In 2006 under the guidance of pastor Jeff Mills the Lord directed us to begin an intensive training program for Bolivian pastors (called the Pastoral Assistant program – or PAs) to help pastors honor Christ by being true to His Scriptures in their life and ministry, in order to strengthen the church and reach the lost for Christ.

This is an urgent need for the Bolivian church, because ever since the earliest years of the gospel in Bolivia (early 1900’s) the church has tended toward syncretism, mysticism, anti-intellectualism, pragmatism, pastor/hero worship, and Andean animism – with little interest or knowledge in the Bible. The church is weak, and cults like the prosperity movement in recent years have captivated it, taking it even further away from the Bible. Many supposedly Evangelical leaders actively try to separate God’s people from reliance on God’s Word, encouraging as a replacement confidence in themselves as “apostles”, “prophets”, etc. The upshot is that the church is shockingly weak and ineffective.

Since 2006 God is changing this situation in the lives of many pastors and churches around Bolivia. One of the ways He is doing this is through pastors committed to study God’s Word. Kep’s newest PAs is pastor Rene Sanchez. Rene and his wife Diana have 3 children, and Rene is pastoring the main Nazarene church downtown La Paz. Rene shares his testimony, “In the early years of my pastoral ministry my teaching was essentially entertainment. I made mention of the Bible in my Sunday preaching, but mostly I shared stories about myself, my own opinions about current events, and things I learned from other pastors. I rarely picked up a Bible even to read it, and my ministry could be summed up with trying to be popular and make people in my congregation feel good. We had a lot of attenders, but very few conversions or transformed lives. I never really understood the sufficiency of God’s Word to convict of sin, lead people to Jesus, and transform through the power of the cross. My ministry was not honoring to Christ or effective in pointing people to Jesus to save and transform lives.

In 2009 Kep invited me to join his ESI group (ESI is short for “Equipping Servants Pastoral Training” – this is a ministry funded by Parkside Church where we place a pastor book-set valued at $350 in the hands of pastors, and then train them over 3 years in the use of these resources to be true to Christ using His Word effectively in ministry). It was in ESI that I was confronted with the richness of God’s Word as we studied each week through the book of Romans -- and the poverty of what I was feeding the members of my church. The Lord convicted me deeply of my sin, and I asked Him to help me understand the Gospel so that I could become a more effective instrument in His hands for the conversion of the lost and the building up of believers through the transforming truth and power of God’s Word. As I have grown in my understanding of the Bible, I have grown in my passion for Jesus and my commitment to teach and preach the Bible. My life and ministry have radically changed. When I finished the 3 year ESI process, Kep invited me to enter into the PA program. Every week this year I have studied Romans for 16 hours each week, preparing sermons through the book of Romans. That is also what I am preaching through in my church on Sunday mornings. By the grace of God, people are turning to Jesus, being saved and growing in their commitment to Christ.”

Rene’s testimony is characteristic of what God is doing in other lives. Currently Kep has 15 PAs he works with intensively -- helping them grow in their dependence on Christ, commitment to preach and teach the Bible, and use God’s resources in God’s way for God’s purposes. We have sent out 3 of our PAs to start new churches and open pastoral training centers in new areas around Latin America – Edwin Callejas is in Huánuco, Peru; Tomas Diaz is in Loja, Ecuador; and Javier Soliz is in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. In addition to this Edgar Mamani is pastoring the IBM Church in La Paz; Pepe Rocha is pastoring the ILC Church in La Paz, and we are asking God to show us where around in Latin America we should start new churches and ESI pastoral training centers over the next 5 years.

Debbie is working with the wives of these PAs encouraging and helping them to look to Jesus through His Word. She works with many of these women reaching out to other women in La Paz through an evangelistic Bible Study that draws dozens of women to consider the claims of Christ each week. She and her team work together to share Christ with these women, disciple them, and help them become fully committed followers of Jesus to reach the lost for Christ.