A wider ministry has characterized much of the happenings in our Hong Kong Mission over the past year. We've circled a few important events which indicate the variety of directions this ministry has taken. Rejoice with us as we see the hand of Christ moving in the many progressive ways we briefly share with you here.

Three Ministers Ordained

One of the signs of the growing maturity of the Swatow Baptist Churches in Hong Kong is the fact that each of the eight churches now has its own ordained minister. In past years the few ordained ministers and missionaries were kept busy taking care of weddings, baptisms, communion services, etc. for the various churches and chapels. Now the local Swatows can take care of these ministries for all of the congregations.

Rev. Chan Hop Sang, Minister of the Homantin Swatow Baptist Church, was ordained on June 18, 1972. His father was also a Swatow Baptist minister and served both in Hong Kong and in the Ling Tong Convention, Swatow, China. Hop Sang is 34 years old and was graduated from Chung Chi Theological Seminary in 1969. In 1971 he married the daughter of the preacher in the Tsun Wan Swatow Baptist Chapel. She was one of the delegates to the Asian Baptist Youth Conference held in Bangkok, Thailand, a few years ago. In addition to his duties at the Homantin Church, he also gives leadership to the Church's chapel programs at Chi Wan San and Chu Lap Kok.

Rev. Yuen Siu Po, Minister of the Castle Peak Road Swatow Baptist Church, was ordained on October 28, 1973. He has been associated with the development of this church throughout its sixteen year history, as a volunteer worker, part-time pastor, and for the past several years as the full-time minister. He is married and has four children, The oldest daughter is in England taking a special secretarial course. Under his leadership the Church has recently acquired premises for a small congregation which they have started in the newly developing area of Kwai Chung.

Rev. Chan Wan Sang, Minister of the Mongkok Swatow Baptist Church, was ordained on April 28, 1974. He is an older brother of Rev. Chan Hop Sang and it was a proud mother who witnessed the recent ordination of a second son. Wan Sang is a graduate of Chung Chi Theological Seminary, Class of 1968. Following his graduation he served with the Church of Christ in China until his call to the Mongkok Swatow Baptist Church in 1973. He has prepared a new course on preparation for church membership and will conduct his first baptismal service in June. He is married and has two sons.

United Christian Hospital Dedicated

The realization of "an impossible dream" could well describe the dedication ceremony of the new 550-bed United Christian Hospital, Kwun Tong, Hong Kong, on December 6, 1973. The dream began more than a decade ago and though the problems and frustrations have been many the. hope has now become a reality. The hospital will be fully operative during the year 1974 and already more than half the beds are occupied. The Nethersole School of Nursing has moved into its new quarters and the doctors and nurses are living in their new apartment.

The impressive opening ceremony was enhanced by the presence of the Governor of Hong Kong, Sir Murray MacLehose, who gave an address and unveiled the plaque. Mr. Lam Chik Ho, Chairman of the Board of Directors, reviewed the history of the planning and construction and Rev. Loren E. Noren, who been on the Committee from the beginning, gave the Invocation.

The whole project cost approximately US $ 8 million the largest grant coming from the Hong Kong government who also provided the site, and will make an annual contribution toward the operating costs. Substanial grants were received from church bodies in West Germany, the U. S. A. (including American Baptists), Canada, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and the Christians in Hong Kong.

L. E. Noren

Area Secretary Visits Hong Kong

Dr. Robert G. Johnson, Area Secretary for Hong Kong and Thailand, paid an official ten day visit to Hong Kong at the end of March. Bob's last visit to the field was in 1971, and he expressed interest and amazement as he viewed the. many changes which have taken place since that time. Perhaps none has been more dramatic in demonstrating our widening ministry here in Hong Kong than the new United Christian Hospital complex which has emerged from the barren hillside which was pointed out to him three years ago.

In addition to visiting numerous Swatow Baptist Churches, Chung Chi College, and other institutions to which we are related, Dr. Johnson also took time out to present a contribution of US$10,000 to Hong Kong Baptist College. This is a four year post-secondary institution offering professional training for some 3300 Chinese students. The teaching and facilities of this college are well up to world Universities' standards, and a diploma from this school is generally equal to that of the B.A. or B.S. degree in the U.S.A. We are pleased that American Baptists, through the World Mission Campaign, were able to contribute to this fine college in this way.

Perhaps the most important aspect of Dr. Johnson's visit was that be was able to meet and confer with Chinese Christian leaders and missionary personnel, to review programs and discuss the development of general policies for the future in this time of widening minstry of our Mission work. This was a timely and helpful experience for us all.

