Panamanian Daniel Dorati came to faith in Christ as a young teen. Daniel explained, “My mother was converted after attending the kindergarten graduation of my younger siblings at a Baptist church in Chilbre, Panama. Mom took all six children to church with her.” As a result, Daniel accepted Christ as Savior in 1966.
The Dorati family moved to Panama City a year later. Their pastor recommended they attend the Free Will Baptist church in their new city. There they met missionary pastor Tom Willey, Jr. “Pastor Tomás had a great impact on my life,” Daniel stated. “I owe much of my spiritual growth to his influence.” As a teen and young adult, Daniel assisted Tom Willey, and later Pastor Gabriel Pérez, in evangelizing the communities of Cañita and Buenos Aires. He was also active in the First Church as a leader among the youth.
Steve and Judy Lytle arrived as missionaries in Panama in 1977. They planted the Bethania Church (Iglesia Bautista Libre de Bethania). As they prepared for stateside assignment — only one year after the church organized with 73 charter members and three deacons — Steve, Judy, and the church prayed about who should fill in during their absence. God placed Daniel on their hearts.
Though Daniel had never served as a lead pastor, he was a seasoned evangelist with a pastor’s heart. He had passion, patience, and people skills. After much prayer, Daniel accepted.
Upon the Lytles’ return to Panama, a season of transition, adaptation, mentoring, and growth began. Steve and Daniel worked together over the next decade, and Steve became Daniel’s associate pastor in 1992. Under their leadership, a missionary vision and outreach characterized the Bethania congregation. Over the years, Pastor Daniel led the church to begin or assist in more than a half dozen preaching points or church plants. They conducted medical outreach in underprivileged communities. They began an annual missions conference enabling the church to spread the gospel by giving, praying, and going, both in Panama and to the ends of the earth.
That first mission conference took place during Panama’s crisis years of 1987-89 under the dictatorship of Manuel Antonio Noriega. At the time, many people were unemployed. Yet church members responded with faith promises totaling more than a thousand dollars a month and sent an evangelistic and discipleship team into a nearby community to share the gospel. The congregation offered an inspiring example of bold faith and obedience. Additionally, the church met its monthly mortgage payment and other obligations.
Pastor Daniel mentored several young men in much the same way he himself had been discipled, mentored, and sent out by Tom Willey and Gabriel Pérez. Edwin Escudero is one of those young men. Edwin testifies, “Some friends invited me to a teen camp in February 2008 where I learned my first Bible verse. It was 1 John 2:17: ’And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.’” Edwin accepted Christ as his Savior and almost immediately felt God’s peace.
He recalls, “I knew God had done something in my life. I asked for forgiveness, and my sins were forgiven (Isaiah 43:25).” Edwin grew in his relationship with the Lord under Pastor Daniel. Edwin describes Pastor Daniel as “one of the key pieces to help me keep growing as a disciple of Christ. His counsel, his prayers, and his rebukes helped mold my character.”
Daniel acknowledges, “I gave him counsel, and perhaps most importantly, helped him understand our failures aren’t forever, but the school God places us in so we will grow.”
Edwin enrolled at Chame Seminary (2011-2013) and came more directly under Steve and Judy’s leadership and influence. Edwin is convinced the years at Chame helped him learn not only more of the Word, but also how to become a better child of God. As the seminary requires of all students, Edwin served in a local church every weekend, gaining ministry experience. He delivered chapel devotions when it was his turn. Each afternoon he worked hard (along with the other students), keeping the facility clean and repaired. These responsibilities came in addition to daily classes and homework. Over those three years, the Lytles saw Edwin grow and mature both emotionally and spiritually. After graduation, he began to build a ministry résumé.
Edwin married Jenifer Pérez on February 22, 2015. Both grew up within a few blocks of the Bethania church. Edwin and Jenifer began dating when she turned 18 and Edwin was 22. Three years later they married. Edwin attended the Bethania Church, helping Daniel and being mentored by him. He later pastored First Church in Panama City (Parque Lefevre) for a short time. In many ways, this was a discouraging time for this young man who had never pastored, working in the oldest Free Will Baptist church in Panama. Later, he served part-time as an interim pastor in the Buenos Aires community where Jenifer’s relatives lived. Through those years, his heart yearned to return to full-time ministry. Then God opened the door.
IM’s director of global partnerships, Kenneth Eagleton, put Edwin in contact with Bright Hill Collective Foundation, previously known as Ship International, in El Salvador.
(This organization is one of IM’s partners.) What began as an orphanage became a school with more than one hundred students enrolled. Recognized by the Ministry of Education, costs are underwritten by donations (scholarships), with parents paying only a small monthly fee.
“We had never boarded an airplane or visited another country,” Edwin said. “After a week’s visit, we felt like we had returned to a place we knew, just hadn’t visited in a long time.”
Edwin and his wife Jenifer are now missionaries in El Salvador, sent by the Panamanian Association of Free Will Baptists. Working as missionary pastors, they hold weekly services and Bible studies. The Escuderos provide evangelism, counseling, and discipleship to school children and their families. Edwin requests prayer for their ministry, asking God to give grace and wisdom.
Over the course of more than fifty years, God has faithfully called, led, and empowered Free Will Baptists (Bautistas Libres) to accomplish His Kingdom work in the United States, Panama, and now El Salvador. Panama has matured from a mission field to a partner in the Great Commission.
Because of gifts to missionaries, Panama, and the WMO, the Escuderos are well prepared to take the gospel to children and their families in El Salvador. It’s about the gospel!
About the Writer: Steve Lytle and his wife Judy served more than three decades as missionaries to Panama. Steve later accepted a role as administrator and professor at the Free Will Baptist seminary in Chame before returning stateside to serve in the IM office.
