Unemployment and poverty have kept Nicaraguan children out of school. In a project of the Bible Society of Nicaragua, more than 19,000 at-risk children or child laborers participated in Bible studies. The children received Bibles and were connected with local pastors who could disciple them.
The project also worked with parents of 18,725 child laborers, encouraging the adults to send their children to school. Based on testimonies collected through follow-up interviews, children were experiencing God for themselves, becoming witnesses to their friends and parents, and applying biblical principles to their lives.
12-year-old member of the Iglesia Alégrate en Dios church, Leyla Esperanza Sosa Bustamante was one of the children who benefitted from the Bible studies:
“I am very glad because you gave me my first Bible; this really makes me happy because my Bible classes’ teacher teaches us how to read the Bible. Now I understand the Bible better than before because I read it a lot. When I am at home, I dedicate time to read the Bible with my mother. Since all of the children at the church received the Bible, we have changed a lot. Now we all go to visit other children to invite them to attend our church and they change just like we all are. So much so that they stop being involved in idleness and so that they don’t have vices because here in the neighborhood, little children smoke and are idle. I say to all children that they don’t dedicate just to work, but they read the Bible so that they learn to get their behavior better.”
