Public Expressions of Faith

About a month ago fellow missionary Christopher Sills and I (Brad) were invited by a couple of the indigenous pastors we work with in the Cañar and Chimborazo provinces to visit them at there churches. These are just two of the about 20 or so pastors who are regularly taught the Bible and sound doctrine through the ministry of Reaching and Teaching International Ministries.  These pastors come to the training from many different providences, often travel many miles, and give up several weeks of work a year to become better equipped to lead their churches, and to reach their communities for Christ.  

It is a great joy for us to be able to see these pastors where they live, work, and minister.  On this occasion we traveled several hours from where we live in Cuenca to join these pastors in worship, fellowship, and a time of encouragement.

The first two pictures were taken in a small community near Chunchi.  This community, like most in Ecuador, is predominately and strongly Catholic with a touch of their traditional (pagan) religion lingering in their lives and religious practices.  This day we started with a church service with song and sharing in a small store front type room they use as a church.  After the service we went to the public pool and Pastor Francisco baptized a married couple around 75 years of age.  

Baptism in these communities are not looked at with favor in these communities, and often those who follow Christ in baptism are persecuted.  Yet, this couple choose to follow Christ in public baptism, and this truly was a public baptism.  At the time of the baptism there were many kids swimming in the pool, and when Christopher began to preach many of those kids came and listened to him proclaim God's Word and watched the testimony of the baptism of these two people.  

Afterward we had a large meal and after the meal we walked back to the church and celebrated the Lord's Supper with the newly baptized followers of Christ.  

Christopher Sills preaching at a baptism.

Pastor Fransico (in the white shirt) baptizing.

The following day we traveled an hour away from El Tambo, and then arrived at a dirt road.  Which we took for another hour and a half.  This road was one lane and traveled through the winding - steep mountains.  There was little room for error and thankfully I did not make any and we made it there and back safely.  

At this church we participated in a worship service celebrating the graduation of the children from one year of Bible study to another.  This service was interesting in that it was totally in the language of Quichua.  Quichua has no similarities linguistically with Spanish or English except for some words they have borrowed from Spanish.  So we understood little of the words but had a wonderful time of worshiping our Lord and Savior.

A group of Quichua  girls singing at church.

The picture below is a picture of Pastors Jesus Manuel & Pastor Felix and his granddaughter  plus a family of 14 packed into my 5 seater 4-Runner.  The father of this family helps lead worship at the church through song.  They asked us for a ride to there house because they normally walk.  It took us (driving) over 30 minutes to get to their house.  In fact a normal Sunday for him and his family is walking 2 hours to church, 3 to 4 hours at church, 2 hours walking back home through rain or sun, mud or dust.  WHY?  Because they want to worship the Lord with their church family, and there are no other churches nearer to worship.  

How many people can fit in a old Toyota 4-Runner?