Emily Pearson

VALPARAÍSO, Chile (BP) -- Maria had reached her limit. Seeing no other way to escape her troubled life, she was considering suicide. But because of the faithfulness of Chilean university student Ruth Aguirre and Southern Baptist missionary Karen Wright, she chose to live for Christ instead. Maria had received a Gospel of John when Aguirre and Wright were prayerwalking on Polanco Hill, one of the 42 hills upon which Valparaíso, Chile, is built. By the time Aguirre visited her several weeks later, Maria had read the entire Scripture portion. That day she accepted Christ and agreed to let Aguirre begin a Bible study in her home. Aguirre was even more amazed when Maria's husband said he, too, wanted to learn more about Christ. Aguirre has "adopted" Polanco Hill as part of the "42 Hills Project," an initiative begun by Wright linking U.S. churches with Chilean believers to reach the 42 hills of Valparaíso -- Chile's chief seaport -- with the Gospel. For Aguirre, it was during a vision trip with Wright that she felt called to reach Polanco Hill, a dangerous place for any outsider but especially for a single 22-year-old female. Aguirre realized she would be trusting God with her life every time she set foot there. "It was difficult at first to go," Aguirre said. "I was afraid. But once I finally began going and praying, I became very aware of the needs of the people." Like much of Valparaíso, Polanco Hill is dotted with brightly colored houses. But beneath the cheery appearance is an area riddled with poverty, crime and violence. Alcohol is cheap and readily available. A house on one street is painted completely black, a sign of its use for drug deals. Unemployment rates are among the highest in the country. Many of the youth in Valparaíso suffer from broken homes and a lack of role models. A majority of teens never finish high school. Faced with a bleak future, they often turn to theft and dealing drugs. Throughout the city, groups of young people loiter in the streets with nothing to do -- a perfect breeding ground for peer pressure and poor life decisions. Aguirre sometimes prayerwalks the area alone despite the risk. "It's a little hill, but there's a lot of need," she said. "There's a strong sense of abandonment, of desolation." But she also sees the hand of God at work in her adopted community. Many people are beginning to share with her about their lives and struggles -- such transparency is uncommon here. "I feel like God has put a sign on me that I can't see, but that other people must see," she said. "It must say, 'Talk to me, tell me your problems!'"

VALPARAÍSO, Chile (BP) -- Maria had reached her limit. Seeing no other way to escape her troubled life, she was considering suicide. But because of the faithfulness of Chilean university student Ruth Aguirre and Southern Baptist missionary Karen Wright, she chose to live for Christ instead. Maria had received a Gospel of John when Aguirre and Wright were prayerwalking on Polanco Hill, one of the 42 hills upon which Valparaíso, Chile, is built. By the time Aguirre visited her several weeks later, Maria had read the entire Scripture portion. That day she accepted Christ and agreed to let Aguirre begin a Bible study in her home. Aguirre was even more amazed when Maria's husband said he, too, wanted to learn more about Christ. Aguirre has "adopted" Polanco Hill as part of the "42 Hills Project," an initiative begun by Wright linking U.S. churches with Chilean believers to reach the 42 hills of Valparaíso -- Chile's chief seaport -- with the Gospel. For Aguirre, it was during a vision trip with Wright that she felt called to reach Polanco Hill, a dangerous place for any outsider but especially for a single 22-year-old female. Aguirre realized she would be trusting God with her life every time she set foot there. "It was difficult at first to go," Aguirre said. "I was afraid. But once I finally began going and praying, I became very aware of the needs of the people." Like much of Valparaíso, Polanco Hill is dotted with brightly colored houses. But beneath the cheery appearance is an area riddled with poverty, crime and violence. Alcohol is cheap and readily available. A house on one street is painted completely black, a sign of its use for drug deals. Unemployment rates are among the highest in the country. Many of the youth in Valparaíso suffer from broken homes and a lack of role models. A majority of teens never finish high school. Faced with a bleak future, they often turn to theft and dealing drugs. Throughout the city, groups of young people loiter in the streets with nothing to do -- a perfect breeding ground for peer pressure and poor life decisions. Aguirre sometimes prayerwalks the area alone despite the risk. "It's a little hill, but there's a lot of need," she said. "There's a strong sense of abandonment, of desolation." But she also sees the hand of God at work in her adopted community. Many people are beginning to share with her about their lives and struggles -- such transparency is uncommon here. "I feel like God has put a sign on me that I can't see, but that other people must see," she said. "It must say, 'Talk to me, tell me your problems!'"

LIMA, Peru (BP) -- "Please, can you help us?"       The woman's plea was the first thing Quentin and Gina Roberts heard as they entered an inner-city slum in Lima, Peru.       What they found shocked them.       Lean-to shacks and cracked adobe homes lined a narrow, dirt path in the small community of Rosario de Fatima. There was no water system ...

LIMA, Peru (BP) -- "Please, can you help us?"       The woman's plea was the first thing Quentin and Gina Roberts heard as they entered an inner-city slum in Lima, Peru.       What they found shocked them.       Lean-to shacks and cracked adobe homes lined a narrow, dirt path in the small community of Rosario de Fatima. There was no water system ...

