News > South America

On September 22, Pastor Abraham Kim and Jose Ahn left Buenos Aires, Argentina and arrived at the small airport of Santa Cruz, Bolivia. The name “Santa Cruz” means “Saint Cross.” Santa Cruz is located right below the equator. The hot sun seemed like it could burn us in a few minutes. But in the shade it was cool. The schools were closed to celebrate “El Dia de Primavera” (Spring Day). We saw a mango tree that had almost a thousand mangos. There were also coconut trees with many yellow fruits.

On that night, Pastor Abraham delivered a short, but very heart-moving message based on John 20:19 translated by Abraham E. He encouraged all the people to follow Jesus, which means to imitate Jesus’ character, raise disciples, and dedicate our lives for Jesus’ sake because these three will remain forever.

P. Abraham also had time to talk for about an hour. M. Esteban said the normally shy Bolivian leaders boldly asked many questions. Their questions mostly focused on P. Abraham Kim’s life of faith and his future plan for UBF.

The next morning at 6 a.m. they had a Daily Bread prayer meeting. Jose Ahn delivered a 5-minute message titled, “Jesus, the Horn of Salvation.” Around 15 leaders came and had personal prayer time around 7 a.m.

That same morning, P. Abraham looked for M. Mark and Ruth S. who needed encouragement in their pioneering ministry of 10 years. M. Ruth thanked him for remembering them.

That evening, we visited M. Esteban’s mall in Exposanta Feria. We prayed that God may use M. Esteban to be like Joseph of the Old Testament. We prayed that he may not only feed his household, but also invite many missionaries through this business to Bolivia and Latin America. We also prayed that many may invest in his new project (assembling ready-made steel houses).

That night, around 40 leaders gathered together to have a house church Bible study with Jose A. based on Genesis 2. We saw many men and women ready to establish families and house churches.

The pioneering of the Bolivia campus began 24 years ago. M. Esteban and Pauline married in 1987 and began God’s ministry in Bolivia. Bolivia is known as the Galilee of Latin America since it is one of the poorest countries with no access to any body of water. The young people cannot get a job even after graduating from a university. It looked like Korea in the 1960s and early 1970s. But M. Esteban has great hope for this nation to be changed like Galilee that went from being the darkest place to that of a glorious town because of Jesus. They have now around 100 one-to-one Bible studies and 50 average SWS attendees. M. Pauline and M. Pamela have 13-16 one-to-one Bible studies. M. Corina from Mexico, who is married to Matthew, also has an average of 8 one-to-one Bible studies. Their newly built first floor Bible house is very beautiful and can be expanded to the second and third floor. It will also provide a meeting place that can support more than 200 members, as well as 5 family residences.  

Prayer topics:

1. Raise 12 disciples and 120 Bible students
2. Establish 10 new families by 2015
3. Raise the Bolivian leadership to succeed the ministry by 2015
4. Raise disciples to be missionaries to all Latin America and other continents, making Bolivia a missionary sending country
5. Their newly started business for self-support may prosper to be a source of blessing to bring many missionaries to Bolivia and Latin