we just didn't date. We were friends all that time. But after I graduated I was living in Fort Worth, working at Fort Worth Children's Hospital and I came up to take my boards, stopped at Falls Creek on my way back and helped a church with their girls in their cabin and sat down and Elbert and his students were on the row behind, so we got reacquainted and he got my number and, um, he was at my apartment pretty quickly after we, after that semester, started and um, you know, all my friends know Elbert and my roommates said you know he's pretty passionate.

Kay 14:11

We could call him intense and he was. He was very serious but kind of spooked me a little bit and then that was in the fallided. Oh, maybe we just, you know, maybe I'm not quite ready. And then by January I'd gone to see my aunt and uncle in North Carolina. I really felt like the Lord said settle down, it's time I'm going to bring someone into your life. When I got back to Fort Worth, Elbert had been at my apartment talking to my roommates. He said I'd like Kay to do a retreat with me and they said we were going to tell him no, but you're going to have to do that. And I said I'm not going to tell him no. And so it was a retreat in February.

Elbert 14:53

We were engaged in April, married in August Wow, We'd known each other a long time, but once she decided that the Lord was in this, then things moved a little more quickly.

Kyle 15:07

Yeah, things move a lot quicker when you already know each other or you know what you're doing in life, where you're going, what's going on. It just answers so many of those questions just already. And then once you know the Lord's in this, why slow?

Elbert 15:22

it down. Yeah, after my sophomore year here at OBU, going to be a preacher boy studying religion was the only degree OBU had back in that day. And so after my sophomore year I had preached at a couple of churches in eastern Oklahoma, in McIntosh County, and one of them called back the next Wednesday night and said would you be our pastor? At that time I was 19, about to have my birthday, to turn 20. And I think maybe I didn't know enough at 19 to say no. Actually I do think it was God's will, but so I started pastoring at 19.

Elbert 16:04

So by the time Kay and I were married, I had been pastoring for four years and was already started on MDiv at Southwestern. And so, talking about knowing what you're doing, I do think that's clear that there was no question for Kay where is this guy headed? Well, I didn't just talk about it, but she could see it real clearly. Again, she was a nursing major working at Worthworth Children's Hospital, and so I do think you're right that that kind of changes things a little bit when you've known people for a long time. I explain that because I don't want everyone to think that we're advocating meeting someone for the first time and being married a few months later.

Kay 16:43

No, but we got married after I graduated. But it was Vivian Baptist Church outside of Eufaula, little white church and little white parsonage. It was my dream come true and they were pretty glad to see some girl come along to marry their pastor who had been there four years. So it was idyllic. The Lord really blessed. It was a really sweet, sweet time.

Elbert 17:13

It's funny to me. I work hard at people's names, but it just doesn't come natural for me. I'd been at that church for four years. We'd gone from 25 to 100 in attendance. I'd baptized a good number of them. But as people would come out the back door, Kay would be standing beside me. She'd been there a month and she'd be whispering their names in my ear as they came up. And so to this day, when the Tom Ellis Center students meet on Monday mornings and someone starts speaking, they know that I look over at Kay and she reminds me of their names.

Kay 17:47

So it's really funny.

Kyle 17:48

Yeah but that's great. So the other day we were talking and you talked about some Elbert. You talked about some valuable lessons that you learned in that first pastorate that you did regarding spiritual disciplines. Talk to us about that a little bit and what you learned in those early years.

Lessons From Elbert's First Pastorate

Elbert 18:14

When I look back at those years I really believe. First of all, I think godly deacons in the first churches just made all the difference. Actually, not just the first churches, All the churches in Oklahoma. Just amazing how those men shaped us, and I would just want to encourage both students to recognize that God's putting people around, but also to members in churches, like Kay was mentioning earlier about Mrs White. But the deacons there, but one summer they asked if the church had grown and they asked if I would be full time that summer. And so it was. It was, um, the church was still running, I don't remember maybe 50 or 60 or 70 by then.

