More than 23,000 Southern Baptist students – from teenage to college-age – will tackle roofing, drywall repairs, painting and landscaping in 96 World Changers projects this summer in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
By the time World Changers winds down operations in early August, the North American Mission Board’s initiative to renovate substandard housing expects to have donated $16.4 million in free labor in 80 American cities and reached 1,000 people for Christ.
Now in its 19th year, World Changers is a pre-packaged mission experience sponsored and managed by NAMB, enabling students to donate a week of their summer to rehabilitate some of the poorer neighborhoods – at no charge to the homeowner.
The 96 projects will kick off May 30-June 7 in Indianapolis, a first-time World Changers site, where rehab work on 15 homes will precede the Southern Baptist Convention’s June 10-11 annual meeting at the Indiana Convention Center.
Through World Changers, students will be encouraged “to become excited about serving God,” said John Bailey, the North American Mission Board’s leader for student volunteer mobilization. “We’ll challenge them to let World Changers change the way they follow Christ and to become Christian leaders back in their schools and communities.”
Other first-time World Changers sites this summer include Bonne Terre, Mo.; Rockingham County/Reidsville, N.C.; Longview, Tex.; Walterboro, S.C.; and Prince Edward Island, Canada.
World Changers’ major cities will include Chicago; New Orleans; Philadelphia; Dallas; St. Louis; Salt Lake City; Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio; Buffalo, N.Y.; Memphis, Tenn.; Tampa and Tallahassee, Fla.; Tulsa; Birmingham, Ala.; Charleston, S.C.; Savannah, Ga.; and Little Rock, Ark.
World Changers’ two flagship operations this summer will be New Orleans and Birmingham.