THEY COME TO FIX THEIR SHOES AND GET THEIR LIVES FIXED AS WELL

It’s another day in Zapala, a small town in the Neuquen province in the South-West of Argentina. A dry wind is blowing; everyone is looking for a shelter from the sun. You would think that a desert is something that doesn’t have much life in it, a place where you have to fight for your existence, thinking firstly of yourself and only then of those around you. All though sometimes this is true, Juan Alberto Azocas is someone who has been going against the stream, proving that love overcomes all wrongs and hope heals the brokenness. For the Zapala community, he is not only their shoemaker, but also the one who has brought lots of life, hope and joy to the people around him.

Everyone who enters the shoeshop get
greeted with a warm smile and kindness.

“My shoemaker shop is a talent I have been entrusted to take care of, just like in that story in the Bible, but for me it means something more than just doing my best with repairing the shoes,” says Alberto, with a bright smile on his face and a large apron around his waist. The sixty-two year old man looks more like a counselor or a teacher than a shoemaker. “For me, it goes together with the gift of serving people, doing everything I can to help them. I don’t worry about the money – I believe that if you do your job well, the money will come.”
Though he indeed does his job with an excellence, in Alberto’s world, helping people doesn’t mean just fixing their shoes. It means doing whatever he can to bring back joy and peace into their lives – praying for a couple who cannot have a children, helping a woman who has been beaten up by her husband, bringing a lost soul to a church or just lending a listening ear to someone who is going through a hard time. For Alberto, people are more than just clients, and his shoemaker workshop is more than just a workplace. “Many of the people who first came to me to fix their shoes, now are like children to me,” he says. With many of them he has stayed in touch, and they keep coming back for a chat, prayer or a piece of advice.

This policeman and his wife weren't able to have children for many years,
he came into the shoeshop one day and got to know God through Juan Alberto, and was prayed for.
They now have a beautiful one year old daugther.

Though so beloved by his community, Alberto was not born in Zapala. He came to Argentina more than 30 years ago, leaving behind his life in Chile and following God’s calling, helping to start a church in Argentina. After serving the first years as a pastor, because the church didn’t have one, Alberto decided to leave his ministry to some one else. That left more time not only to focus on shoemaking, but also create relationships with people, which has been more than rewarding. “There was a woman, a schoolmaster, who we prayed for after she kicked us out of her school, because we wanted to hand out New Testaments to the school kids,” he shares one of the stories. “After four years, she came into my shoemaker shop saying that the Bible she received from her friend, who got it from me, saved her from committing suicide. The woman hugged me, saying she would like us to give out the New Testaments in her school.”

Juan Alberto proudly shows his Gideon card.
As an active member of the organization he gladly gives out the New Testament to all that want one.

Alberto has tons and tons of stories like that. About his mom who was healed from a serious heart disease. About teenagers who stopped using drugs. About people who have gotten out of depression and started a new life. And that is not all. There are more to come, little pieces of miracles walking in and out of his shop while he greets everyone with a smile and an encouraging word from the Bible or his own wisdom. The people of Zapala keep coming to Alberto’s shop, leaving not only with their shoes repaired but lives mended as well.