I don’t believe that parachurch mission boards are Biblical or necessary, but they are a part of Baptist history, and therefore I can’t always ignore them. Here is a case in point.
John Westrup was born in England on May 3, 1847, but at some point he immigrated to the United States. In 1871, Brother Westrup became employed by the American Baptist Home Mission Society to carry the gospel into the American Southwest. There he began to see the spiritual needs of Mexico. In 1880, he became the first missionary of the Texas Baptist Foreign Mission Board. The Lord quickly blessed his work in the State of Coahuila, and his journal speaks of converts, baptisms, and the establishment of four churches with a total of eighty members. His last journal entry reads: “Four baptisms today. Go back and teach them next week.” During these early months, Westrup had been sending reports back to Texas, but then they abruptly stopped. Westrup’s brother, Thomas, volunteered to find out what had happened. He discovered that on this day (December 21) in 1880 (that first year of the mission), John and some of the Lord’s converts were murdered either by fanatical Catholics or by Indian bandits near Progresso, Coahuila.
Did the work of the Lord stop in the light of this murder and persecution? No. Brother Thomas Westrup immediately took up his brother’s mantle and returned to Mexico, fighting for eternal souls in that country.
Source – “This Day in Baptist History II” by Cummins and Thompson