Names Breadcrumb, Jennie Belle White go together
- Sep 27, 2007 - comment
JONESVILLE, La.– Just across the sea wall from where the Ouachita, Tensas and Little rivers flow into the Black River stands one of the oldest Southern Baptist storefront ministries in the state of Louisiana. It is the Breadcrumb Baptist Ministry Center and just outside its front door is Four Rivers Park, at the confluence of the four rivers.
In Jonesville the names Breadcrumb and Jennie Belle White just go together. Mrs. White set the wheels in motion some 22 years ago and still serves as the director of the center. The Breadcrumb provides food, clothing and tutoring ministries as well as evangelistic services.
Rev. Ken Gilmore, director of missions for Ouachita Association, said Mrs. White and the Breadcrumb illustrate what Jesus did when he was on the earth. He met the needs of the people, and that is what the Breadcrumb is doing. He said the ministry offered an excellent opportunity for Christians to “do” missions rather than just talk about them.
Jennie Belle, as she is affectionately known around Catahoula Parish, was an elementary school teacher in Jonesville and saw the large number of children who could not read on grade level. “Many of their parents had no idea of how to help their children study at home,” she said. “We needed a tutoring ministry, a Christian tutoring ministry.”
With the help of her husband, Clifford White, Louisiana Baptists, the Ouachita Baptist Association and area churches that storefront tutoring ministry was begun in late 1985 in an old store building in downtown Jonesville. Today the Breadcrumb has shifted its focus to providing food and clothing, although a smaller version of its tutoring ministry continues.
The center director said on average some 200 to 250 families are provided with food assistance each month and another 50-75 families receive clothing. There is a 25-cent fee for each item of clothing, but there is no charge for the food that the Breadcrumb provides.
Worship services are held at the center each Tuesday and Thursday morning with area pastors leading those services. Also there is a worship service one Wednesday of each month.
In the summer of 1985, Mrs. White took a class in Christian Ministry at New Orleans Seminary and it was there her dream began to take shape. The teacher had the seminary students to choose a type of ministry in which they would like to become involved. “Then she grouped us according to the ministry that each one of us had chosen,” Mrs. White said. “There were five men preachers and me in my group.”
Mrs. White shared with her group what she wanted to do in Jonesville – a storefront tutoring ministry. “This was a new term at the time in the convention,” she said. She and her preacher partners planned everything they thought would be needed – from transportation to tables.
The whole group got an “A” on the project. But it was more than just a school project.
On the weekends she talked about it with her Director of Missions, Dr. Ralph Webber, and his wife, Ann. That fall they brought others into the project and took it before the Ouachita Association
Everything was in place to start the ministry on Nov. 4, 1985. However, on that day Mrs. White was hospitalized with a blood clot in her leg and had to watch from the sidelines as others got her new mission effort off and running. There was a delay of only one day in getting the ministry started.
Just a few months after the center was opened, folk began to bring clothing and thus the clothing ministry was started.
In 1990 the Lord provided a larger facility and the center moved into its current location, an old hardware store building at the corner of First and Front streets in Jonesville..
The food ministry started in 1991 when the Food Bank of Cenla came into existence. Currently the Breadcrumb has almost 500 families certified to receive food through the center. Each family is allowed 10 pounds of food each month for each person in the family. A family of four receives 40 pounds of food. An average of 200 to 250 families are served each month.
The clothing ministry took on added significance when hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the Louisiana coast. Several hundred evacuees made their way to shelters at churches in the area. The Breadcrumb provided clothing for many of them.
After school tutoring programs at area schools have reduced the number of children taking advantage of the tutoring ministry, but the program continues during the school year. Children who need the tutoring services are given one-on-one assistance by volunteers at the center.
The work of the Breadcrumb is carried on by an all-volunteer staff. Mrs. White said there were some 30 or so volunteers at the present time and about half of them were there just about every time the center was open for business. They come from churches of the Ouachita Association as well as churches of other denominations.
The Breadcrumb still receives financial support from the Ouachita Association and a number of churches in the area along with the Louisiana Baptist Convention.
Mrs. White said the name for the Breadcrumb came from the story in Matthew where the Canaanite woman came to Jesus, asking help for her daughter. In that she was not Jewish, the woman would seemingly have no natural claims on a Jewish Messiah but desired the crumbs that fell from the master’s table. Scripture says that Jesus healed the daughter.
Mrs. White said she greatly appreciated all the volunteers who made the work of the center possible. One of those volunteers is Edna Earl Guyon of New Ouachita Baptist Church. Mrs. Guyon is 86 years old and a cancer survivor but still drives about 20 miles one way two or three times a week to help.
Jennie Belle and Clifford White are longtime members of Utility Baptist Church near Jonesville.
This article is reprinted from the September 27, 2007, issue of Baptist Message, the newsjournal of the Louisiana Baptist Convention.
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