The Holmes Family: January/February '23

After a relaxing Christmas holiday, the year started busily and victoriously as we quickly realized that this would be a historic semester for our full-time ministry training school. Providence Baptist College & Seminary welcomed a record 13 new students for a total enrollment of 40 [pictured out soulwinning with intern, Katie Holt] for the first time ever. Our part-time ministry training school also broke new ground by having three of our new missionaries teaching classes both on Saturday afternoons and Sunday evenings. We are keeping the regular Truth Baptist evening service schedule and making space for discipleship meetings and Temple Baptist Institute courses.

January 22nd was a highlight for our ministry as the second floor of our dormitory was dedicated with prayer and a special service where my missionary mentor, Ron Gensaw [pictured with former members of the church he started], gave a testimony. Humanly speaking, we would not have the property or the church without the guidance of the one who first welcomed my family to Nigeria in 2005, and it was a privilege to host him for the first time in 14 years.

As has been the case over the last several years, any two-month period is filled with travels and conferences. I was able to take Brian with me on a trip to Enugu in January to visit three different ministries and intervene in a church that needed help. A special Missions Sunday and stewardship banquet was held at Grace & Glory Baptist [pictured above] on the last Sunday of January. Next, Missionary Evangelists [pictured with the conference hosts]

Jim Belisle from FBMI and Don Wattenbarger of Bibles Beyond Boundaries joined with me to conduct a Pastors’ & Workers Conference in Ogbomoso and a Soul Winning & Leadership Conference in Jos during the first two weeks of February. Other visitors included an intern from Vision Baptist Missions and the parents and sisters of Mrs. Olivia Young, who has been serving here with her husband since August of last year.

A final high point for the first two months of 2023 was the start of a new ministry inspired by the co-pastor of Grace & Glory, Adewale Adesina. Three missions-themed youth conferences, under the tagline of “Who Will Go,” have been planned in different regions of Nigeria [Ibadan conference delegation pictured. Special features of each youth meeting are mission-themed sermons and lessons from our new missionaries, forums with those interested in missions, and follow-up to guide potential future ministers through the process of training and launching. Please pray for the long-term effects of these conferences and also for our country as we are entering a potentially tense election season.

Missionary Evangelist Jeff Walters included in his prayer letter an update on the Bible clubs and Bible studies that our seminary students conduct each semester:

We thank the Lord for His blessings and strength. We also thank God for the life of our supporting brothers around us Evangelist Jeff Walters and Pastor Mark Holmes. This just concluded month was focused on keeping our clubbers in the club. We started a contest that included a rule that if a clubber did not attend all the weeks, he/she would not be able to participate in questions and answers to win prizes or gifts. We have not yet completed the series of lessons that we planned but already, over 700 souls have professed Christ as their Lord and Saviour during our emphasis. This month, one of the plans that is a priority is to set a time to meet with our clubbers parents once again through visitations to their houses. This will enable us to witness to many about salvation again.

The House Fellowship and Bible Study cells are also doing very well to the glory of God. Please, pray with us. We need strength for the teachers and spiritual growth for all our clubbers. As we have stated in our previous reports that, the acquisition of games materials and other logistics needed in the ministry has helped the ministry moving forward and children are happy to be part of it. Glory be to God, this passed month we had a successful AWANA Seed Planters training for all the Seminarians. 31 seminary students were trained on the importance of children ministry, Especially in having AWANA as part of their children and teenagers training in their various churches. We covet your prayers as you supports, and we are ready to do more as God leads and strengthen us all.

Who We Are

Mark Joseph Holmes was called to the ministry at the age of fifteen, five years after he was saved. He went to Hyles-Anderson College to receive his training and graduated summa cum laude in 2000 with a degree in Pastoral Theology. During Mark’s senior year, God placed on his heart the desire to reach the people of Nigeria, so he spent an extra year in preparation by taking missions courses. Mark served on the same bus route each college year, as captain for three years.

Sabrina Michelle (Hopkins) was saved at the age of eight and surrendered her life to God five years later. While at Hyles-Anderson College studying music education, she served in the Bible Club and deaf ministry and also traveled one summer with a tour group. After graduation with a Music Education degree, during the year before their wedding, Sabrina taught fourth grade at her home church’s Christian school—Central Baptist in Baton Rouge.

As newlyweds, Mark and Sabrina served at their sending church where Mark oversaw the bus ministry and helped in the youth department, Sunday schools, and junior churches. He was privileged to start a children's church and young adult class during his two years of service, and he also regularly preached at a prison ministry and taught for a local Bible institute. Sabrina taught private piano for two Christian schools; she played often in the church services and also taught the beginner Sunday school class. Mark and Sabrina started full-time deputation at the end of May, 2003. Mark Joseph, Junior was born on December 4th of the same year.

In June of 2005, the Holmes family began their first term as Fundamental Baptist Missions International missionaries in Nigeria. Soon, Truth Baptist Church along with Temple Baptist Institute was started, the church now averaging 220 on Sundays with 42 graduates from the ministry training school. Property with buildings was purchased, and Providence Baptist College & Seminary opened its doors in August 2009 and has now produced 30 graduates. 35 churches have been started by those who have been trained or ordained by their ministry, including one of the most recent, Grace & Glory Baptist Church in Abuja, in which the Holmes family is also involved. Mark and Sabrina have returned to the U.S. for the birth of: Victoria Noel 12/14/05
Brian Michael 8/20/07
Noah Preston 2/3/12

LaDonna Elizabeth 7/3/14
For nearly a decade, Truth Baptist Church has been the home of a national pastors' conference, an annual youth camp, a full curriculum DVD correspondence college, and the City of Refuge recently became their newest ministry.

Where We Are

The Niger River is Nigeria’s most remarkable physical feature, as well as the source of its name. Formerly a British colony, Nigeria gained its independence in 1960 and became an independent nation of three culturally distinctive regions and at least 250 different language groups—more than any other African country. Home of the world’s largest black population, it is estimated that almost one out of every six Africans resides in Nigeria.

Upon independence, Nigeria inherited a currency that was more valuable than the U.S. dollar at the time. Yet the country has consumed itself with the sell of oil and other natural resources and all but abandoned its agricultural sector, leading to Nigeria’s diminished currency value and heightened reliance upon imports and aide from other countries. Military coups, ethnic tensions, a thirty month “civil war” that claimed over a million lives, and economic corruption have been the driving forces behind Nigeria’s instability of the last forty years. In 1998 a democracy was established, ending fifteen years of military rule.

Baptists have enjoyed a presence in the country for over 150 years with the Southern Baptists growing their own national convention and an estimated Baptist population numbering more than 3.5 million people; the former President of Nigeria was a claimed Baptist. However, Muslim influences are growing greater, indigenous beliefs are still popular, and many existing Baptist churches have abandoned biblical doctrines. There is a great need to reach the rest of the more than 170 million people of Africa’s most populous and possibly most influential nation.

The Holmes Family

January/February '23

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