Source: International Mission Board, April 1, 2026
Of the approximately 3,600 IMB missionaries on the mission field worldwide, only 30 are African American.
On each of my mission trips to Africa over the past six months, I’ve heard Africans say they love the brothers and sisters who come from America to bring the gospel. Yet the epiphany was hearing how excited they are to see people who look like them presenting the gospel. One person said, seeing black brothers and sisters traveling to the Motherland to teach makes them feel so special.
Jeremy Westbrook, executive director of the State Convention of Baptists in Ohio, said, “What a joy it is to partner with the IMB in helping create pipelines to help prepare and send future missionaries from our own mission field right here in the Buckeye State.”
The SCBO is committed to sending teams of Ohio African American pastors to mission fields over the next five years. The hope is that Ohio will help increase the number of African Americans who become missionaries.
Read the full story and another about IMB work in Africa that reports, From ICU to cellblock to classroom: Baptist chaplains transform Kenya’s hospitals, prisons and schools.
See also: Life as a Foreign Christian in Libya (International Christian Concern).