A new tribe in South America has yet to hear the Gospel.

Venezuela (MNN) — Go into the world and preach the Gospel. That’s the goal of all believers. Share the Good News with those who have not heard. That’s exactly what’s happening in South America.

While many South American Christians are looking into cross cultural missions, there’s at least one tribe that’s never heard the Gospel before. But, that’s going to change.

Greg Sanford is with New Tribes Mission . Sanford just returned from Venezuela where two couples are breaking new ground with a tribe called the Yanoma (YAH-no-mah). “Through a number of circumstances we’re able to be invited into one of the villages of the Yonoma people. And so, we have two young missionary couples living in tents right now trying to build an air strip to be able to start to live among the Yanoma people and start (trying) to learn the Yanoma language.”

Sanford finds it amazing there is still a group of people that have never heard the Gospel message. “We’re pretty excited about that as we think of the year 2003. We’re celebrating Christmas. Remembering again the birth of the Savior and yet the Yanoma people still haven’t even heard for the first time.”

It’s unclear how large the population is, but Sanford says, “We’ve only been in there a very, very short time, but we figure they number 1,000 to 2,000. They live in make-shift shacks. They have nothing from the outside world.”

Funding is needed to help establish an airstrip and build housing for the two couples living there. Pray too that these missionaries will be able to learn the language so that they can share the Gospel quickly.