The African American Fellowship (AAF) of the Baptist Convention of Maryland/Delaware (BCM/D) is establishing a new scholarship to aid African American missionaries and churches in their efforts with international missions. The scholarship is named in honor of George Liele, an African American and emancipated slave who became the founding pastor of First Bryan Baptist Church and First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Ga. Liele later would become a missionary to Jamaica.

In February 2020, the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) Executive Committee designated the first Sunday in February as George Liele Church Planting, Evangelism and Missions Day. Robert Anderson, the pastor of Colonial Baptist Church in Randallstown, Md., made the motion to add the calendar date at the SBC’s 2019 annual meeting in Birmingham. In response to the day of recognition, the AAF of the BCM/D encourages African American churches to take a special offering during February in honor of Liele’s ministry. This year, the gifts will support the George Liele Foreign Missions Scholarship.

Marshal L. Ausberry, past president of the National African American Fellowship and past first vice president of the SBC, will be the guest speaker at the AAF of the BCM/D’s Missions Awareness Meeting on Feb. 4.

The meeting, which also kicks off Black History Month, will be educational, providing information about Liele, African American foreign missions and the new scholarship. Nathaniel Thomas, current AAF of the BCM/D president, said the organization seeks to intentionally emphasize the mobilization of African Americans in the area of international missions. Registration for the meeting is available here.

Anderson, in previous interviews with BaptistLIFE, expressed hope that teaching about Liele in conjunction with international missions will help African Americans consider the need for missions.

“Hopefully, it will be motivating to get more African Americans to go to Maui, Tanzania, Europe, Asia – to look beyond their own country,” he said. “There’s a whole world to reach!

“… If George Liele can do what he did in the midst of slavery and all of those evils and still preach the gospel and lead people to Christ and make disciples, what excuse do we have?”