LIMA, Peru (BP) -- Missionaries Tommy and Beth Larner were out running errands on a typical summer day in Tijuana, Mexico. They decided to grab a quick lunch before preparing for an evening of prayerwalking with local believers.

LIMA, Peru (BP) -- Missionaries Tommy and Beth Larner were out running errands on a typical summer day in Tijuana, Mexico. They decided to grab a quick lunch before preparing for an evening of prayerwalking with local believers.

CARACAS, Venezuela (BP) -- Joe Busching casually approaches the Venezuelan college students laughing and chatting on the campus lawn. After striking up a conversation, he asks if they'd answer a few simple questions. The students agree.

CARACAS, Venezuela (BP) -- Missionary Ed Engle puts his life in God's hands as he begins his journey up the mountain to El Coche, a slum in Caracas, Venezuela. [QUOTE@left@180="Pray that the people in the barrios won't just be saved, but that they will be like Paul or Timothy."
-- IMB missionary]On the way, a man calls out and runs toward him, a nearly toothless smile lighting up his face. He's been drinking and can barely form a coherent sentence, but he recognizes Ed's friendly face. Engle embraces the inebriated man and spends a few minutes talking with him as best he can. A few minutes later, Engle climbs into a crowded SUV -- the public transportation that will take him up the mountain. The roads are too steep for other vehicles and it's too hot to walk. He wipes the sweat from his face, then hands out Gospel tracts to the other passengers. At the top of the mountain, Engle steps out onto the dirt road, mindful of the open stream of sewage flowing nearby. He spends the next few hours tirelessly trekking through the maze of tiny concrete and metal homes, handing out tracts and talking to residents about their families, their lives and Jesus. He meets a 17-year-old girl -- with two young children -- whose lover has just thrown her onto the street. He visits a family in their home -- a doorless, windowless shack with an uneven dirt floor. Heavy rocks and beer bottles anchor the thin metal roof to the house. As Engle winds his way from house to house, he isn't bothered by the lack of shade and water; it's worth the discomfort to share the Gospel. Tomorrow, he'll get up and do it all again, knowing that there's plenty of work to do. Of the more than 5 million people living in Caracas, only 1 percent are evangelical. Many of those who are spiritually lost live in the city's barrios (slums), considered some of the most dangerous in the world. Nearly 4 million people -- some 80 percent of the city's population -- live in lean-to houses that stretch across the mountains on either side of Caracas. The narrow streets are plagued with constant crime, substance abuse and gang violence. Engle and his wife Pam, International Mission Board missionaries in Caracas, have worked in the slums of Caracas for 12 years. In a place where houses are built nearly on top of each other, there isn't space to hold large evangelistic services or other public events. Instead, the Engles, from Tennessee, must rely on individual conversations to tackle a God-size task.

IQUITOS, Peru (BP) -- Just three days after his wife died, 72-year-old Edison Romero climbed into a cramped wooden boat for a journey down the Amazon. He could have stayed home to mourn, but he took a 12-hour trip from his village to Iquitos, Peru, to attend missions training. "I just couldn't miss it," Romero said. [QUOTE@left@175="We can't [reach the world] by ourselves. There's just too much to be done. ... But if I can send a bunch more Peruvians and invest my life in them, I can be more effective sending than I can going." -- IMB missionary]The School of Cross-cultural Missions that Romero attends near the city of Iquitos is one of three training centers launched by Peru a las Naciones (Peru to the Nations), a Peruvian Baptist organization. Every two months, Romero and about 30 other participants and family members -- ranging from elderly adults to toddlers -- convene outside Bethany Evangelical Baptist Church in Iquitos. They pile into two crude metal buses with their luggage and a half-dozen live chickens for a jarring hour-long ride over a muddy road full of potholes. When the road ends, the travelers -- loaded down with young children and luggage -- hike barefoot through a swampy mud pit. At the bank of the Nanay River, which flows into the Amazon, they cram into a narrow wooden boat. There's barely breathing room; the air is stifling. Then it's another 45-minute trip downriver to the jungle camp. After they reach the shore by the camp, they haul their belongings down a dirt path to the wooden cabins -- covered with dried banana leaves and mosquito netting -- that will be home for three days. There's no electricity or hot water. And since there's no refrigeration, the live chickens will provide fresh food each day. The small children must occupy themselves without the help of modern conveniences, toys or physical comforts. But no one complains. CROSS-CULTURAL MISSIONS Leaders of the group are Tommy and Beth Larner, International Mission Board missionaries from Texas. Tommy, who works with Peru a las Naciones, helped to start the training camp. He and Beth lead a team that teaches Bible storying, evangelism techniques, church-planting methods and other missions principles. Training national believers in missions is crucial to reaching Peru with the Gospel, Tommy said. "We can't [reach the world] by ourselves. There's just too much to be done," he said. "We could go to an unreached people group. But if I can send a bunch more Peruvians and invest my life in them, I can be more effective sending than I can going." Cross-cultural missions often implies taking the Gospel to other countries. But the school near Iquitos teaches believers in the Amazon how to effectively share Christ in the many jungle villages throughout Peru. "These [believers] live in cross-cultural missions," Tommy said. "Their passion is to go deeper and farther into the jungle where the Gospel has not been preached."