How God's Providence Guided by W. A. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Jan 8, 1914

How God's Providence Guided

By W. A. S.

It is a wonderful work that the Lord is doing among the Indians of our Lake Titicaca Indian mission. In that wild region, the cradle of the ancient Inca Indian peoples, scores have yielded fully to the truth, and hundreds are recognizing the power in the message for this time.

Our station is at Plateria, a little beyond the town of Chaucuito, on the southern shore of the lake, on the Peruvian side. It was a strange providence that carried the seeds of truth into that far region. Years ago an Indian lad of this high Andean village, Camacho by name, was taken from his home to act as servant to a Peruvian family in the town of Moquegua. While there he learned to read the Spanish language, and some time later returned to his home country. Desiring to help his wholly illiterate people, he opened a school there by the lakeside. About this time Camacho became the possessor of a Bible, and then some copies of our South American missionary paper came into his hands through a friend in the city of Puno.

Soon after, Camacho was rejoicing in the light of the gospel, and was teaching it in his school. So great was the interest among the Indians in the way of salvation that the priests were stirred up to stop the teacher's work. They got the authorities to put Camacho in the jail at Chaucuito; but in a little time his friends secured his release.

About this time our brethren in Peru came in touch with the Indian teacher by correspondence. Elder A. N. Allen tells how our Peruvian workers met this brother:—

In December, 1909, in company with Elder W. R. Pohle, I visited Puno, the Peruvian port on Lake Titicaca. Having had correspondence with Camacho, and knowing that he had quite a following among the Indians interested in the gospel, we made every effort to secure animals to ride out to his home, some twenty-five miles distant. But all our efforts to obtain animals failed. Then we tried to send a message telling of our presence in Puno, and asking for an interview. In this we were no more successful. Feeling that we could not leave without seeing Camacho, we made it a special subject of prayer that night, praying earnestly that God would overrule in the matter, and in some way bring it about that we might meet this Indian brother. Next day, about noon, while still we waited on our quest, word came to us that the Indian Camacho had come into Puno. We found him; and after talking with him for some time regarding his experiences, and the way the truth had come to him, I told Camacho that without doubt God had chosen him as an instrument for introducing the gospel among his people.

Then he related to us a dream that he had had the previous night—the night of our prayer season. It was this that had caused him to come to Puno. He said that in his dream he was in Puno, and there he met two strangers, foreigners; these men, in the dream, had told him that he was to teach the gospel to his race.

This direct answer to prayer and the evident spirit of the man, encouraged Brethren Allen and Pohle to believe that God had indeed begun a good work among the remnant of the old Inca race, those “children of the sun,” whose empire was overthrown by the Spanish conquerors under Pizarro. And so it has proved. Brother Camacho later attended an institute in Lima, and has been a trusted helper to Brother F. A. Stahl and others in the Indian work. That work—as far as converts are concerned—has now grown to be probably the largest missionary enterprise among the Indians in South America, though our workers have been few and our resources so small. It shows how truly God's hand is guiding in spreading the advent message through the darkest and most out-of-the-way places of the earth.

Where human resources fall short, the living God is able to supply the means; and he is doing it before our eyes continually. W. A. S.