INTRODUCING JORGE SALAZAR
LA PAZ, BAJA CALIFORNIA SUR, MEXICO
2026 GRANTEE
ALEX STEDDOM INTERNATIONAL STUDENT FUND
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
My name is Jorge Salazar. I am an international student from Mexico with a burning desire for pastoral ministry. Having grown up in a pastoral/missionary home, I was able to see what ministry life looked like from a very intimate perspective—especially as my dad planted a church, began training pastors and leaders in persecuted countries (and continues to do so), and my mom worked as a Biblical counselor. As I grew into my teenage years and served in different areas in our church plant, being a pastor and working in ministry was the last thing I wanted to do with my life. Yet, the life of the mind (i.e., philosophy and theology) has always been particularly appealing to me. Thus, when I found out about Bethlehem College, I applied and waited on the Lord for a miracle. Although I had been working as an English teacher for a few years and saving all of my pay, this would be far from what I needed for a 4-year Bachelor of Arts. program abroad. Right in the midst of COVID and the political turmoil of 2020, however, the Lord provided for all the visas, permits, and the financial needs for the first year—even despite the limitations of international students who cannot work more than 20 hours a week, earning minimum wage, and only on-campus jobs. On top of this, Bethlehem was able to grant me a scholarship that covered the tuition for my B.A. degree.
Two weeks after my freshman year, my fiancée Alondra—whom I met serving at the VBS of our church plant back in Mexico—flew from our hometown in La Paz, and we got married. It was a small wedding and an even smaller reception! Without a penny to our name, my wife and I trusted in the Lord and dove into my sophomore year, soon to realize we were also expecting our first son! The Lord again provided for our needs, and our baby boy Matteo was born two weeks before our first anniversary and a week before finishing sophomore year. During the rest of my time at Bethlehem I was quickly enamored by the academic life and thrived therein. The Lord continued to provide for us as I finished my B.A., saw our second baby (Annette) come into the world, and finished an accelerated Master of Arts in theology at Bethlehem in 2025. Throughout those five years my wife and I served in our local church by doing live translation work (we are both fluent in Spanish and English), serving in the children’s ministry, playing music with the worship team, bagel pick-up ministry, serving in the youth ministry, and hosting our small group.
Once I was finished with school, the U.S. government issued us a 1-year work permit whereby I was allowed to work in a field related to my degree. Thus, my family and I were able to move to Austin, TX to work at a public charter classical K-12 school where I have been very enthusiastically teaching Latin, History, and the humanities for the past year. We were immediately plugged into a like-minded church as the one we attended in Minneapolis. Here my wife thrived starting her own ministry with the ladies from our church. I began attending a Bible study group, began a book club reading one of the church fathers, and formed part of the softball team! Yet, as my wife and I served our church and as I taught these young students at my workplace, my love for my brothers and sisters in the church and a burning desire to pursue pastoral ministry began to grow, and so, my wife and I prayed.
Spiritual Maturity and Depth
My father, a missionary and pastor (now in Canada) encouraged me to apply for pastoral positions at his church and other churches in the vicinity where they live—there is an incredible need for trained pastors in secular Canada. Having two degrees from Bethlehem in theology, he feels confident that there would be many churches who would hire me in a heartbeat! Nevertheless, as I told him, my pastors, and mentors, I know myself to still lack the spiritual maturity and depth to begin pastoral ministry. Thus, I applied to Bethlehem Theological Seminary and, by the Lord’s grace, they accepted my application. And so, my wife and I prayed again.
My wife and I became convinced that ministerially, going back to Bethlehem would be of far greater benefit for pastoral training. The reasons were simple: I desire deeper, intimate, and more intentional pastoral training, as opposed to mere academics. Naturally, while Bethlehem offers both, their solid pastoral apprenticeship program was especially attractive to me. I could undertake this apprenticeship under my pastor from Richfield Bible Church—a church that already knows and loves us! In fact, when I told Pastor Bryan we were considering going back to Bethlehem, he was thrilled and eager to mentor me in the apprenticeship program. This is especially is why I want to go to seminary—to grow in spiritual maturity and depth under a pastor who I admire and highly respect as a Godly man, and who already knows me and can invest into my soul to prepare me for ministry within a church that already knows us, and whom my wife and I can continue to serve from day 1.
