Indigenous Ministry in Jaqué by Boat

After making three trips into a small Colombian community in 2025, Mateo* and Isabella* decided to follow Christ and were baptized.

They are the first believers in their community! We will return to their community for discipleship and follow-up in 2026 and make several trips down the coast into additional Colombian communities.

You are an essential part of Mateo and Isabella’s spiritual journey through your gifts and prayers to this ministry.

This year, we plan to take 12 U.S. partner teams into Jaqué. They will prayer walk, share Bible stories, worship, and pray with new believers, as God uses both the U.S. teams and local believers to encourage one another.

Having reliable transportation for our teams and national partners has been a huge blessing as we travel, and your generosity makes this possible.

These areas of South America that are still unreached with the gospel are challenging to access, require expensive travel, and depend on indigenous partners for access.

Thank you for being faithful teammates with us as we, together, watch God work along the Pacific coast of Panama and Colombia.

Please continue joining us in prayer:

• Praise God for Mateo and Isabella’s salvation! Pray for their spiritual growth and witness in their community.
• Pray for the U.S. teams coming to work with us. Ask God to use their time to point people to salvation.

Your continued giving and praying help the gospel go into unreached places. With the Great Commission as our mandate, we must reach them no matter the cost.

*Names changed

Roberto* and Gabriela* are teens living in a remote area of eastern Panama. They had heard very little of Jesus and His love for them.

A team of young people helped our team share the gospel through activities for teens and young adults in local villages.

Because of the generosity of givers like you, Roberto and Gabriela heard the story of the calling of Levi and responded to God’s call on their lives (Mark 2:13-17).

They decided to follow Jesus and were baptized!

Yira* is Roberto’s grandmother. Our team has prayed for her for several years. She has poor hearing and doesn’t understand much Spanish, speaking mainly Emberá.

Because of your sacrificial gifts, Yira heard the gospel from one of our indigenous national partners and accepted Jesus as her Savior.

Eliana* attended Bible story times faithfully many times. She listened, asked questions, and pondered what she heard.

Your giving enabled us to return time after time with the gospel. Now, she is your sister in Christ and is a baptized follower of Jesus!

Thirty baptized believers meet regularly in this small village on the Pacific Coast of Panama, close to the Columbian border, 100 miles from the nearest road.

Thank you for giving and praying for this region to hear the good news!

Please join us in prayer:

• Praise God for volunteers serving with our team who share Jesus in new ways.
• Pray for Roberto, Gabriela, Yira, and Eliana as they grow in Christ.
• Ask God to strengthen this new church with godly leaders and spiritual maturity.

We thank God for your generosity! You are truly partners in this work through your prayers and gifts.

*Names changed

How long have you been praying for a loved one to come to Jesus? Perhaps weeks, months, or even years?

Seven years ago, our team met Andrus* and Ana* and began praying for this precious couple to follow Jesus.

They participated in countless Bible story sessions, asking questions and spending time with believers. Each U.S. partner team to Jaqué prayed for the couple. Gospel seeds were planted and watered.

After about two years, Ana decided to accept Jesus as her Savior.

But Andrus didn’t. Ana prayed faithfully for her husband, just as you pray diligently for those you love to come to Jesus.

She talked with him about the difference Christ made in her life, and we continued sharing the gospel with him.

We rejoice in reporting that Andrus recently accepted Jesus and was baptized!

We are so thankful for the opportunity to see this miracle. Thank you for being part of Andrus’ faith journey through your giving and prayers for this ministry.

Like the testimony of Andrus and Ana, the work here is slow but consistent. God is faithful in multiplying your generosity to reach the lost in Jaqué.

Please join us in prayer:

• Praise the Lord for Andrus and Ana’s decisions to follow Christ! Pray for their children and extended families to see what God has done and follow Jesus, too.
• Ask God to strengthen our team’s unity, as we adjust to three indigenous missionaries leaving to work in another region.
• Pray for physical endurance for our team, especially in the hot summer months.

Thank you for your gifts, which bring the gospel to the Jaqué region of Panama and Colombia. We rejoice in the wondrous things God is doing!

*Names changed

A young life changed

Your support allowed our team to share Bible stories in a small village on Colombia’s Pacific Coast in January of this year.

A little boy we met, about eight years old, was crying and batting his ears. When we asked what was wrong, his mother shared that he was hearing voices telling him that his parents didn’t love him, were about to abandon him, and that he should kill himself. We continued to pray over him, and he calmed down.

