Naylor stands next to the dedication sign for the nursing school named in her honor at Bangalore Baptist Hospital in India. During her 35 years at the hospital, she created a variety of strategies to reach India with the gospel through medical care. She retired in February.Some call her the Mother Teresa of Bangalore, but at one time some called her a criminal over labor disputes at Bangalore Baptist Hospital.
She is a celebrated, sought-after surgeon who befriended local officials in her area, but later the Indian government denied her license to practice medicine and, at times, delayed or denied her residential visas.
Colleagues and friends know her as disciplined, strict and forthright but also as warm, affectionate and not shy at all to express her faith in Jesus Christ.
Rebekah Naylor first arrived in India in 1974 as a medical missionary with the Southern Baptist Foreign Mission Board (now International Mission Board). She served as a surgeon at Bangalore Baptist Hospital and became chief of medical staff four years later.
Naylor, whose father, Robert Naylor, was pastor of First Baptist Church, Columbia, from 1947-52, became administrator and medical superintendent in 1984. She founded the adjoining nursing school, which was named after her in 1995, and became a consultant on special assignment with the International Mission Board in 1999. During her tenure at the hospital, she started a choir, taught Bible studies, led chapels, supervised building projects, and created a strategy to reach India through the hospital’s ministry.
Since returning to the United States in 2002 to care for her ailing mother, Naylor has been on active staff as attending surgeon at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas.
Although she officially retired from the International Mission Board in February, Naylor said she plans to have a continuing role in the ministry of the hospital in which she has invested nearly 35 years.
*Name changed for security reasons. Leyton is an International Mission Board missionary serving in southern Asia as a music and media strategist.