When Ana* found out her daughter had liver cancer, she had no idea what to do. They were alone in the city, far away from their small home on a farm in southern Nicaragua where Ana’s husband and their 3-year-old son still lived.

With nowhere else to stay while her daughter was in the hospital, Ana lived in a women’s shelter, alone and afraid.

“I was really sad and depressed for my daughter,” Ana says. “I also worried because I didn’t know how my husband or son were doing at home.”

Ana had been going to church since she was small, but she was never able to afford a Bible of her own. She felt cut off from God’s message of love. “My life was empty, without hope,” Ana says.

Then one day, volunteers from the Bible Society came to the shelter and gave Ana her very first Bible, made possible by American Bible Society financial partners.

“In that moment, I felt security and hope, because I knew God was taking care of me and my needs,” Ana says. “I felt God was giving me answers to all my troubles, and that gave me new strength to trust Him in the midst of my problems.”

The continued support and generosity of our partners encourages healing and growth for people in Central America by placing God’s Word in their hands and hearts. We are grateful to them for reaching out with God’s arms of compassion around the world!

“Thank you very much for the Bible that you gave me,” says Ana. “Bless you all, and may you continue to take the Bible to people like me who need it.”

*Name changed to protect identity.