By Allie Martin and Jenni Parker
September 26, 2003

GUATEMALA (AgapePress) - Compassion International staffers in Guatemala are not letting poverty, a bad economy, and crime hinder their work with needy children.

Once a week, staff members at the Guatemala City office meet for praise and Bible study. Then they get to work organizing 117 projects throughout the nation. Each project serves an average of 180 children from poverty-stricken families. Children who have been sponsored through Compassion International attend these projects, where they take part in Bible study, receive tutoring, play games, and eat nutritious snacks.

Luis Colmenares is director of the Guatemala office. In a country where the average yearly wage is about $1,600 and 60% of the population lives below the poverty line, the ministry director says widespread poverty causes many people to give up.

"Overall, Guatemala has been a country in development. We face, as in other countries in the world, challenges that are in some ways generic, such as fighting with poverty, with lack of opportunity, with lack of development in the minds of people," he says.

According to Colmenares, those who face such obstacles often lose faith in the future as well as in themselves. "People sometimes don't think they can achieve as much as they can because nobody has told them, 'You can get to be this much -- you can be a greater person and a better person than what you are now,'" he says.

In cooperation with local Christian churches and missions, Colmenares says Compassion International is not only helping to meet the material needs of children and adults, but also showing them that true riches are found in a relationship with Jesus.

Compassion's work in Guatemala began in 1976. Today there are more than 15,000 children participating in the ministry's projects and getting the assistance they need to rise above their circumstances and become all that God has created them to be.