From Peru to Bethany

Not to long after Missionary Terry and his wife Mary arrived in Peru in 1996 they traveled high in the Andes mountains to meet the Lutheran brothers and sisters in the faith who live in the district of Peru called Ancash. Mary recounts her relationship with Carmen “Soledad” Hauranga.

On that trip is when I first meet Soledad and Javier (her brother who now is a Vicar working in Lima). She would have been about ten years old then. I immediately liked her and we started up a friendship. Through those years she grew into such a blessing to me and to the church, as she was always available to help Dora (Pastor Fidel Convercio’s wife) with Sunday School and VBS in Llamac and Chiquian. When she finished high school about five years ago, Terry and I invited her to come to Lima and apply for one of the Mission’s seven Post-Secondary Scholarships for Peruvian Women. The program is administered by to our National Peruvian Council, made up of eight men from our congregations.

She received a scholarship! She began to study English in Lima and live with her brother Javier. Soledad and I would meet to practice English and our friendship grew. Terry and I soon realized she would be a great candidate for the Bethany Scholarship for international students. We both encouraged her to keep focusing on English. While living and studying in Lima, Soledad was also able to help Javier with a Sunday School program and help me out with various visitors to our mission building. She gave tours in English to our many visitors. She also took conversation classes from mission volunteers who came to serve for short periods of time, such as Polly, Dan and Keri.

When the time was right she applied to take the TOEFL Test (Test Of English as a Foreign Language), in order to demonstrate college-level English proficiency. She ended up with the third highest score out of the 79 who were tested! After receiving the required approval of the National Peruvian Council and the missionaries, Soledad applied to Bethany Lutheran College. On April 11th, 2006 she received a letter from the Admissions Committee that she had been accepted. What a blessing for us! 

Now the next hurdle was to get the Student Visa from the US Embassy. This is not an easy thing to obtain here in Peru. About 85 per cent of the visa applications from lower economic class Peruvians are rejected. If you cannot demonstrate sufficient evidence that you will return to Peru, such as a spouse, owning a home and car, having a large Peruvian bank account, you are considered a high risk and your visa application is rejected.

When the time came for Soledad’s appointment at the US Embassy, I had her armed with letters from Bethany, the missionaries, and the Peru Synod Council. She was fully prepared to be turned down on the first attempt. I had a back up plan in place to mount the second attempt. On the day of her embassy appointment Soledad went in for the interview and within five minutes she was back out the door! The embassy employee behind the glass who was interviewing her had read Terry’s letter. He looked up and said to her, “tell your Pastor Schultz you are going to school.” We don’t know if he was a believer or not, but we do know the Lord answered our prayers! And we had many praying for her that day!  What an extraordinary blessing!

Soon afterwards, I started to get anxious over all the things that Soledad needed for school and how she would be traveling “alone” in the USA. One night when I was not able to sleep, so I wrote an email letter to Terry’s and my home church, Mt. Olive Lutheran Church in St. Paul, Minnesota (WELS) and asked if they could take on a few “projects” for us: 1), an airline ticket for me so I could take Soledad to College (that was a promise I had made to her mother!), 2) a clothes drive for her, and 3) a shower! I received an answer back from Mt. Olive the very same day! Yes, they would take on all three projects, plus have a mentoring friendship with her. Most importantly, they would make a commitment to be praying for her all four years of her schooling!  WOW!  Another great blessing! 

When Terry and I were in the United States on furlough last summer we were able to spend time with our Mt. Olive family. They had a fund-raiser for my airplane ticket (which was not cheap) and raised the entire amount! They had already collected four full boxes of used but good-condition clothes for Soledad, a bike and a used laptop computer! More and more blessings from our Savior! They have an evening planned to meet Soledad and host a shower just a day after we arrive in the United States!

I was also able to get a couple of amazing ladies lined up at Bethany Lutheran College to be her “big sisters” and help her with anything she may need. Soledad and I have also made a promise that we will talk once a week. I then needed to report back to her mother. All this is very hard on her family (mother, father, two brothers, a sister in-law, two nieces, and one nephew), but they are also thrilled with this great opportunity and honor that Soledad has been given. She will be able to work on campus to make some spending money. She will not be going home at Christmas break or during the summer months, so we need to remember her family in our prayers. A girl from a tiny mountain village high in the Andes, who lived only five years in Lima, is now a student with a four-year scholarship at Bethany Lutheran College! It is all a blessing almost too enormous to imagine.

Mary Schultz is an ELS Missionary’s wife living in Lima, Peru.

“Sing to the Lord a new song, for He has done marvelous things” (Psalms 98:1a).