ATLANTA – Two best friends and registered nurses from Wilmington, N.C., leave today for India as some of the first tsunami relief volunteers to be sent to Southeast Asia by the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.

Cokie Westfall and Linda Marie Jones will be working with Sam Bandela, one of CBF’s Global Missions field personnel, in medical clinics for tsunami survivors in India. Both are members of Winter Park Baptist Church in Wilmington.

Westfall, a Campbell University Divinity School student with a call to medical missions in India, heard about the disaster on television and e-mailed friends in India she knew from a previous missions trip to the area. "Immediately my heart was there. It dawned on me an hour later that I need to go," she said. "This is what God has wired me to do."

After coordinating the trip with Bandela, Westfall told Jones of her plans to volunteer. "When I heard that she was going, I wanted to go. But it didn’t seem like a possibility, just a first reaction," Jones said.

A love offering collected by Winter Park church members has financed the 10 days of medical relief the women will provide.

Jones has traveled to Southeast Asia twice and is "aware of what amount of devastation a tsunami would bring," she said. In addition to meeting medical needs of tsunami survivors, Jones hopes to find future ways for her church to connect with relief efforts. As Winter Park’s associate pastor of missions and outreach, she is accustomed to organizing and partnering in missions work.

Also aiding in relief efforts is Reed Kennedy, who left last week for Indonesia. Kennedy, who works at Radford University, brings 20 years of experience as a hospital administrator. He was also a missionary in Colombia, where he worked with a Baptist hospital.

Kennedy of Blacksburg, Va., had been talking for a couple of years about disaster relief involvement, and tsunami relief is a door "God just opened up for him," said his wife, Gina. Kennedy’s prior cross-cultural experience and his organizational skills are valuable in coordination of relief efforts. "He can get the ball rolling fast," she said.

Kennedy returns Jan. 19.

CBF has sent five volunteers to Southeast Asia and will continue to send limited numbers of volunteers to the area, according to Timothy Wood, CBF Volunteer Missions program manager. Currently, potential volunteers must have either medical skills or be a water filtration specialist. Other requirements include prior experience in a third world country, current passport, money to pay project costs, appropriate vaccinations and a statement of good health by a physician.

Interested persons must complete and return a volunteer application form, which takes at least a week to process. Volunteers not approved for immediate relief efforts will be contacted as future opportunities arise. Currently, there are no firm departure dates for volunteer teams, Wood said.

For updated information and the volunteer application form, visit http://www.thefellowship.info/Global%20Missions/Volunteer%20Missions/asiarelief.icm.

CBF is a fellowship of Baptist Christians and churches who share a passion for the Great Commission and a commitment to Baptist principles of faith and practice. The Fellowship’s mission is to serve Christians and churches as they discover and fulfill their God-given mission.