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Christ Saving the Indigenous, Colombia
Helman and Rosalba Ocampo
MY CONVERSION I grew up in a peasant household, I am the second of 13 children. During my first 17 years living in the mountains, we had no light, no bathroom and very little food. I could not go to school and learned to read and write a little while I was working in farming. Our house was a thatched roof, no walls and a dirt floor. We slept on tables with no mattress and no blankets. We had no clean water, and we never knew that doctors existed. When I was 17 years old we moved to a small town called Puerto Lleras. It was then that I used a bathroom for the first time, learned what toilet paper and underwear were and I bought my first pair of shoes. At age 18 I received Jesus Christ as savior. It was a day of great joy, because I was so religious (Catholic), I had an altar with more than 15 statues and would pray to them and light candles every night; I was a slave to them. But when a pastor told me "I see that you are very religious, but you are missing one thing...open your heart to Jesus", I fell to my knees and was overjoyed and for the first time in my life I felt loved...because I had never received love, a hug or a kiss from anyone, not even from my parents. STUDIES At age 19, an American named Jim Cartee, who spoke no Spanish, told me that if I would teach rural children to read and write during holidays and vacations, he would pay for me to go to Biblical Seminary. I was so happy and accepted the deal. But when I went to talk to the Seminary director I became discouraged because he told me that I must have at least 9 years of school to be accepted. Because I learned to read and write on my own, I had not even been to a real school before. But the pastors sister, who was a teacher, gave me a package to study to validate the elementary school level. And so I studied day and night and after 3 months I passed the exams with good grades. I then made an agreement with the Seminary that I would finish the other grade levels at night during the 4 years that I would attend the Seminary. God helped me and so I graduated. At the age of 24 I became a pastor of a church and when I was 26 God gave me a beautiful wife. It was a gift from God to find the person who had the same call to the unreached people groups, particularly indigenous tribes. She had read the same books I had read. Born in a Christian home, she was very active in the Lord's work. She was a youth leader and at the same time a counselor. We got married and immediately got involved together in the Lord's work. It has been 28 years of working every day in the ministry of Crisalinco. I've always said that nothing that has been done would have been possible if I didn’t have her next to me so committed to the ministry. Today we have two daughters. One, age 28, is married and they have two children. The other is 26 years old. THE CALL 27 years ago, during fasting and prayer, God broke our hearts by giving us a burden for the Indigenous of Colombia. God told us: "I'm going to save the Indigenous through you" and it was that day in January 1982 that God gave us the name for the ministry: "CRISALINCO", which means Christ Saving the Indigenous in Colombia. For 8 years we traveled to the tribes and in the year 1991, founded the school to train missionaries. The school alone was not very effective, so, together with Swiss missionaries, we founded the Bible Institute in 1995 to train Indigenous pastors of different languages in Colombia.CHURCHES Today, to the glory of God, we have founded 143 churches in 20 languages of the 80 tribes in Colombia. We continue to declare the goal of 15/500, 500 churches by the year 2015 within the 80 tribes. 27 missionaries have graduated from the missions school and 82 Indigenous pastors have graduated from the Bible Institute. In total we have 180 leaders working full time in this beautiful work for the Lord Jesus Christ. "And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come." Matthew 24:14. "After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes..." Revelation 7:9
MY CONVERSION
I grew up in a peasant household, I am the second of 13 children. During my first 17 years living in the mountains, we had no light, no bathroom and very little food. I could not go to school and learned to read and write a little while I was working in farming. Our house was a thatched roof, no walls and a dirt floor. We slept on tables with no mattress and no blankets. We had no clean water, and we never knew that doctors existed. When I was 17 years old we moved to a small town called Puerto Lleras. It was then that I used a bathroom for the first time, learned what toilet paper and underwear were and I bought my first pair of shoes. At age 18 I received Jesus Christ as savior. It was a day of great joy, because I was so religious (Catholic), I had an altar with more than 15 statues and would pray to them and light candles every night; I was a slave to them. But when a pastor told me "I see that you are very religious, but you are missing one thing...open your heart to Jesus", I fell to my knees and was overjoyed and for the first time in my life I felt loved...because I had never received love, a hug or a kiss from anyone, not even from my parents.
STUDIES
At age 19, an American named Jim Cartee, who spoke no Spanish, told me that if I would teach rural children to read and write during holidays and vacations, he would pay for me to go to Biblical Seminary. I was so happy and accepted the deal. But when I went to talk to the Seminary director I became discouraged because he told me that I must have at least 9 years of school to be accepted. Because I learned to read and write on my own, I had not even been to a real school before. But the pastors sister, who was a teacher, gave me a package to study to validate the elementary school level. And so I studied day and night and after 3 months I passed the exams with good grades. I then made an agreement with the Seminary that I would finish the other grade levels at night during the 4 years that I would attend the Seminary. God helped me and so I graduated.
At the age of 24 I became a pastor of a church and when I was 26 God gave me a beautiful wife. It was a gift from God to find the person who had the same call to the unreached people groups, particularly indigenous tribes. She had read the same books I had read. Born in a Christian home, she was very active in the Lord's work. She was a youth leader and at the same time a counselor.
We got married and immediately got involved together in the Lord's work. It has been 28 years of working every day in the ministry of Crisalinco. I've always said that nothing that has been done would have been possible if I didn’t have her next to me so committed to the ministry.
Today we have two daughters. One, age 28, is married and they have two children. The other is 26 years old.
THE CALL
27 years ago, during fasting and prayer, God broke our hearts by giving us a burden for the Indigenous of Colombia. God told us: "I'm going to save the Indigenous through you" and it was that day in January 1982 that God gave us the name for the ministry: "CRISALINCO", which means Christ Saving the Indigenous in Colombia. For 8 years we traveled to the tribes and in the year 1991, founded the school to train missionaries. The school alone was not very effective, so, together with Swiss missionaries, we founded the Bible Institute in 1995 to train Indigenous pastors of different languages in Colombia.
CHURCHES
Today, to the glory of God, we have founded 143 churches in 20 languages of the 80 tribes in Colombia. We continue to declare the goal of 15/500, 500 churches by the year 2015 within the 80 tribes. 27 missionaries have graduated from the missions school and 82 Indigenous pastors have graduated from the Bible Institute. In total we have 180 leaders working full time in this beautiful work for the Lord Jesus Christ.
"And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come." Matthew 24:14.
"After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes..." Revelation 7:9