To summarize the reason for going to Bethlehem in a sentence it would be: To deepen my love for Christ and his Word so that I may serve his Church in helping her to love Christ and his Word. Or, using Bethlehem’s motto: to spread a passion for the supremacy of God in all things for the joy of all peoples through Jesus Christ. I want to go to seminary to grow this passion in my own soul so that I can then spread this passion for the joy of all peoples. Or, infinitely better, the Holy Scriptures themselves when they say, “You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also” (2 Tim. 2:1–2), and “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15). Oh, how much I desire this!
After seminary, I hope to become a pastor of a local church for the rest of my life, serving my fellow saints until the Lord calls me home. I do not know whether God will call my family and me back to Mexico, up to Canada, to remain in the US, or send us abroad. Regardless of where he sends us, I desire to pastor a church, remain there, and serve global missions therein.
God Given Goals
Having been raised in a missionary household, the Lord has placed a special need for missions in my heart. I know God is the God of his Church—and his Church is not just local, it’s Global! Thus, wherever the Lord sends us, I know that with his help we will serve his Global ministry by investing in missions in at least these three ways:
First, I pray He will allow me to work with my father and the Canadian organization he works for called WorldServe Bible College. This is a Bible school similar to Training Leaders International. Their professors and pastors take their curriculum (i.e., the Bible College) to places where pastoral training is impossible due to persecution or lack of resources (e.g., China, Cuba, Vietnam, Myanmar, Ethiopia, Latin America). There they offer theological education to pastors and church leaders, equipping them to then take the curriculum and teach others to do so in their hometowns. I hope to pastor a church that will partner with them in contributing to their ministry prayerfully, financially, and actively sending pastors/teachers/volunteers to help in their mission (me included!).
Second, I hope to pastor a church that will recognize the necessity of Christ’s mandate for missions and will send out missionaries from our own assembly; a church that will not only know the Great Commission in Matthew 28, but will actively contribute to this end even by going themselves, and plant sister churches!
Third, I pray that the Lord will place me in a church that can partner with churches around the world to edify and be edified by prayer, theological investment, and training. I especially see the need for this in my hometown in Mexico where doctrinally solid churches are virtually nonexistent.
These are the three God-given goals I plan to undertake, with the power and guidance of the Holy Spirit, wherever it is the Lord sends us.
The Immediate Future
And so, as my high school teaching days draw to a close for the present, my family and I now turn to you, our brothers and sisters, the Church of Christ. This same Church in which we seek to invest our few and numbered days we open-handedly invite to partner and invest in us as we pack our few belongings.
For the time being, Bethlehem is doing everything possible to hire me part-time as a librarian assistant or custodian (as they did during all the years I studied there). However, our situation is complicated because, according to the legal limit for international students, I am only allowed to work 20 hours per week on campus, and my wife is unable to work at all due to immigration laws.
Our need is approximately $1,750 per month for the duration of my program (2 years) to support my family—my beloved wife Alondra, Matteo our 3-year-old son, Annette our one-and-a-half-year-old daughter, and our soon-to-be-born baby.
We trust in the Lord’s provision for our lives in this new stage of our walk with him, as he has always faithfully provided. I want to invite you to support us through the Alex Steddom International Student Fund and to continue praying and interceding for us: that God would provide all the necessary immigration documents, that He would provide for our travel expenses this summer, that He would provide for the medical expenses for the arrival of our third child, that He would strengthen us to trust and rest in Him so that we may experience his peace, and that his name would be glorified in everything that he does through this small but growing family.
God bless you,
Jorge Salazar, M.A. ’25
1st-Year Seminarian