Former HCJB World Radio missionary Rev. Rodrigo Zapata was remembered as a scholar, pastor and friend by those at a memorial service Tuesday, Nov. 22, at the church where he had pastored in his native Ecuador.

A small group gathered in the Iáaquito Evangelical Church in Quito to remember Zapata, his ministry and his marriage to Mercedes, his wife of 43 years. He died Sept. 15 in California at the age of 67.

Born on Oct. 12, 1937, Zapata earned an engineering degree in Guayaquil, Ecuador. He studied the Bible after meeting an Ecuadorian carpenter who challenged him to do so, and in the early 1960s prayed with an HCJB World Radio chaplain to receive Jesus Christ as Savior.

Zapata and his wife began attending the Iáaquito Evangelical Church, across from Radio Station HCJB's studios in Quito, and soon he began pastoring there. He later received a theology degree at Seminario Bíblico in San José, Costa Rica. Pastoring in Zapote, Costa Rica, he became known as "Zapata de Zapote."

At HCJB World Radio in Quito, where he served as a missionary from 1980 until 1993, Zapata was the first dean of the mission's Christian Center of Communications. He also helped with a biblical literacy radio program and wrote and produced radio programs with Mercedes. He began his work with HCJB World Radio as an employee in the Radio Circle, a ministry in which the mission built simple fix-tuned radios for Ecuadorians who couldn't afford commercial receivers.

Zapata faced tough scrutiny in Ecuador for his views on liberation theology which were not popular with fellow missionaries or many Ecuadorian pastors. His concepts were published in such books as Human Rights Are Biblical and Theology of Liberation: Its Roots, Development and Challenges.

He led such groups as the Inter-American Broadcasters based in Costa Rica and the Ecuadorian Evangelical Fraternity. Estuardo López, who now heads the latter group, remembered Zapata's self-sacrifice to disciple younger Christians, including himself.

Later in the U.S., Zapata taught at the Hispanic Bible School of Chicago. Then in California, toward the end of his career, he and Mercedes were both named pastors with the Church of the Brethren. District Director Bryan Boyer helped evaluate Zapata who was "so thorough in his answers that the committee recommended full ordination be granted to the Church of the Brethren-something that is not often offered to persons from other denominations."

Zapata is survived by his wife, Mercedes, three children, Richard, Hito and Rocío, and eight grandchildren.

Source: HCJB World Radio