Archive for October 31, 2013


Oct 31

A Beautiful Account of God’s Work among the Rabinal Achi

2013 | by Trent Hunter | Category: Mission

To highlight God’s work among the Rabinal Achi, Karen Gregory recently published an article for TGC’s International Outreach, “Christ for Guatemala’s Mayan People.” It’s a wonderful article that will make your heart rejoice. Here’s how it begins:

Our group from Desert Springs Church in Albuquerque, New Mexico, had taken a second mission trip to the town of Rabinal, in the Baja Verapaz region of Guatemala. We wanted to spread the Gospel to the Achi people, descendants of the once-mighty Mayan nation.

On that memorable day in 2004, we traversed a mountainside for two hours. We hiked alongside Pastor David Ixcopal, his wife Maria, and several of their 11 children, with the goal to share the Jesus film—the pastor’s only Western gospel resource at the time. A donkey carried the film, along with a generator and sheets that would serve as a movie screen. By evening the entire village of Patchalum viewed the movie; for many, it was their first exposure to the glorious Gospel of Christ.

For several days we accompanied Pastor David up and down steep mountains, taking paths between corn rows to reach the low, dark dwellings of Achi families.

I was overwhelmed by the Guatemalan pastor’s daily response to the call of Jesus, and the willingness of his family to ignore the seemingly impossible task to spread the Gospel. Their crushing poverty, amazing energy and boundless joy, in contrast to my many resources, paltry excuses and constant grumbling, made me weep. I returned home a broken woman.

Read the rest of Karen’s article here. To learn more about our Rabinal Achi Partnership, visit the DSC Global Missions Page.