Imagine leaving a comfortable life in the United States and going to live at more than 3,800 meters of altitude, on a freezing plateau where almost no one spoke your language. That is what Fernando and Ana Stahl did. In 1909, this couple of Adventist nurses crossed half the world to serve the indigenous peoples of the Andes.
They did not arrive with speeches. They arrived with medicine, with chalkboard chalk, and with hands ready to work. They opened schools where there were no schools. They cared for the sick that no one cared for. And, when they were persecuted, the indigenous people themselves defended them.
This is the story of a couple who turned the answer of an ancient prophet into a way of life. And it is a story that speaks straight to you, Pathfinder, about what it means to truly serve.
Who were Fernando and Ana Stahl?
Fernando Anderson Stahl (1874-1950) and Ana Christina Carlson Stahl (1870-1968) formed one of the most remembered missionary couples in South America. Both were nurses. They studied at the Battle Creek Sanitarium, in the United States, and began living according to the Adventist faith in the early 1900s.
Here is the important detail: the two worked together, as equals. Ana was not just the wife who accompanied her husband. She was a nurse as trained as he was, she attended births, treated wounds and taught hygiene to the village families. In a time when few people valued a woman's work, her service saved countless lives.
Think of the pair as a Director and a Counselor who share the same mission. Each with their own gift, but pulling the same cart. It is this spirit of partnership that makes a Club work. And it was this spirit that made the Stahls' mission succeed in places where everything seemed to be against them.
The verse that became a way of life
The Stahls' story fits inside an ancient verse. In the book of Isaiah, the prophet hears God ask who would be willing to go. And he answers at once. In Isaiah 6:8 (NIV) it is written: "Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, 'Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?' And I said, 'Here am I. Send me!'"
Notice that Isaiah's answer has no "but." He does not ask about the salary, does not request guarantees, does not complain about the distance. He only says: here I am, send me. That was exactly the attitude of the couple. They did not wait for perfect conditions to serve. They went with what they had.
In your Club, that same calling appears all the time, just in a smaller version. Someone needs to carry the first aid kit. Someone needs to help the newcomer who does not know how to tie a knot. Service begins when you raise your hand before calculating how much it will cost.
The Platería mission, near Lake Titicaca
In 1909, the Church sent the Stahls to South America, beginning in the La Paz region, in Bolivia. Shortly after, around 1910 and 1911, they crossed over to the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca and settled in Platería, a district near the city of Puno. There lived the Aymara, an indigenous people treated with contempt by the society of the time.
An Aymara leader named Manuel Zúñiga Camacho opened his own home to welcome the couple. It was from that meeting that the first Adventist indigenous school in the region was born. The idea was simple and bold: to teach the Aymara to read, write and care for their health, treating each person with dignity.
The work grew fast. Wherever a school came in, a small health post came in too. The two things went together. Learning to read and learning to wash your hands were part of the same mission. In one generation, that network came to total around 200 schools around the lake, each one treating the Aymara with a dignity that the society of the time denied them.
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What made the Stahls' work so strong was the blend. They did not separate body, mind and faith. In a single village you would find a classroom, a post where Ana treated the sick, and a space to pray and sing. All together, all caring for the whole person.
This care for the body was not the couple's invention. It comes from a principle that Adventists take seriously: health is part of faith, and taking good care of the body is a way to honor God. If you want to understand where this idea comes from, it is worth reading about the origin of the Adventist health message at /en/desbravadores/espiritualidade/origem-da-mensagem-de-saude-adventista/.
You can live out that same model in the Club, at your scale. Learn a first aid Honor, organize a cleanup effort, visit those who are sick. A good /en/desbravadores/servico/comunitario/ project unites exactly the three things the Stahls united: learning, serving and caring. Real service always puts a hand on those who need it.
The Platería persecution of 1913
Not everyone was pleased with what was happening. When the Aymara began to read, to demand respect and to care for their own health, powerful people felt threatened. Starting in 1912 and 1913, the Platería mission suffered attacks. Believers were threatened, assaulted and even imprisoned because of their faith.
The case became so serious that it gained national attention and came to be debated in the Congress of Peru, becoming part of the discussion about religious freedom in the country. And something moving happened: many indigenous people stepped forward to defend the couple who had treated them with dignity. Those who had once been despised now protected their teachers.
Here there is a lesson both hard and beautiful. Doing good does not always please everyone. Sometimes, serving with justice bothers those who profit from injustice. But true care creates bonds so strong that people begin to defend one another. It is the same in a healthy Club: whoever is well treated learns to protect their neighbor.
The turn to the Amazon, in 1921
You might imagine that, after so many years and so much success in the Andes, the couple would rest. That is not what happened. In 1921, already with much road behind them, Fernando and Ana came down from the freezing mountains to the humid heat of the Peruvian Amazon. A completely different world.
There they started over, this time among the Asháninka, an indigenous people of central Peru's forest, opening work in the Metraro region, in the Perené valley. They traded the cold of the plateau for the rivers, the mosquitoes and the tropical diseases. And they did the same as always: school, health and respect.
The legacy of that period still exists. In Iquitos, in the Peruvian Amazon, the Ana Stahl Adventist Clinic operates to this day, bearing her name. It is proof that a service done with love does not die with the person. It goes on caring for people long afterward.
The book and the legacy that reached you
In 1920, Fernando published the book "In the Land of the Incas," telling the stories he lived in the Andes. The book helped many people around the world to learn about those peoples and to take an interest in missions. It was a way to multiply the calling: those who read it felt the urge to also say "here I am."
The Stahls are called foundational to South American Adventism for a reason. Much of the way the Church serves on this continent, uniting education, health and faith, has its root in what that couple planted in Platería and in the forest. You, Brazilian Pathfinder, are part of that same tree.
That is why their story is not just a lesson about the past. It is an invitation. You do not need to cross oceans or climb mountains. Your Titicaca may be the isolated classmate at school. Your Amazon may be the shelter your Club visits. The calling is the same. The answer can be too: here I am, send me.