Today our story comes from a woman who, over the past three decades, has watched her community transform through the Students International ministry.

Aurelia was first introduced to the Students International ministry when a friend invited her to accompany her to Jarabacoa’s medical site, telling her she would receive help for her medical needs and that they could participate in Christian activities. Aurelia started attending the site, and the Lord started moving. “El Callejon, the community I live in, lacked many resources in many different ways.” One day, a Students International missionary came walking through El Callejon and spotted Aurelia and her husband sitting outside their home. “We started talking and doors started opening. For me and for my community. It was just a door, but through prayer the movement in our community grew and soon, Students International was a great blessing to all of us.”

Soon, El Callejon, a community that neighboring communities had built walls around found itself being filled with more and more Students International ministry sites wanting to share God’s hope and love with the people living inside those walls originally designed to keep them out and tuck them away. An art site came in and painted those walls with Bible verses and stories. A women’s social work site made its home in El Callejon, reaching out to the women and later the young girls in the community, bringing them together while sharing the gospel. “Students International built a school, which my children ended up attending and studying at. They came in, loved on, and played with all our kids.” The microfinance site formed groups of women near the community, which Aurelia herself started to attend. “Microfinance has been such a blessing to me. I am always recommending it to women around me, and because of that, many have become participants themselves.”

“Students International has been a big blessing in my community for years,” says Aurelia. While still part of a broken world, Students International has become a light in El Callejon where God’s Word and love are being spread.

Today, Aurelia and her family are still being impacted by the Students International ministry. Aurelia’s daughter has taken on a big role working at one of Jarabacoa’s women’s social work sites and Aurelia herself continues to attend the microfinance site and has started working in one of Students International’s preschools in a nearby community.