Elder Fernando Stahl is by far the best-known Adventist missionary to Peru. Religious liberty was then unknown in Peru. People who accepted the Adventist message were persecuted, as was Elder Stahl himself. Shortly after transferring to a new place where he had not yet learned the local language, he was greeting people who called out to him as he passed them while going through a large village. In English, his response would be translated, “The same to you.” After leaving the village, his young son, who understood the local language, asked his father if he knew what people were saying to him when they greeted him. No, Elder Stahl replied. The son then enlightened his father that they were calling him the devil and all kinds of bad things, including that Elder Stahl had horns, etc. And to each one, Elder Stahl had replied, “The same to you,” which was about all of the local language that he then knew! Fortunately, nobody bothered him when later he returned to that same village. When still later Elder Stahl told this story on himself, a bit of his sense of humor showed through because he added, “Somehow I was reminded of a text in the fifth chapter of Matthew, which says, ‘Agree with thine adversary quickly.’”—F. A. Stahl, In the Land of the Incas, 1920, pp. 160, 161.PPP 149.2

A while later, Elder Stahl was strongly urged by the few members of a newly organized church to stay with them. They loved the singing and the preaching, and they wanted a school. Unfortunately, he couldn’t stay more than a few weeks, and he did not have a teacher to send to fulfill that request. Finally, just before Elder Stahl was going to leave, the chief extracted a promise from Elder Stahl that he would find and send a teacher. The chief then wanted to know if a teacher showed up how they would know that the person was sent by Elder Stahl. Picking up a stone, he broke it into two pieces. Handing one half of the broken stone to the chief, Elder Stahl promised that the teacher he sent would bring the other half of the broken stone. Thus three years later when finally a teacher was found and sent to open a school, the Broken Stone Mission was founded.PPP 150.1

About 1923, Elder Stahl preached on the north side of Lake Titicaca in Peru. Brother Condori, who had previously allowed a small Catholic church to be built on his property, accepted Elder Stahl’s message of righteousness by faith and the second coming of Christ. After accepting the Adventist faith, he converted his church into a Seventh-day Adventist church. Shortly thereafter the stone church was destroyed, and Brother Condori had to flee to the other side of the lake. Fifteen years later he still was unable to return home—it simply wasn’t safe for him to do so. Nevertheless, he had not given up sharing his Adventist faith. In 1938, now eighty years old, one Sabbath Brother Condori sang with great feeling at the Sabbath school he then attended, “There’s a Land That Is Fairer Than Day.” Those knowing his story understood that the hymn had a double meaning for him—not only was he looking by faith for his heavenly home, but he was still having to look by faith to the far side of the lake for his earthly home.PPP 150.2

This story serves to illustrate that it was not only the pioneers who showed this kind of personal commitment to missionary work. The local people, fully grasping the importance of the message, were also prepared to invest personally in the work of God, even if it required extreme levels of personal sacrifice.—Ibid.PPP 150.3

29. William A. Spicer

31. R. A. Underwood