Wrapping up our Bolivian adventure

Have you ever tried llama meat? We have! Our trip to South America was full of new experiences. During our two months in Bolivia, we were able to explore and learn many new things. We took some Spanish classes, and our tutors helped us catch up to the language and culture of Bolivia. They helped us out a lot, and our knowledge of Spanish has improved in leaps and bounds. We also enjoyed learning the local foods as well. We will not quickly forget the taste of llama meat and freeze-dried black potatoes!

Ah, Bolivian hospitality. Every church we visited fed us a delicious meal.

We met with a leader of the Quechua people to discuss literacy. They're always so friendly.


We also learned a lot about the literacy situation in Bolivia:
After investigating the need and possibilities for establishing our own literacy ministry in Bolivia, we have decided that, although we love Bolivia and its people, we are not going to move there to begin a full-time literacy ministry at this time. We may return to hold a training workshop, but are not planning to live there long-term as we had thought possible. Here is what is going on with literacy in Bolvia:

● The government is funding a literacy program that offers payments to their students, such as supplies of food. They also lend a TV/DVD combo to the students for use with their educational DVDs, and they get to keep it for the duration of their classes. This is very difficult for literacy ministries like ourselves to compete with, because we simply don't have the resources to pay our students.

● There are literacy programs already present in Bolivia who are already struggling to compete with the government's program, despite being established for many years.

●The need for literacy in Bolivia is mainly in Quechua and other tribal languages, not Spanish. We do not speak these languages, only Spanish. We may be able to return and train in Quechua with a translator, but we could not lead our own ministry there. To meet this need, there is currently already a Bible-content literacy program working in Quechua.

●The Quechua culture is a very oral culture. In fact, the written form of their language did not exist until the Spanish came over and wrote it. Therefore, there's not much of a passion for literacy to work with, which is why the government is offering payments to their students in the first place.

Thanks so much to all who prayed for us and gave towards our trip to Bolivia! We know that God has a perfect plan for us, and He will continue to open the right doors to lead us to His will!


So, what now?
Well, good question! We have been asked by the LEI staff to consider becoming a contact for their short-term missions department. So, we are now in Nicaragua for six weeks to help host two short-term teams. We have joined an LEI missionary couple, our good friends Tedd and Emily Lodes, who are already in place teaching literacy and English classes in a village called Rio Blanco. When the teams arrive, they will assist with teaching these classes as well as doing some church construction work. We are very excited to be here learning more about how to plan for and host short-term teams. Please pray for us as we go and live in Rio Blanco. We know God has another great adventure planned for us there!

Brad with three boys from one of the Lodes' ESL classes. They all greeted us in English: "Hi, I'm James. It's nice to meet you"
"It's nice to meet you too, James."

We're really looking forward to helping out with Tedd and Emily's classes and working with the teams when they arrive on May 9th. It is so exciting to see the Lord working all over the world!