Elbert 19:08

But but I was not used to having, you know, 40, 50 hours a week dedicated to the church. I was used to being a student, and so that summer I just felt like the Holy Spirit impressed upon me to just spend my mornings for my quiet time, and so it was just this time of extended reading through the Word. I think it was one of the most pivotal things in my formation for ministry was that summer I read through the New Testament once a month and then I read through the Old Testament that summer. But there's just something powerful about reading in Mark. When you still remember Matthew reading in Luke, when you still remember Mark, when you still remember Matthew reading in Luke, when you still remember Mark. There's something about tying it together when you don't take three years to finish. We really encourage in our Tom Ellis Center for Missions that all the participants are reading through the New Testament once a semester and I think that's life-changing, it's life-giving. The Word comes alive. So again the example that I'd watched my father because he was reading through the New Testament, he'd reading through the scripture every year, then that summer it really was just completely life-changing. And then also it gave me time to be very, very consistent in my evangelism. And so it was uncanny. At that church it seemed like when I went visiting, the Lord gave us people who came into the church. It was humbling because it was nearly always not the person I visited. It was like the Lord had a way of saying now, elmer, let me make sure that you don't put too much confidence in the flesh, so, but if I was faithful to be sharing the gospel all week, it was just amazing how he brought to himself people. So anyway, it was just really encouraging. So it was that church between. What does the body of Christ look like? How do you get into the word? How do you spend time in prayer? What does evangelism look like?

Elbert 21:17

And then also, it was at that church that we decided we needed to add on to the sanctuary because of growth.

Elbert 21:27

And I had just taken a little hour and a half or two hour credit course at Southwestern with Dr Cal Guy, and he had suggested some mission books, and the class had made such an impact. I invited him to come up and he had stayed with me in the parsonage there and preached on a Sunday at that little church. And after Dr Guy's impact, I suggested to the congregation that for every so much that we raised for the building, we should set aside a certain amount for mission trip. And so, as we were raising money, we wanted to do both hand, not to be self-centered, and by the time it was finished we had enough for, I think, seven or eight from the church to go to a place that Dr Guy set up for us in Honduras. And that was my first mission trip. And so those are the kinds of lessons that came out of that first church. So you're right, the Lord used that in a powerful way in our lives.

Kay 22:35

Well, they were a gracious church. I was not yet a member but they allowed me to go and it was a medical mission trip and so being a nurse really, really helped and I have a picture on my wall at home of my translator helping me interview children. I remember that little boy had asthma and so, really formative. We went thinking the Lord would call us and it was three weeks before we got married and so we thought he would call us on that trip. But he didn't. But he did change our heart and we were open and taught us a whole lot. It's really good.

Elbert 23:16

We had a doctor and a dentist a medical doctor and a dentist in the church and they both of them were greatly impacted went back many times on mission trips. So God spoke to others. It just wasn't the preacher and his wife, it was other people on the trip. And then, like I mentioned earlier, years later he was very, very clear that God, like Kay mentioned a while ago, he was very clear that when he called us but it wasn't at that time of what our experience is is God knows how to communicate.

Elbert 23:53

We need to pay attention and when he speaks we're supposed to obey. But we can relax that he'll guide us in his timing. I love it in Acts, chapter eight, where Philip's all involved in the work in Samaria and then the angel, he has this call to leave the revival and go to a desert road and he gets there and it's the Ethiopian eunuch. So I just see this clear picture that as long as we're obeying God and willing to obey, he's able to guide us. Now, if we start disobeying, that's different, but he's able to guide us.

Discerning and Following God's Call

Kyle 24:24

Yeah, I think back to a lot of conversations I have with students and I didn't realize that that was your first time overseas, was at that first pastorate, and I talk to students and I say you want to be a better pastor, you want to be a better businessman, you want to be a better nurse, you want to be a better insert whatever vocation you want into this sentence and going overseas crossing version of whatever it is the Lord has for them to do in a vocation. And so it's fun to hear you talk about how that was your first time overseas and you had already had some missions perspective and how that the Lord used that, even in your pastor, to shape really the rest of your future, absolutely. So that's fun to hear. Let's talk about for a second. Then.

Kyle 25:42

It sounds like, kay, you knew from early on that missions was on your radar. But talk to me about when, when the Lord started really focusing you and refocusing the two of you into hey, we had this missions conference and you felt that guy was talking to you all about going what. What were those conversations like? As a couple saying hey.

Elbert 26:16

Well, I guess it's time for us to pack up and move. We've ended up doing that a few times over the years and it is a pretty significant like it's a why in the road. You're at a fork. In the road Kay mentioned we had gone to the state convention. A senior leader from Foreign Mission Board International Mission Board now was speaking to Oklahoma Baptist Convention in November and he had used the passage in the Gospels about one boat being full and calling out to the other boat. And then, like Kay said, he used the phrase the missionaries in Central America. The missionaries in Central America are saying to you, come over here and help us.

