“I make drawings and cards to invite my friends to church activities, I am sure that God gave me this special gift, and I am using it for service and his work,” says Dámaris Paredes, a 13-year-old teenager and member at the North Ventanas Seventh-day Adventist Church in Ventanas, Ecuador.

During the delivery of the missionary book, The Great Controversy, Paredes prepared personalized cards for a dedication and invitation to her friends to attend her church's programming during Easter week. They, moved by Paredes' invitation, accepted, and became interested in studying the Bible as a result.

Paredes recognizes the need that exists for the preaching of the gospel, and gives special credit to her parents for the support and drive to seek out more teenagers so that they can know about God. She also expressed appreciation for them reinforcing her spiritual life and relationship with God.

“My parents help me a lot. They accompany me on visits, they teach me how to approach someone, and how to give Bible studies; they dedicate special time to me, and I discovered how important it is to give my gifts to Christ, and that's why I started drawing messages from Jesus and sharing them, I even created a page, Adventist Online Gallery, to publish them, and my friends really like it." she says.

Paredes is a leader of her teen small group who is recruiting more people to open a Bible class with her youth teacher. She currently has six people she visits and teaches about Jesus.

“I want to serve God because the sacrifice He made impacted me, and I need people to know that they have that value and that they have already paid a high price for them. God loves human beings and everyone should know it; My parents have instructed me to serve Christ, and they are very involved with my salvation, and I feel the same way, with the task of preaching the love of God to more people,” says the teenager.

Just like her, several teenagers from the south of the country are committed to the Church's mission, speaking, preaching, participating, and working with love and encouragement, through the method of Christ, making friends and caring for them.