Pastor, Bible Teacher, Northern Peru

Miguel is a pastor in the mountains of northern Peru. He is also the director of one of the modular Bible institutes that the Sullana seminary offers in his town.

 

Testimony

In August of 1986 I was involved in an accident. In my sick bed I was reading Carl Marx's book on Communism and I my health continued to deteriorate. So I prayed to God: "God, I don't understand why I am here, but if you exist please help me. But, most of all I need to know if you exist. If you don't exist, then I don't know who I am." After two days I began to improve quickly and, by the grace of God, I was healed.

Truthfully, I did not know much about how to receive Christ, although my parents were Christians. A couple of months after I recovered from my accident, toward the end of high school, I recall that I prayed a prayer: "Lord, if you are still interested in me, give me the opportunity to know more about you. But, I want to continue studying and to become a professional"

I did not end up getting the opportunity to study as I had hoped. By the grace of God I traveled to the port city of Paita, where my parents now live. There I met Pastor Elfer Ato, whom God used and he introduced me to a missionary from the United States. She sponsored me to study at the Baptist Seminary of Peru. When I was in my first year of studies, in a class on discipleship, it was then I that I had an encounter with Christ. I was studying about the security of the believer in the book of 1 John. I was studying the second chapter, about communion with God and I realized that I did not know God. I had read Romans 10:9-10, so then and there I bowed my knees and I prayed this to the Lord: "I confess to you my sins, make me your child, I receive you as my savior, and I desire to know you with all that I am. From now on I will serve you, I will give my life to your service."

From that moment everything changed; my life changed and I changed. I thank God for having saved me in the way that he did. This happened when I was 15 years old, at the seminary, shortly after I had finished high school.