Exclusive stories from the mission field
Impoverished children feel strong pressure to leave school to sell candy and soft drinks on the streets. Local missionaries have a feeding center where they get to know the children, visit them in their homes and share the importance of continuing their schooling in order to break the cycle of poverty.
A 35-year-old farmer whose foot had to be amputated after a minor wound became infected went to a Christian retreat for a local Quechua community, where he put his faith in Christ. Workers continued to care for him and, through biblical reflections, helped him reconcile with family members, which led four of them to receive Christ.
People are hearing the gospel through digital platforms and radio programs that reach more than 200 towns. A local ministry’s radio station receives daily visits and phone calls from people seeking prayer, with many accepting Christ as Savior. Other workers giving away Bibles reported about 100 new Christians were recently baptized.
A woman came to a native ministry’s worship and, deeply troubled, confessed that the man for whom she had left her husband and children was mistreating her, and she wished to seek God’s forgiveness and return home.
Poor children faced pressure to sell trinkets rather than attend school, and local missionaries encouraged them to stay in class. Every day of the week, children also received nutritious lunches at the local ministry’s feeding center, giving them the health they needed to excel in class and helping workers sow the seeds of God’s kingdom.
Depressed since her marriage started to sour a few years ago, 32-year-old Ximena Flores suffered steady deterioration of her mental health, cementing her husband’s desire for separation. A schoolteacher with a 5-year-old daughter, Flores’ condition worsened when the COVID-19 pandemic forced her to teach online from home
At a small nightclub in rural Peru, the blaring music was drowning out the message a local missionary was giving nearby at a three-day gospel event. Villagers asked the nightclub owner to turn the music off, and he grudgingly consented. He was further annoyed when the preacher and other Christians visited him the next day and invited him to attend that night’s evangelistic event.
Victor lived in a slum area riddled with crime, a red zone where he was constantly on edge to protect the small family he had begun. He struggled to support them as a driver of a three-wheeler taxi. Though raised to worship idols, Victor believed in no gods as he faced the threat of COVID-19 with each passenger he carried.
Early in the coronavirus pandemic, a 60-year-old doctor in the central Andes of Peru lost his job at a government hospital for treating COVID-19 patients with chlorine dioxide.
A 54-year-old waste collector in northern Peru and his children had long fought with his wife, but he never thought she would leave.
