Skills and Drills Video Productions is honored to donate tapes, books, baseball cards and products to the Declare Evangelistic Ministries and further supports their efforts to bring baseball to the boys of Croatia!

Boys of all ages and baseball... you just can’t get more American than that! This is a true saying, but now boys of all ages and baseball are slowly becoming a European thing, too.

There is an opportunity to use baseball as a sports evangelism tool. In the spring of 2003, J.D. Harris found a group of young teenage boys and started to work with them on learning baseball. These boys were excited to learn something new, and they wanted to do everything they could to learn as much about baseball as they could. Through J.D.’s involvement with these boys, he earned their trust so much so that when he invited them to come to church, many of them came.

God has opened a unique opportunity to use Baseball as an evangelistic tool in four cities in Croatia during May/June of 2004. Each camp will be five days in length, in which every boy will receive classroom training in Baseball English, plus a lesson from God's Word. Then every boy will have two hours of baseball instruction. The culmination will be Saturday afternoon when they will play their first game. The venues for these camps will be; the Brzaj Bible Center in Sisak, the Petrinja Baptist Church in Petrinja, the Primary School in Hrvatska Kostajnica, and the Primary School in Kutina. We are excited about this outreach opportunity

The Declare Evangelistic Ministries is headquartered in Lubbock, Texas and can be reached through their website www.declareevangelistic.org.

J.D. and Ellen

J.D. and Ellen married in 1993. They are members of Southway Community Church in Houston, Texas . They live in Pearland. They enjoy missions, working in their church, their family, traveling, and riding motorcycles.

J.D. is twice retired, first from the U.S. Air Force and then from a second career as a flight instructor. Since he accepted Christ as his savior about 10 years ago, he has become increasingly active in missions. He has participated in short term trips to Kenya , Haiti , and Croatia . He works in outreach through the Christian Motorcyclist Association and helps with a nursing home ministry. He enjoys working with youth and sharing his testimony.

Ellen is retired from public education. After 16 years as a high school mathematics teacher, she worked 14 years in the Instructional Technology Department of Houston Independent School District as a teacher of teachers, curriculum developer, and Instructional Software Coordinator. Ellen has known the Lord most of her life, but has only become personally involved in missions in the last 10 years. She has participated in short term trips to Ecuador and Croatia . She is a TEFL curriculum developer and team trainer. She enjoys teaching, music, and sharing Christ.

Rich & Paula Barnds

Rich and Paula answered God’s call to missions in 1985. At the age of 41, Rich left the business world and accepted an appointment to Europe. Their first field was Austria, where Rich was the administrator of the Eastern European Bible Institute. At the same time, Paula was active in her role as a staff member of the International Chapel of Vienna.

In the spring of 1994, God called Rich and Paula to minister in the country of Croatia. There they used their burden for evangelism to reach many people for Christ. It was at this time that God allowed them to use their God-given mother tongue for evangelism. TEFL (teaching English as a foreign language) has been very effective in ministry and is in its tenth year as an evangelistic tool in Croatia.

God has used their ministry to plant new churches, see others mature, disciple new believers and see many now in His service. Paula’s call to evangelism and her burden to see others come to Christ, energize her efforts in TEFL and other evangelistic efforts.

As the director of Declare Evangelistic Ministries, Rich, along with his wife, Paula, are looking forward to many more years of fruitful ministry in Croatia, Bosnia and beyond.

Wileen Brumley

Wileen first answered the call to missions in 1997 when she was challenged to go to Croatia for a short-term project to teach TEFL. A powerful influence in her life was seeing lost people trust Christ as their Savior. She returned the next two years by herself and then in 1999, her husband Ron joined her. The people of Croatia and their spiritual needs had touched and won Ron’s heart.

However, Ron was never to return, as the Lord took him home in the fall of 2000. After Ron’s death, Wileen believed that God called her to minister in Croatia on a full-time basis. She has a dream to combine her love for music (she is a elementary school music teacher) with TEFL to touch the hearts of many and plans to move to Croatia in January of 2004, as the Lord provides.