Donald Willard Schultz was born April 6, 1931 in Clinton, Wisconsin to Ernest & Marie (Plamamn) Schultz. He spent his early years in a wood frame farm house with 8 brothers and sisters. As a teenager he heard a clear call to be a missionary, and got a Bachelor’s Degree in Missions and French at Bob Jones University where he met Barber Jean Fisher. They were married September 3, 1954, appointed by United World Mission and sailed for Paris for language study January 1955.
In February 1956 they sailed to West Africa and made their way 600 miles inland by rail and dirt road to Kenieba, Mali where they served for the next 27 years. As pioneer missionaries they lived in a mud hut with a thatch roof for 18 months while Don built a cement block, sheet metal roofed house. Larry was born in 1957 in the unfinished house. The twins, Rick and Debby, were born 14 months later in Tampa on their first home-assignment.
The mission station eventually housed 18 missionaries, and Don oversaw the construction of 5 houses, a church, a Bible school, an orphanage, and a dispensary. He was appointed Field Chairman, then West Africa Area Secretary; his administrative duties included liason between missionaries, home office and government officials, and field supervision, including the establishment, evaluation and implementation of individual missionary and team ministry goals and objectives.
When he and Jean left the field in 1983 Kenieba had a national church, a literacy program, a Bible school, an orphanage and an extensive dispensary program reaching 30,000 people a year, and sixteen young men who had completed Bible studies and were ordained.
Back in the States Don was a supervisor in a louvered door plant for two and a half years before accepting the call to pastor Lewis Memorial Church in October 1986, guiding the congregation through several transitions before retiring in January 1999.
Don dearly loved his family: his wife Barber Jean, his children Lawrence (Candace), Richard (Cathryn) and Debra Thomas, his grandchildren Allison (Joshua), Shawn, Sarah (Charles), Justin, Anna (Matthew) and Amy (David), and his great-grandchildren Evangeline, Serena, Jubilee, Moriah, Lily, Corbin, Thomas, and Elizabeth. He is survived by his brother Everett and sister Edna. He was welcomed to heaven by 5 brothers, a sister and his cherished grandson Ryan, but most importantly by his loving Savior, Who most assuredly said, “Welcome home my good and faithful servant.”
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