Hugh Smith

From November 26-30, 1974, Hong Kong will host the First World Conference of Baptist Men. Dr. David Y.K. Wong, chairman of the Men's Department of the Baptist World Alliance, says he expects about 1000 men to come. This will be a training ground for Christian service and a meaningful spiritual experience. More information can be obtained at the BWA office-, 1628 Sixteenth St., NW, Washington, DC, 20009.

Twenty Years of Swatow Women’s Work

How to celebrate "Twenty Years in Hong Kong" is on the agenda of every recent meeting of the executive council of the Swatow Baptist Women's Association. You should hear them relate the unique experiences of the beginnings of their Christian faith in the homeland. Sometimes they weep when they recall two decades of upheaval and distress, bewilderment and poverty during their migration to Hong Kong. Gradually most of them have found financial security for their families, as well as education for their children.

Now they are planning how to express their continuing joy in the Good News of Jesus Christ. The annual Thanksgiving service in November 1974, will focus on varying ministries of the Swatow Baptist Women's Association since its beginning in Hong Kong in 1954 when Mrs. Edna (Smith) Armstrong was advisor to this group.

At present Estelle Schock and Ruth Noren are working in Hong Kong with Swatow church women. They speak to neighborhood circles (membership from 15 to 50) in churches located in nearly every area of Hong Kong, install officers and try to train new leaders. Retreats, usually held in quiet countryside locations, attract about 300 women mosty from corwded resettlement areas. The offering from the Women's World Day of Prayer this past March was sent for Christian work in Vietnam.

English classes for Swatow laywomen and pastors' wives are held weekly in the Noren and Schock apartments. We all have fun together, and at the same time there has been helpful give-and-take in the search for Christian answers to some of the difficulties of living in Hong Kong.

Ruth Noren

Widening Ministries Among Children

There are approximately 11/4 million children in Hong Kong and. only 50,000 of these attend Sunday Schools or other church related children's meetings. There is a need therefore for the churches to develop new programs aimed at contacting children who would otherwise never hear about Jesus Christ and the new life He offers to those who accept Him as Savior.

This year two Swatow Baptist groups organized one day evangelistic children's camps to reach such children with the message of God's love. Only children from non-Christian homes could attend these programs.

A new type of program was used where four or five children were assigned to one Christian leader. Each group worked through a series of learning experiences and outdoor activities planned around the theme "Encounter with God."

At the end of the day's activities at the Chuk Yuen Christian Center, the children were invited to stay behind if they desired to talk with their leaders about the day's experiences. 75% remained and asked questions.

As a result of the one day camp at the Kwun Tong Swatow Baptist Church ten new students joined the Sunday School and five the weekly Bible Club. Two of these children have brought along two new friends to join the club.

This we hope is just the beginning of new types of creative programs to reach children with the message that can bring to them Life.

June M. Sutton

New Pastor at Kowloon Union Church

Dr. & Mrs. Elbert E. Gates, Jr. (Pearly and June) arrived in Hong Kong on September 1 where Pearly took up his new duties as pastor of the Kowloon Union Church. This is an English speaking church located in the heart of Kowloon which was organized many years ago by the London Missionary Society to provide a church home for English speaking people living in Hong Kong. Pearly is the first American pastor the church has ever had. Usually the pastoral leadership is brought out from the United Kingdom.

Pearly and June were commissioned as Special Service Workers at the, American Baptist Convention held in Lincoln, Nebraska, 1973, and so they are both members of the American Baptist Mission in Hong Kong. In addition to their duties at the church, they have entered actively into the life of the Mission, and have identified with many of the Christian projects in Hong Kong.

Their daughter, Connie, is now with them in Hong Kong having come from Geneva, Switzerland, where for three years she was on the staff of the World Council of Churches. Presently she is secretary to the Medical Superintendent, Dr. E. H. Paterson, of the United Christian Hospital.

The family was reunited when their other daughter, Carol Hurd and her two children, Tammy and Jamie, came out from the United States for a visit at Chinese New Year.

The Gates will be in Hong Kong for a three year term ending in August 1976.

Marty’s Back in Boston

After spending three years as a Special Service missionary in Hong Kong, Marty Hackett left on January 12. She spent a week in Saigon with Dr. and Mrs. Getz, another with old and new friends in Burma, a third in northern Thailand, and three more with her brother Bill, who is studying music at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. He likes everything there except the bread, and she taught him how to make his own, in exchange for concerts and recitals, parties and sight-seeing.

