Janet Kay Meredith, 1944-2021

Janet Kay Meredith, retired International Mission Board missionary who shared the gospel among Central Asian Affinity Peoples, died Jan. 11, 2021, at Mt. Joseph Senior Village in Concordia, Kansas. She was 76.

She was born on Oct. 13, 1944, in Cass City, Michigan, to the late Delbert and Cherry Nelson Esckelson. She was a 1962 graduate of Oxford (Michigan) High School.

She married William Meredith on Jan. 29, 1965, in South Bend, Indiana. They moved to Concordia, Kansas, in 1982. While Bill served as a pastor in Kansas churches, Jan, a homemaker, taught Sunday School and assisted in his ministry.

Involvement with missionaries over the years, especially through World Missions Conferences, rekindled an interest in international missions, Meredith wrote when seeking missionary employment. A volunteer trip to Bulgaria in 1996 strengthened their feeling of call. When Bill retired from teaching in 1997, they applied to the International Mission Board

IMB appointed them in 1998 to Central Asia, where they served six years.

Meredith’s husband of 55 years, Bill, died in 2020. She is survived by daughters, Kim Mills (Travis) of Ames, Kansas, and Tina McManus (Rob) of Concordia; son, Michael Meredith (Shari) of Hays, Kansas; foster daughter, Youlanda Willingham; 11 grandchildren; six great-grandchildren; sister, Faith Espinoza of California; and brother, Richard Esckelson (Raquel) of Puerto Rico.

Read an obituary here.