EDITOR’S NOTE: This year’s Week of Prayer for International Missions in the Southern Baptist Convention is Nov. 30-Dec. 7. Each year’s Lottie Moon Christmas Offering for International Missions supplements Cooperative Program giving to support Southern Baptists international missionaries’ initiatives in sharing the Gospel. This year’s offering goal is $210 million. To find information and resources about the offering, go here.
CHILE (IMB) – It took a flight. A ferry. A truck ride. Traveling on foot.
Forty remote islands in southern Chile have little gospel knowledge and access, but Lord willing, that will soon be changing. International Mission Board missionary Landon Williams clings to the promise given in Isaiah 42:4 that the coastlands will wait expectantly for God’s law.
Earlier this year, Landon brought a pastor from a church in Kentucky and a Chilean missionary to island communities to investigate how they can get the gospel to these remote areas. To their joy, they found people waiting expectantly on the coastlands.
On one island they met Moisés and Yované. The couple built a church 27 years ago with their bare hands, cutting each piece of wood. Pillows with crocheted covers rest on chairs. Posters with printed Psalms adorn the sea-foam green walls. A handmade cloth is draped over the pulpit, with “I am the vine” from John 15.
They have no pastor, but Moisés and Yované call people on their remote island to worship with them all the same.
Landon and his wife, Megan, serve in Santiago, and their vision is to mobilize churches in this global city to reach the nations. The Williamses traveled to southern Chile with a team from Santiago and a team from Grace Baptist Church to partner with Chilean missionary Carlos Carrasco and investigate how they could help reach the islands.
Landon estimates less than 20% have a local body of believers. He believes that together, they will reach the lost of Chile with the gospel.
Rodrigo Dörner is a Chilean church leader in a port city among the islands. As Rodrigo sat with Landon, Todd, and Carlos in the small island church, he began to understand God’s call on his life to lead believers to reach beyond their own island. He saw how his church could be the answer to this couple’s prayer.
Landon and the team prayed for Rodrigo before leaving. They prayed he would cast vision, lead, and train leaders who could go to the remote island.
“As we take the gospel further out,” Landon said, “as we lean into the vision from Isaiah, we realize that we’re leaning into the promises of God. To this day, there are coastlands, or faraway places, that have yet to hear the gospel.”
Landon encourages Chilean believers to learn “they can be a part of taking the gospel to the stretches that are further away from them to these people who have yet to hear, who need to know the saving message of the gospel of Jesus Christ.”
Pray
• Plead with the Lord to send a pastor to the remote island church.
• Take a moment to pray for Landon and Megan Williams as they mobilize Chilean believers to fulfill the Great Commission.
• Pray for the gospel to travel to coastlands of Chile. Pray for Landon, Carlos, and Rodrigo as they seek to see the promise fulfilled.