Elbert 26:59

And there was just this sense in my heart that the Holy Spirit, like every Christian, can recognize when the Holy Spirit's convicting for salvation and it's not just a sense of empty words. They're not. They're not just, they're not just intellectual ideas, but, as scripture says, our spirit bears witness. So inside, the spirit bore witness and I felt like that's what God was saying to us At that point in time. I had read a book a couple of years earlier, by a listen to God, and the pastor's name was Tom Eliff, and so at that point he had already influenced my life by the way that God guides us and wants to guide us. So at that time again, like Kay said, I'm pretty sure it was in the middle of the service that I leaned over to her and said I think that's what the Lord's saying to us. Well, that night at the hotel, we talked for some time.

Elbert 28:20

Within a few weeks we'd contacted the Foreign Mission Board and had begun the process, this idea that says if this is what God says, you act on it. Process, this idea that says if this is what God says, you act on it. And what I know now is there are plenty of places for doors to get closed and as you walk in obedience, there are all kinds of places for affirmation. But as we started down that path, it was nothing but affirmation from all kinds of directions. We had a list of probably seven or ten ways that we felt like God had affirmed that.

Elbert 28:54

So I guess what I would say, kyle, is there was general guidance in the past and then specific you're supposed to act on this guidance and then confirmation that, yes, this is from the Lord. I really I think this is vital for everyone going to the mission field, but I don't think it's just for missionaries. Galatians 5 commands us to be led by the Spirit, so this is not some unusual thing for any follower of Jesus. Oh yeah, what did I just call them Followers of Jesus? And so if we're following him, then he's leading and so I think, being led by the Spirit and this is how he led us. But I think, however it's perceived, I think people in any walk of life, that followers of Jesus are supposed to be led by the Spirit and that's how he led us.

Kyle 30:00

That's awesome. So what about your application process to the Foreign Mission Board? What was that process like? And I mean we may get into it a little bit, but how is that different than today? I mean, we're talking different time periods.

Kay 30:19

Well, so you write a biography of your life. I mean, it is just pages and pages and they give you a guide. You just work through that, you do a biographical sketch. But in those days we had to be, of course, had to have medical clearance, but we also had to have psychological clearance. So that was interesting.

Kay 30:47

But I can really understand what they were trying to say. They were trying to say we want you as healthy as you can, to flourish there, and if we need to deal with anything before we go, let's do it, and that is just step by step. We had a great candidate consultant, don Revis, and he just walked us through and by that time we were pastoring at First Baptist Perkins and it was a dream church still a dream church in my opinion, but it's just a lovely parsonage. But here's the main thing my beloved grandmother lived 11 miles from there and remember I'm the oldest and I'm named after her, and sweet, sweet day. So when the Lord is asking me to leave all that, it was quite a big ask in my heart. And so the Lord. We did. We worked on that application process for months and so we contacted them. That was November when Elbert heard that and we were appointed 13 months later, in December, and that was relatively fast in those days, but Elbert had finished his MDiv in between.

Elbert 32:10

Why don't you share about the women? The night you were staying up with one of the older women in the church, just how the Lord was confirming, because again, the question was looking how does that call look and how does that process look?

Kay 32:30

I think it goes back to what you ask about Elbert's disciplines and his walks with the Lord, because the Lord has asked us to go back. We've gone to the field three different times and we switched in the middle, so he's done a lot of redirecting. But back to Mrs White who asked me if I'd been saved. She followed me all through high school and her son came to OBU so she was over here and checked on me. But one of the things she would always ask is Kay, are you reading God's Word? And I would sporadically, but I just couldn't get disciplined. And so that first time the Lord asked us to go, he really didn't use his word as much as he did my relationships.

Kay 33:17

And there was a lady in our church in Perkins and we were sitting up with her sister one night and she began sharing her testimony how the Lord had called her when she was my age and she didn't go. And here she was, 70, 80-year-old, dear saint, regretting that she'd never obeyed. There was another lady in the same church. She was the WMU president. And at those pivotal years, like students are here at OBU where you can make life-altering decisions who you marry, what you study, where you live. She had made a decision to marry an unbeliever and she began to share with me how the God had so clearly called her, and in a year of disobedience, her life took a different trajectory.

Kay 34:14

But I'm, I was in the stairwell here at Shawnee Hall and this guy that had never talked to me before just it was just the two of us in stairwell and he just looked me straight in the eyes. He said you're going to the mission field, aren't you? And I said, ah, um, we are talking about that field, aren't you? And I said we are talking about that and he just went on. I went on, never talked to me again.

