Portrait of Nellie Smith. IMB Photo

Nellie Smith, an International Mission Board missionary emeritus who shared the gospel in Indonesia, died Oct. 26, 2025, in Jacksonville Beach, Florida. She was 95. 

Nellie was born Dec. 28, 1929, in Harrisville, Mississippi, to the late Gussie and Allie Brock. She graduated from Brookhaven (Mississippi) High School, and attended Whitworth College in Brookhaven, Wake Forest (North Carolina) College, and Campbell College in Buies Creek, North Carolina.  

The summer after her year at Whitworth, Nellie worked as a photographer’s assistant at Jackson Studio in Brookhaven. She married John Smith on May 11, 1952. Immediately after the service, they left for North Carolina, where John attended seminary and was pastor of a small church at Chocowinity. During their time in North Carolina, Nellie attended college. After seminary, John was called to Jonesboro Heights Church in Sanford, North Carolina.  

While seeking missionary appointment, Nellie wrote, “It was during the first year at Jonesboro that John felt a definite call to foreign missions. At first, I did not feel this call as strongly as John felt it. I knew I was in the center of God’s will, and I didn’t possibly see how He could want me for a missionary. … After much persuasion, I went with John to the Foreign Missions Week at Ridgecrest in the summer of 1958. It was at this meeting that I turned everything over to God.” 

In 1963, the International Mission Board appointed John and Nellie missionaries to Indonesia.  

Nellie was preceded in death by her husband of 63 years, John D. Smith.  

She is survived by her daughter, Abigail May (Russell) of Jacksonville Beach, Florida; three grandchildren; and four great-grandchildren.  

A funeral service was held Nov. 7, 2025, at Brookhaven Funeral Home, with burial in Little Bahala Baptist Church Cemetery, Wesson, Mississippi.  

Read an obituary here.