By Tamy Gaitan, ChangeMaker in Nicaragua

My father always wanted to go back to Nicaragua, and it was ingrained in us that the house we lived in wasn’t our home. We needed to go back. That was always the plan: “We’re going back to Nicaragua.” So in 2001, my parents returned to Nicaragua and remained there until my father’s death. Recently, I learned from my mother that my grandfather, my mom’s dad, had always wanted to be a missionary. She said he talked about doing it but just never did because of circumstances. 

Growing up, missions and missionary work was always on my heart and on the the heart of my family 

My call to missions began when I was a teenager, and the Lord gave me a heart for using two languages, English and Spanish, to talk to others about Him. I also knew from the time I was fourteen that I wanted to live outside the U.S. but didn’t know where. My parents were instrumental in this time of my life, allowing me to go and taking me to Mexico, Honduras, and Nicaragua. 

Since they were very involved in missions, they discipled and taught me about having a mission vision. Growing up in Dallas and going to youth events like “Breakthrough” (now called SOAR) were also used to speak to my heart. 

In 1990, the political climate of Nicaragua changed. I was nineteen at the time and my father, who is Nicaraguan, wanted us to meet his side of the family that we had not seen in thirteen years. By this time, I was very excited about missions and about attending college. I told my family that since we would be there for two weeks I wanted to stay for two months and be part of missions while in Nicaragua. The Missions department gave me permission to do this as part of VSM. The only thing they required was for me to keep a journal and turn it in to them.

I was twenty-two and just out of college when I went to the mission field for three years in Mexico as a BMA missionary. It’s where I had pre-field training and learned culture and language. It was a great training ground for me. 

Oscar Gaitan was the right hand man to the Missions coordinator in Nicaragua and he drove me around to the churches. The coordinator had us do things like painting buildings, teaching children, and working with youth. We spent a lot of time together, but it took him eight years to convince me to come back to Nicaragua and marry him. What began as him being my driver has not stopped. He has been driving me ever since. 

My passion is children’s ministry and training children to work for the kingdom from a very young age. I train children’s teachers to teach and serve not only the children, but to disciple the children’s parents as well so as a family they would serve the Lord. 

The children’s ministry in every church is vital, because even the children can learn and serve God from a very young age, and have energy and time to do so. Then we encourage the adults to continue serving in many areas of ministry. 

Women are vital in this kind of training, and are often the workforce in a church. The Lord uses women in great ways to further His kingdom. 

Our own children have always been a part of everything we do, all kinds of missions work like taking them to all the missions points we travel to, visiting a family in need, and to all kinds of trainings. When they were babies, we hung up a hammock and let them swing beside us. As toddlers, they sat in the back during trainings, and as children, they would go with us to visit with and invite kids to children’s Sunday school, which we call kids club. They were a part of teaching in kids club, discipling other youth, and they are a part of INTINO, our youth ministry.. Now we pray that our children, Lidia and Ostali, would continue their missionary legacy of training, traveling, discipling, and telling others about Jesus.