Kay 34:36

But it was just over and over affirmation, things that could not. Just the Lord knew exactly what he was doing. No one else knew what they were saying to us. So we just wrote all that down, we stored it in our hearts. But the Lord didn't use as much of his word with me that time and I think it's because I hadn't developed that discipline of being in there every day. But when he called later, I can point to you verse, chapter and verse where I go. Oh, that jumped off the page and I could misinterpret that. Any of that you can misinterpret.

Kay 35:14

But you go back to a call, you go back to where he's led you. You go back to wise counsel, circumstances, all those things God uses in our life, the pulling of the Spirit, and it was undeniable. So that's why it's so important to have a call, because there were days in those early days in Mexico when I was sick and couldn't go to school, when that sweet little grandmother she's getting older and I would have loved to have spent Christmas with her. When days get hard, you got to go back to the call, back to obedience and nail it down early. And that's why the board is asking you to write all that stuff, nail it down.

Kyle 35:59

Wow. So you guys have applied to the foreign mission board at the time and you're you're trying to decide where you're going, where the Lord's taking. You all landed on Mexico city. Talk us through that process and what it looked like for you all to work through. Okay, lord, you're calling us to go overseas, but where?

Kay 36:21

We, there was a book of jobs and security wasn't what it is today and we had it and we could, just at night we would just read all the job descriptions, job request, and we read them. Read them, no, not no. So there was one for um state of mexico the capital of the state of mexico and mexico is toluca and it asked for a church planter and a nurse who could do health teachings, community health classes that is my love. And well, baby immunizations, that which is just my first love. And so we read that and we just looked at each other and we go that's it, that's absolutely it. And so you know, the just looked at each other and we go that's it, that's absolutely it. And so you know, the board has a voice in that. So our candidate consulted and we all prayed, really since the Lord asked us to do that, and so we were appointed December 10th 1985, december 13th 1985. And we were in language school. We went to orientation and we were in language school April of 1986.

Kyle 37:41

Wow, so you find Mexico city. You how long between when you're appointed and when you got down there and kind of what was? What was your initial impression when you guys got down there?

Elbert 37:55

yeah, the trip. Um, there were three of us that were going to mexico at the same time, three couples, and so at that time, um, the mexican constitution did not allow for foreign religious workers. It was due to, uh, things that had happened in the late 1800s, when the Roman Catholic Church owned most of the property of the country, and so the Constitution didn't let outside priests or foreign workers. And so we went in on tourist papers, and it was rather obvious to the people at the border that we were going to be staying more than a week or two. They gave us six-month visas. We had to come out every six months to change our visas, and so the three couples drove in together. It was rather humorous, because the distance was such that within a year, we could travel the distance in 10 and a half, 11 hours, because we knew the roads. All of that the first day, the first time in it was a three day trip. Oh geez, oh, my goodness.

Elbert 38:56

We, uh, we arrived in Guadalajara and, um, again, we were at a period of time when missionaries to Mexico were studying language in Mexico, which was just this amazing blessing, so we would travel around the country and get to know other workers and just see the country, and the idea was they wanted us to fall in love with Mexico, and so it was very easy to do.

Elbert 39:20

We studied Spanish there for one year and then we went to. Our city was Toluca, which is one of the state capitals that surround Mexico City, and so it was in the Mexico City area, but the first term we were 45 miles west in a city of about a million 800,000 at that time, and so we drove over one weekend during language school and found our house and rented our house and moved over. We were the only person in the state with the board, and so we eventually met one other American couple who lived in the city, but we only saw them like once or twice, so we were the only ones that we knew there, which really ties you to the brethren we spent a lot of time into each other.

Elbert 40:18

We're completely comfortable with contemporary trends right now to put everyone on teams, but also there's something about one way to learn to swim is to be thrown into the deep end of the pool with someone watching, and so that was the way we did it back then in Mexico. At that time you had the option, as a new missionary, that you could choose to go to a city with a veteran couple and spend your first term working with someone. So even back in the 80s, there was an understanding that some people would best begin their work with mentors present, and so it's not like those things weren't heard of. It's just that they gave us a choice and we didn't know anyone who chose to go be on a team with someone else instead of. I think God sent me to this city and we were just saying I want to get started on the assignment the Lord gave me. So within a few weeks we went to First Baptist Church. Maybe the next Sunday went to First Baptist Church, set up meetings. They didn't have a pastor at that time.

Elbert 41:24

I set up meetings with some of the leading men said we're here to help start new churches. Tell us about your missions. They had two missions, and so we asked permission to contact their missions. They gave it. We went to those missions and said if you'd like to organize as a church as soon as the Lord would allow it, then we would like to work with you. If you want to stay a mission and don't want to move forward, then we really we don't have time for that.

