s () (}S Called To Ghana Three women minister abroad As she walked along a dirt road, not having showered or changed her skirt in a week, Ghanaian children surrounded her and reached for her hand. Sophomore Penny Cronk said she saw God everywhere in West Africa in the fall of 2005 and was eager to learn from rhe people she taught. C ronk and sophomores Nicole Dicken and Lorie Morris spent three months working at the Village of Hope, a home for orphaned and abused children, in Ghana, West Africa. In an e-mail to her parents, Cronk said not knowing where she would be in the future did nor borher her as she stopped and experienced God where she was. "God is so evident," Cronk said. "He's everywhere I turn, in every little pair of brown eyes and every bright smile. Every field that is covered in shades [of color] from green to brown, twisting into barricades of trees and bushes, and every wave that brings with it a distinctive sound. taste and sometimes a sinus burn, confronts me with God and His grearness. 1 see it all and can JUSt hear Him saying, ' I am here, and here, and here, and here.'" Before leaving for Africa, C ronk had lived in Searcy with her family since 1999. "She had [it] in her mind to do missions for some time;' her fathet, Keith Cronk, vice president for Information Technology, said. "She used to go our and do campaigns when the Harding students came over [to Australia], even when she was in [primaty] school." Sophomore McKenna Camp was a friend ofCronk's in high school and her roommate during their freshman year at Harding. "Penny was having issues deciding on a major, and she decided that she needed to change hcr focus," Camp said. "Instead of [focusing] on herselfso much. she thought she needed to focus on helping others and going where God wanted her. She decided to take a semester offand do mission work." While Cronk was deciding where she would be most needed, she learned that her friend Dicken had decided to do mission work in Africa, and had said she was waiting for an opporrunicy todo so. Afrcr talking ro Morris abom their mission plans, Morris decided to join also. 'The three women contacted Sam Shewmaker, mission– ary-in-residence, who helped them find several mission fields that best suited their inrerests. Mer reviewing rhe list of possibilities, they decided they would go to the Village of Hope because they said if offered something of interest to each of them. "Penny was more interested in the medical aspect, Nicole wanted to help in a school, and Lorie wanted to help in an orphanage," Camp said. "[The Village of Hope] happened to have all three." Upo n arrival in Ghana, Sepf. 5, Dicken said they began work right away. fiUi ng in as teachers for children in first through ninth grades. After more teachers were hired. the women stopped teaching full rime, bur instead substituted for various subjects including English, math, science, religious and moral education, and also music, dance and agriculture. During the times they were nOt teaching, the women established relationships with the village children and adults. Dicken said her favorite parr of the trip was getting to know the older children. The children in seventh through ninth grades studied most ofthe day, which made geni ng to know them difficult at fi rst. Consequently, the women created weekly study groups in their home, where the children came to study and socialize with the women and each other. "When Jwould see their smiling f.1Ces, I would think, 'This is what I came here to do,'" Dicken said. "'They have been loved.''' Dicken said she learned a lot from her experience at the Village of Hope. "People are rhe same; they need rhe same things regardless ofwhere they are," she said. "Everywhere, all [people] want is love, and God is the God of it all." ·Brecnna Woad and Jennifer Allen sophomores :.·
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