Part of making justice personal is giving boys and girls the opportunity to learn.
In the Amazon jungle, families face numerous hardships, with one major obstacle being limited access to educational opportunities. JMI has been addressing this issue since 2004 by building schools in remote villages, saving children from long and dangerous journeys to get an education.
In recent years, JMI launched an initiative to also provide school libraries for students. We work with local pastors and leaders in order to identify villages that desperately need a school library and then raise funds for construction. The first library we built opened in Terra Preta in 2019.
This August, our team joyfully inaugurated another new library in Itacoatiara, one of the more populous cities on the banks of the Amazon in Brazil. Our partner, Pastor Luís, volunteers with the kids in this area and saw their need for increased literacy and learning opportunities.
A team of 10 from our JMI office in Manaus traveled five-and-a-half hours down the river to Itacoatiara and spent a weekend with the locals, celebrating the new space. At the opening, children from Pastor Luís’s church gathered to listen to a message about the book of Daniel. They were encouraged by how one small person can do big things for the Lord.
After that, everyone went into the new library together, where we talked about what we can learn from different cultures and people all across the globe. Through JMI library projects like this, kids are given access to a multitude of books and resources to engage their minds and discover the world.
Our library projects also bring joy to whole communities, as they are reminded that they are not forgotten.
We can’t wait to see how the kids in Itacoatiara are going to use this new space to gain knowledge, dream about their futures, and pursue opportunities they once never knew existed.
Help us continue this much-needed work by making a gift.
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