Crossroad Bible Institute continues to radically transform people’s lives in countries fraught with political turmoil. In Colombia, Antonio Prieto Surmay has seen such transformations firsthand. Prieto Surmay, director of CBI Colombia, reaches out to the inmates in 16 different facilities in his country and makes sure that students continue with their studies after they are released.
During the process, Prieto Surmay has formed close relationships with ex-members of the FARC (Armed Revolutionary Forces of Colombia), a paramilitary organization involved in the Colombian armed conflict that started in 1964.
“We not only disciple them (the ex-members of the FARC) but also their families. They see the changes in the students and then decide to turn their lives around,” he said.
Partly because of the country’s history of political instability, Colombian facilities are known for their underdevelopment, slow medical attention and verbal abuse. Despite these poor conditions, Pastor German Sanchez and fieldworker Gladis Arenas, who work closely with Prieto Surmay, visit the different institutions in Colombia. Every week, Sanchez and Arenas collect lessons and share the powerful Word of God with CBI students, confident that its light will illuminate even the darkest corners of Colombia’s prisons.