By Grahame and Patty Scarratt / CMS Missionaries to Chile (1980-2010)
It all happened by accident—or did it?
In 1980, our family moved from Kiama NSW to Temuco in southern Chile to work in Bible teaching with the indigenous people of the area: the Mapuches. A Bible training course already existed, but we took some Preliminary Theological Certificate (PTC) notes with us in case they came in handy. PTC was never far from our minds as Grahame had been involved with Impact Books and Moore College External Studies while studying at Moore (1963-1966), and he had taught PTC in Kiama for 12 years.
In 1982, a young Chilean by the name of Enrique Lago was sent from Santiago to train with us. Enrique was about to finish the basic Bible training course and was looking for further studies. We showed him the PTC notes and he chose to use them for training. In 1983, we had some courses translated into Spanish for this class of one, but soon after, a few more people joined us. Moore College approved our use of PTC in 1984, after which more courses were translated. PTC then spread more widely throughout Chile for ministry training, enrolments growing steadily until our return to Australia for our children’s education in 1987.
We returned to Chile at the beginning of 1993, but not to Temuco: we went to Viña del Mar in the centre of Chile to work in theological education for the whole country. We arranged for the translation of all the PTC courses into Spanish, and large numbers of Chileans of all ages started studying the Scriptures. By 1997, in our church of about 200 members, about half were studying PTC. And it didn’t stop there.
Around 1999, at the annual pastors’ conference in Santiago, a deaconess from Buenos Aires in Argentina who knew of Moore College requested to study PTC in Spanish. We agreed, but due to the cost, we sent the courses digitally via email. What followed was a series of requests from different countries—Mexico, USA (Fort Worth), Bolivia, Cuba, Guatemala and Spain. Thus MOCLAM (which used to stand for “Moore College in Latin America”) was established around the turn of the century. Then in 2008, after a chance meeting, the General Secretary of IFES (International Fellowship of Evangelical Students) in Latin America invited us to Panama to attend a meeting of the Latin American IFES leaders. That opened opportunities for MOCLAM to spread across the entire continent.
It’s amazing what happens by chance—or is it? Our God is sovereign and organises circumstances according to his purposes. He used us as his servants in that particular time and place to serve the Latin American church. Using PTC and establishing MOCLAM was his project, not ours.
Grahame Scarratt graduated from Moore College in 1966.