We had been telling the story of the demon-possessed man that Jesus had healed, sharing with him that this Jesus who healed that man could also heal him. He decided that he wanted to follow Jesus, and the demons left him.

The following day, the mother and another son came to us, telling us that they wanted what he had received, and they prayed to accept Christ as Savior as well.

Please pray for this family, that they will grow in their faith and that we will be able to visit again soon to continue discipling them.

Youth outreach

Our team in Jaqué has been trying to reach the local youth in the community for months. Many of these children are growing up without any stable family life, without much access to higher education, and no hope of any job that will support them besides running drugs for the cartels.

Holidays are tough times, as the community parties for days. Carnival (like Mardi Gras) and Holy Week were times when our team decided to host special activities for the community’s youth. Your gifts allowed us to plan and host these events.

Our team and local believers worked to prepare soccer tournaments, volleyball games, snacks, and, most importantly, Bible stories. These activities were well attended, and relationships have continued to grow since. Several afternoons weekly, the youth of Jaqué continue to show up to play soccer or volleyball, and our team, along with US partner churches visiting, can spend time with them. Please pray for these youth that their hearts will be open to the gospel and that we will see lives changed.

Basketball clinic offers access 

This month (April), we had a group of US partners from Oklahoma go out to Jaqué with us. We have been trying to get into the school in Jaqué for over six years.

This group offered to hold a basketball clinic with the school children. The PE teacher liked this idea and arranged for our group to work with them during school hours for several days. After the clinic, our team shared Bible stories and sang songs with the kids. Please pray that we will be able to continue to have access to the school and share Bible stories with the kids and the teachers.

Thanks to our boat, Aventuras Jaqué – we have continued ministering in Jaqué, up the Jaqué River, and elsewhere. Even in rough seas, this sturdy, dependable boat has taken us through safely. We recently had some repairs made and continue to do maintenance, oil changes, etc.

We are thankful for you, who have given so generously to the Indigenous Ministry in Jaqué by Boat ministry. You support makes our work possible.

Thank you so much for your generosity to this ministry and those God calls us to reach in remote areas of eastern Panama and the Chocó region of Colombia. Your prayers and sacrificial giving undergird the operation and maintenance of the Aventuras Jaqué, a boat helping our team and national partners take the gospel to those who have never heard the name of Jesus.

Gospel explodes where sadness prevailed. In the 1970s, the Panamanian government constructed a hydroelectric plant dislocating several indigenous communities. One of these was an Emberá community relocated to the new village of Piriatí. This violent uprooting shakes the core of an indigenous community in ways that are hard for most of us to comprehend. People began to suffer depression, and Satan seized the opportunity. Even the tribal witch doctor could do nothing to help the people.

Several hours east, other Emberá heard about the people of Piriatí and traveled with local missionaries to the village. As they shared the gospel—Emberá to Emberá—several from the one family decided to follow Christ, and over time, more and more did the same. The only family member who could read, a 12-year-old boy, was appointed as “pastor” so he could read the Bible to the believers, and they could continue to learn God’s Word.

Blessed to be a blessing. Those who came to Christ in Piriatí soon began to visit other Emberá villages in Panama, taking the gospel to many of their people. One of those earliest believers dreamed of sharing the gospel beyond Panama to other Emberá villages in Colombia. He passed away five years ago, never having realized this dream.

Today, however, three of his children and three of his grandchildren are actively working to make this dream a reality. They have traveled to Colombia several times, sharing the gospel story in their language in places where whites and Latinos cannot go, sometimes staying for 6-7 weeks at a time in villages far upriver. The more remote an area is, the more difficult and expensive it is to get there. Most of the region they are reaching has no roads, so travel is sometimes by air, but more often by boat—on both the ocean and local rivers. We continually praise the Lord for His faithfulness in calling out missionaries from among the Emberá and using them to reach their own people with the good news of Jesus Christ.

Please join us in prayer.

• Please pray for Emberá missionaries who have a heart to share the stories of Jesus just as their father and grandfather did.
• Ask God to protect and guide the three grandchildren, working as full-time missionaries in remote areas of Panama and Colombia.
• Pray for the resources needed for them to continue to serve.
• Ask the Lord to bring Emberá who are seeking Him into direct contact with missionaries who can share the message of salvation.

We are so thankful for you, our partners, who make “Indigenous Ministry in Jaqué by Boat” possible. Your sacrificial gifts and intercession are truly transforming lives as we partner together to solve the world’s greatest problem, lostness.