Welcome to our new Prayer-Blog: Ross & Mary Hunter - Ecuador

June 21th, 2025

Thank you for checking out our new prayer-blog created to provide more frequent updates, stories, and prayer requests to encourage a deeper connection to our ongoing ministry in Ecuador and the expanding Latin American region.

Late last week my WhatsApp buzzed with a new message; "Hermano David (Ross' Spanish name), I am finding it very difficult to teach what I learned at Bible school in Guatemala to my indigenous community in Ecuador. Can you help me? Mariano (not his real name), echoed what many of our students have been struggling with. How does one make the abstract concepts of formal theology more understandable and reproduceable to their indigenous context? One answer is to integrate Orality concepts and methods into our teaching and discipleship that help our indigenous students learn God's Word more deeply, while providing a model they can teach in their churches.

What is Orality? Simply put, Orality is a method of communication that speaks to cultures who process information in non-literate expressions that are connected to the daily life of their comunity. In oral cultures, abstract concepts are communicated through more traditional venues such as story, symbols, rituals, art, song or drama that reflect the patterns of thinking they grew up in. Even students who have broadened their thinking and have excelled in formal education, like Mariano in the story above, struggle to take that knowldege and communicate it to their family back home.

Check out this summary from Dr. Tom Steffen who explains the value of the use of Orality in teaching theology to indigenous groups in his presentation to our Indigenous Research Center last year.

Please join us in Prayer for:

*Mary's visit with her mom (93), who is living with her sister in North Carolina. Please pray for Mary's health where she is struggling with torn rotator cuffs in both of her arms as well as some other health issues she is trying to figure out. Mary returns to Ohio next week and will prepare to join me in Ecuador the second week of July. Pray for Mary as she looks to integrate her recent training in Member Care and Somatic Experiencing into her ministry this summer (see our January to April prayer update for more details).

*Pray for Ross' PhD research on designing a contextual approach to theological education for the Quichua of Ecuador. On Tuesday, June 17th, Dr. Tom Steffen presented a workshop on his recent book, Character Theology, (CT) to our Indigenous Research Center. CT introduces orality as an approach to theological study "that engages God through the ‘reading’ of biblical characters in the context of story." More on this in future updates.

*Pray for Miguel, one of our students who is serving as a Quichua pastor in the city of Guayaquil. Miguel's son-in-law was abducted a week ago Wed. and discovered without life by his family two days later. Pray for Miquel, his wife, and especially for his daughter and her three young children who are struggling with their sudden loss of a husband and father.

*Pray for our financial support, that God would burden hearts to help us meet our finanical needs that enable us to minister in Ecuador.

Thank you for your prayers and interest in our ministry. Please subscribe on our blog page if you would like to receive email notifications of future posts, or check out our website from time to time for updates. For a larger over-view of our work, click on our prayer update link on the top right corner our webpage.

"Holding fast to the word of life..." (Phil 2:16),

in gratitude and prayer,

Ross &/for Mary.

rmhunter83@evministry.org

www.evministry.org