October News!

Dear Family in Christ:

I know, I always start my reports the same way, apologizing for not writing in a long time. I would like to be in touch with you more often, however, one gets busy with life and ministry here and before I noticed it a couple of months have passed without communicating with you. You have to know, though, that I love you, I greatly appreciate your support, and I pray for you to our heavenly father. I hope you can be encouraged by this news and praise God for His goodness.


My dear friends, I want to thank you so much for your time, for always being there for me and for lifting up your sweet prayers to our heavenly father. I just hope He will reward you greatly for your faithfulness.


Colossians 1:13 “Who has delivered us from the power of darkness, and has translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son.”

In His service,

Talo Vergara

Theology Degrees for our people!

One of the main struggles the mission has had in Bolivia is to develop a theology program where people would be well prepared to serve. Most people here want a degree approved by the government; therefore, they are hesitant about studying at Seminaries. Some local seminaries are struggling to survive and are making efforts to get approved by the government (something very hard to get by the way).

The wonderful blessing is that the MEB (Grace Mission Organization) has come to an agreement with the UEB (Evangelical University of Bolivia) to start a new program in which we have great benefits. In first place our students would only have one class every six weeks. Classes will be held at our “MEB center” so the university will bring the teacher to our classroom. The price is very reasonable and the commitment is to have at least 15 students each class. Another great blessing is that they asked the missionaries (Jerry Olson, Daniel Reed and me) to teach some of the classes. They are open and they want to respect our doctrine, so they let us teach many of the classes.
We have started classes in July and we are glad to know we have a group of 18 students, many of them are youth who are studying some secular career but they want to get ready to serve the lord and to get more theological knowledge.

• Thank God for the incredible blessing of reaching to this agreement with the Evangelical University of Bolivia. It is such a great opportunity and a big answer to prayers that we have had for many years.
  
  
• Pray for the Students, that they continue strong, that we could make the group even bigger and that we do not get short in number risking the cancellation of the agreement (remember we must have 15 to go on).
  
  
• Pray for Jerry Olson as he is teaching Theology I.

First Time Teaching at University

Who would imagine that I would be teaching theology at university level? Definitely not me! But our God does amazing things through those willing to be used by Him. He made himself strong in my weakness because to be honest with you, I didn’t feel to ready to face this big challenge. In September I taught Introduction to the Bible and it was such a magnificent experience for me. First, I learned so much, since I had to run against time preparing the material, getting all the knowledge possible to answer any potential question, and, by doing this, I found myself spending many hours studying new bible events and it’s history, geography and background. The students seemed to enjoyed the class (at least they didn’t complain) as they learned about the Bible. It was an incredible blessing for me. I must say, I’m very sorry I couldn’t share this with you before so you could pray for me, however, thank God for the great experience and pray for the classes that I will teach next year.

New Challenge – Leading a Grace Church (Jesucristo Vive) & youth at Emanuel

Two weeks ago, the “Jesucristo Vive” church had the unpleasant news that its pastor decided to leave his position at church. This came as a shock to most of the congregation, which is evidently suffering the loss. The church board decided to ask the missionaries (especially me) to help out in a special way during this hard time. Therefore, I have accepted the challenge of leading the youth for a while. I will also be preaching every Sunday morning and helping with the many events they are planning in the months ahead.

The challenge is even bigger since the Emanuel church leaders had asked me to help them leading their youth. I was entertaining the idea especially since I was needing a new challenge because the youth here are not use to working outside of their churches and it was complicated to make them get together and work as a team. Right when everyone at Emanuel was looking at me as the new youth leader for the church and youth, Jesucristo Vive needed my help and leadership even more at this crisis time. Therefore, I have started my work at Jesucristo Vive, however, I will do my best to help at Emanuel as well. I believe this opportunity to work as a leader at these two churches can bring a lot of potential to give more unity at least to these two churches.

• Please pray for me, for the big challenge ahead, working with two youth groups and preaching every Saturday and Sunday.
  
• Thanks to God for expanding my work and responsibilities. Right at the time I was feeling a bit depressed because of the lack of response from the youth, I was asking God for new ideas to work, right then, two churches to be lead!

T.N.T visits an orphanage

In September T.N.T got together about 15 youth to visit a girls’ orphanage in town. We prepared a program with a drama, an evangelistic trick, testimonies and some worship songs to share the love of God with these needy girls. We went on a Sunday afternoon and we had a beautiful time, sharing about our glorious Lord with about 20 girls form the orphanage (some of them were gone for the weekend). We took some food, clothes and school materials for them and we spent the rest of the afternoon playing soccer and chatting with the girls. We really enjoyed our time with them as our Master was exalted during this precious time.