God has blessed our Church with the opportunity to teach and minister to Central America, the Blacksburg area, and local Universities.
In 1986, a Virginia Tech Student from Honduras, Noe Perez, introduced the Blacksburg Church to the mission work in Central America and to the Baxter Institute. Baxter Institute is a four-year Bible College that serves Latin America. Its clinics provide free medical, dental, and prosthetic care, serving the needs of many people. Students from eleven Latin countries study there and, after graduation, return to their home countries to teach.
VCOM medical school has partnered with the clinic at Baxter Institute. While at the clinics, patients are invited to student led Bible studies. For families that are suffering from malnutrition, food is provided for one year, and in that year, the mother takes classes for sewing, barber/beautician, or restaurant food preparation and service so she will be able to provide for her family.
The Medical Clinic at Baxter, provides medicine and health care to more than 12,000 patients annually. As of December 2023, the Hope To Walk clinic has built and fitted over 1000 legs.
The Blacksburg church has been able to send our youth groups to Central America where they have built clinics and helped with many other needs for the people.
Loy Burch
Mary Burch, ( UL) Loy Burch, and Noe Perez
Foreign Missions
“He said to them,
“Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.””
Teaching Christ to the World
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Baxter Institute
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Honduras Mission History
Interview with Loy burch
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Honduras/Dominican Republic & VCOM
Interview with Dean Sutphin on the BCOC relationship with VCOM, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic. mission work
VCOM - Baxter - BCOC
Baxter Clinic
Through Baxter's newly renovated clinic, 13,000 patients per year are able to see the doctor, pediatrician, or dentist and receive their medications for just $2.00 Our doctors also help visiting groups set up medical brigades throughout the surrounding area. Baxter also joins with VCOM medical schools in the States for large medical brigades. VCOM medical students come to campus for one-month rotations to work in Baxter's clinic and in two Honduran national hospitals. The clinic also manages a nutrition program for malnourished children in the community. The program gives food staples every 10 days, health care in the clinic, and training in sewing or cosmetology for the mothers. Our hope is to offer the mothers a trade that they can use to support their children after their year in the nutrition program. Supporting a child in the nutrition program costs just $45 a month.
The clinic provides medical, dental, and pharmaceutical services to over 13,000 patients each year. The full-time staff are assisted by both visiting medical missions groups from churches and universities in the United States and also by medical students from Edward Via College of Osteopathic Medicine (VCOM).
VCOM
Blacksburg Campus
Baxter Clinic
BAXTER INSTITUTE
Graduation 2023 was such a joyous celebration! Jim Martin, VP for Harding School of Theology, delivered the commencement address for our December graduation. It was translated by Dean Lupe Mayo. Eighteen students graduated. Two mission teams formed in that group and have already arrived in Colombia. With only one month in Colombia, graduate Miguel Suarez has baptized three individuals into Christ. Also among the graduates, two single students are planting a church in Guatemala, one family is planting a church in Danli, Honduras, one single student has returned to Mexico to preach for an orphanage, one family has joined a team of graduates in Medellin, and another family has joined another team in Santa Marta, Colombia. One graduate has returned to his home congregation in El Salvador. This is the special thing about Baxter. Seeing God opening the doors for our 2023 graduates to serve in Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, and Colombia is amazing.