Marty has always had the knack of landing on her feet, but this time she broke even her own records. Within three weeks of landing back in Boston, she had signed a job contract and an apartment lease, joined the choir and been appointed to the pulpit committee of her own Old Cambridge Baptist Church, and begun to fit deputation plans into her meager spare time! Her job is truly one of those wonders God works in mysterious ways to perform. The Boston Visiting Nurses Association, with whom she worked before coming here, had been stymied by communications problems when they tried to work in Chinatown - - and here came Marty, with her hard won proficiency in Cantonese! Many of her patients are elderly, living precariously in one or two bare rooms. Others are. families with assorted health problems, both physical and emotional. She asks for our prayers as she tries to make friends with these people, frail and bewildered and needing Christian love and tenderness in a complex and callous society.

Marion Hackett

Schocks

The few weeks before the Schock family returned to Hong Kong from furlough had a double focus. Besides the routine of packing and visiting churches, there were plans to get our daughter, Judy, Married. She was married on August 18, 1973 in Redlands, California to a fine, Christian fellow student, Michael Kuiper, from Westmost College.

A week later the other four of us arrived in Hong Kong and began settling into our same old apartment. Linda and Phil quickly picked up their old ties at the Hong Kong International School as they plowed into the 1lth and 10th grades. They miss the church "back home", but the local Christian Youth Fellowship is exciting. Music keeps Linda busy, and baseball makes life worth living for Phil.

Estelle and I happily resumed some activities we had developed the previous term: Estelle teaching English and working with the Swatow women and I returning to the Chuk Yuen Christian Chnter. I've also enjoyed teaching Old Testament to 38 students at the Hong Kong Baptist College.

It has also been good to get back to the once a month shuttle to Macau, where the number of Burma refugees continues to mount. With Bill Hackett and I each going once a month, we have doubled our time there and feel this is a great encouragement to the Christians. Two Burmese young men have. recently come to Christ and were baptized at Easter time. Harold Schock

Wider Mission Fellowship

The American Baptist Mission Fellowship meetings in Hong Kong have been augmented this year by the presence of several American Baptist friends. Dr. and Mrs. Ward S. Miller are serving a two-year term in Hong Kong Baptist College where he is Visiting Senior Lecturer and Consultant in English. For 24 years Dr. Miller was professor of English in the University of Redlands in California.

Mrs. Miller, who received the Citizen's award last year for outstanding community service in Redlands, California, also keeps busy at Hong Kong Baptist College. She is serving as Assistant to the President for Public Relations and Development. With two buildings under construction, she carries a heavy responsibility. The Millers maintain their membership in the First Baptist Church in Redlands.

Another American Baptist in Christian work in Hong Kong is Miss Ann Marshall. Formerly dean of women at Berea College, Miss Marshall has come to teach in the Secretarial Management Department of Hong Kong Baptist College. She too will be in Hong Kong for about two years.

Two families in the business world in Hong Kong have also joined our recent fellowship meetings. Mr. and Mrs. Alvin Koons, who spent one term in Hong Kong as American Baptist Missionaries, have returned to Hong Kong where Mr. Koons is associated with a property and investment company. Mr. and Mrs. Robert Otto represent K Mart in the Orient. Mr. Otto is a lay preacher. Both families come from strong American Baptist churches and add much to our fellowship meetings.

While Hugh Smith was attending a conference in Korea, son Stepen got hit in the eye during P.E. 14 pieces of glass were removed from his eye by the doctor. While Harold Schock was preaching in Macao, son Phil got hit in the eye by a baseball during the final game of the season. Fathers and sons are all doing well.

Easter in Hong Kong

One of the meaningful traditions of the American Baptist fellowship in Hong_ Kong is to have a dawn service on Easter Sunday followed by breakfast together. This past Easter was no exception, as our members joined with friends of Kowloon Union Church in a simple and beautiful service at Lion Rock Park in Kowloon overlooking the city. The service was planned and led by June Gates and the young people of the church. As dawn broke the young peoples' singing accompanied by guitars stirred the early morning air. A simple wooden cross draped in black was the focal point of our worship and as the glorious message of Easter was read the cloth was removed and the cross was garlanded with spring flowers.

Afterwards we gathered for breakfast at the Shatin Heights Hotel which overlooks the lovely Shatin Valley. The tables had been decorated by Estelle Schock and Ruth Espy, and as the sun streamed into the dining room we enjoyed a wonderful time of fellowship together.

On Easter evening the Union Church borrowed the Kowloon Baptist Church for a service of Baptism. Six young people had chosen to be baptized by immersion, two of whom were from our own group, Jennifer and Karen Smith. In an impressive and beautiful service, Dr. Elbert Gates shared a devotional thought and then Hugh Smith had the privilege of baptizing his own daughters.

Ann Smith