Elbert 41:50

The Lord sent us here to do a job, and so both missions said yes, we would like to organize as a church, and within a year both did and they both moved forward as a church doing well, many, many decades later. But so our first term, and on Fridays I would ride with a was he 70 or 80, with one of the brethren who had pastored for years. He and I would ride together an hour north into the Massawa Indian Territory and they about 20, oh no, 35 years before us, two single Canadian women had gone there and translated the New Testament and they had begun the first churches. And so by the time we arrived there were 20 churches that we helped organize into an association. And so I did seminary, extension teaching. The Oaxaca Seminary had an extension center there, so I taught seminary to young Mosawa pastors on Fridays and church planting during the on Sundays and then during the week we would go to those churches and do discipleship and evangelism in both of those missions.

Kyle 43:03

That's awesome, kay. What, to what degree were you involved in that and where did where with your nursing degree? And things play into that first term.

A Different Assignment. A Start to a Family

Elbert 43:17

The Lord had a different assignment. He did have a different assignment.

Kay 43:21

I did do one health class, I remember, after we got out of language school and we set up our house in Toluca, two of our friends that were behind us in language school called and they said the director's going around the language school and says a little baby needs a home. And we had really sensed maybe the Lord would. We didn't have any children, maybe the Lord would have us adopt. And, long story short, Daniel Benjamin became our son at 40 years, 40 hours old, and so we went back to Guadalajara, as the Lord was so precious. Those two families that drove into Mexico with us came unbeknownst to all this activity about Daniel. They came in that night for a conference. They helped us. We didn't have any clothes, any diapers, any bed and they were both moms. I said you know what to do. So Elbert and I went back to Guadalajara, Tukwalahara, God in His amazing mercy and just provision and everything. We drove back the next day with a little bitty boy and God put it all together and we were able to adopt Daniel. And so I went from doing almost everything I ever did in ministry after we were married with Elbert, went everywhere together to staying home with a little baby that was probably had been born a bit premature so he really needed to stay in a bit.

Kay 45:05

And so, probably when Daniel was about six months old, some friends, some missionary friends, said have you ever thought about adopting again? And I had already begun to talk to Elbert. I said I think we need to adopt again. And Elbert said oh, my goodness, Daniel's just a baby, no way. I said, oh, but would you just pray about it? And so of course he agreed to pray. So he agreed also that that's what the Lord was laying on our heart. We went to a meeting. Our colleagues out of the blue came and asked us if we'd be willing to adopt again and they said we have a friend and their daughter's expecting. And, long story short, Daniel lacks three days being a year old, and Captain Elizabeth was born and so she became ours at 50 minutes old. So my first term was with teeny, tiny babies and being a pediatric nurse I was quite content.

Kyle 46:08

What a blessing, that's amazing. What a blessing that's amazing. I didn't realize that you all adopted them that quickly into your time in.

Kay 46:20

Mexico. Yeah, one month out of language school, daniel.

Kyle 46:23

And how long was language school A?

Kay 46:25

year One year Okay.

Kyle 46:27

So you've been there 13 months and you adopt Daniel and you've been there 23 months and you adopt Catherine.

Kay 46:35

Katie.

Elbert 46:38

The Lord has been putting that on our hearts for some time, and so the year before, when we were being appointed, we had already begun discussions with the four mission board and had begun all the processes that they required for adoption, but we did nothing to initiate anything. We thought it was from the Lord and we thought then he will provide. And we're not saying that's how other couples should do it, but that's just what he did for us. So he told us ahead of time. Then he took care of the details.

Kay 47:08

And we had authenticated all our documents in Dallas at the Mexican consulate, just in case, maybe, perhaps so that when it did happen and we didn't initiate either one of those adoptions or about those children, I mean, they just came totally out of the clear blue sky, but we had all the documents we needed to proceed quickly, all the documents we needed to proceed quickly. So it was the Lord was really gracious in that. So you have a Mexican adoption process and then you start pretty much all over again with the US Department of State for a foreign adoption. But God was good, he just did it.

Kyle 47:49

Awesome Again. Appreciate it, Thank you for your time, and that'll wrap up this episode of our podcast. So thank you guys. Thanks for listening to this episode. The Tom Ellef Center for Missions exists to equip the next generation of missionaries at Oklahoma Baptist University. Regardless of your major, you can come to OBU, get a world-class Christian education and get equipped to take the gospel to the nations. Our prayer is to send students from the local church through OBU to the world with the gospel. For more information about us or the Ellef Center Scholarship, follow the link in our description and come visit us at OVU.