Mexico Missions

Wow! What an amazing trip! First of all I want to thank you for your prayers and support during our preparation and trip. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective – I could feel the power of your prayers during our stay in Mexico. Words will never be able to express how awesome this trip was, but I will do my best to summarize the events and happenings in less than a day’s read!

We headed off early Tuesday morning for a 6 hour flight to Mexico City, a 2 hour layover, and an hour flight to Hualtuco. There were 14 of us all together – 8 students and 6 leaders (8 girls and 6 guys). We were picked up by the Pastors we would be working with along with another worker from Roca Blanca Mission. We then began our ~ 4 hour drive to Nopala – our main location for the week. The roads in Mexico are absolutely ridiculous. After every corner is another corner. The word “straight” does not exist in their vocabulary. And if anyone ever complains about potholes or speed bumps (topés!) again, I think I might have to knock them one. Nonetheless, we were so tired we were able to sleep some on this trip.

We arrived late in Nopala to a cute hotel and promptly went to bed as we began our ministering the next morning. We were woken up at 6:30 am by a loud loud-speaker directly outside of our hotel window announcing events going on in the town (en Espanol obviously). They don’t have newspapers so this is how they tell everyone about........well, everything. No need for an alarm clock in Mexico! Every morning we began with an hour of personal devotions, using a Missions Devotion book by Wes Merta. We would then all get together with the Pastors as well as our two drivers and translators for an hour or so of team devotions, praise and worship. I thoroughly enjoyed these times. I could feel God moving in my life and challenging me to do more. I think we could be so much more effective in our every day lives here if we spent this much time with God every single morning.

We spent the morning unpacking the 14 large suitcases of donations we brought with us into smaller bags. Giving a toy and candy to all the children we went to see – about 1000 in total!! Praise God. We rented a taxi (aka. a pick-up truck with benches in the back seat) and began our ascent to our first mountain village. Two male leaders rode on the back bumper hanging on to a rope as there was not enough room for them in the back. The mountain roads go literally straight up for 2 hours non-stop! God has created some gorgeous landscapes, which I don’t think he intended for vehicles! We had 80 - 90 children come to our first children’s event, with 90% of them accepting Christ into their hearts for the first time! PTL! We then attended the church service in this village and prayed with the people afterwards – having our prayers translated into Chatino or Spanish. It is so neat to see the simplicity of these people’s lives. I am almost jealous of them and wish I could be so content with what I have and not constantly want things to be bigger, better, and faster.

The next day, after devotions and breakfast, we packed all ~20 of us into two suburban’s and a jeep. About half way to Carrizal, Danbi’s suburban overheated as it is not made to carry 10 people up a steep hill in 35 degree (Celsius) weather. Thus, we crammed 14 people into one 7-seater suburban and about 10 in the jeep. The two male leaders rode on the back of the suburban this time. We had 20-30 children come to this event as the town is very small. We had a lot of fun playing with these children. Our events usually consisted of us playing with the children to start off, making balloon animals and painting faces, then playing some relay race type games with them. Then we would perform 2-4 dramas and talk about them (being translated), present some testimonies, and have an altar call afterwards. The students were in charge of doing most of this with the leaders guiding them.

We headed to our second village of the day, Cerro del Aire, and the children swarmed us almost before we could get out of the vehicles. Unlike the previous village, the VCS mission team had been to this village before so the children knew “white people meant fun and toys!”. Once again we had an awesome turnout and a lot of fun, and were able to spread the gospel once again. Mexico is about 95% Catholic, but not American or Canadian Catholic. Their Catholicism is almost cultish with shrines set up for different saints. Many of them don’t even know who Jesus is.

The next day was awesome. We went to Antontilco, where the team had been before, and had 80 – 90 children come out for the event. We had more difficulty with vehicles – Satan’s attempted, yet failed trap – so were 3 hours late arriving to the second village of the day, Tiltepec. The roads in Tiltepec are about 50-70 degrees steep – with no exaggeration. We didn’t really know what to expect as we were so late and it was getting dark out. But God is so awesome and mighty. We had 234 children come to the event, along with many parents!!!!! We actually ran out of room and had to enforce crowd control the whole night as all the children wanted to get closer to the action and the white people. In order to keep the kids under control we performed all of the dramas we had! So exciting to see the doors God is opening through our mission team in Mexico for the Pastor’s to continue their work there. We still had about 12 people in the suburban and 8 in the jeep for the way home. Let’s just say our team became more “unified”!

Day 4 was also very exciting. We stayed in Nopala this time (rather than driving to a mountain village) and held a children’s event at a local high school. We played an amazing game of soccer with the youth and then did our games, dramas, and testimonies for the 30 – 40 children that showed up. After a couple hours off, we went next door to our hotel preparing for the Youth Concert. A Spanish band from the Roca Blanca mission base set up on an awesome stage for a concert. There were about 500 youth that showed up which is HUGE!!! There were even other parties and dances going on in the town, and they still chose to come to the “Christian concert”. The team and I danced and sang for a long time with a bunch of Mexicans just worshipping God. It was so awesome to be so free to worship God – and it wasn’t even in English!!! Definitely one of the highlights of the trip. After 10 songs, our team did the “Everything drama” – a powerful drama from Lifehouse (you can YouTube the original, but our team does a pretty amazing job as well!).

On Sunday, we had a more restful day hanging out and preparing food give-away bags for that night’s church service. We went to a church member’s backyard and set up for the service. There were at least twenty people new to the church who came because they had been at the concert the night before! Praise the Lord! We did a few dramas for the people then John preached the salvation message. During this time, the rest of the team took the children and held a mini-children’s service including a LOT of improv as we had no idea how much time we were dealing with. A good challenge for us.

At this point, our “ministering” was finished and we had no more children’s events to do. Thus, as a sort of reward orbreak, we drove to Roca Blanca Monday morning. Paradise!! This mission base is like a resort with no tourists! We had the most gorgeous rooms in their guest house and the views were astounding!!! I am still speechless when I think about it. The leaders took off to the beach shortly after we arrived and went body surfing in the Pacific Ocean – and how nice and warm it was! We chased crabs along the shore and found a bunch of dead blowfish and pelicans on the way back. The whole team had a bonfire on the beach that night under a huge expanse of clear sky and bright stars. It was so nice not having streetlights blocking out the stars. The water was crashing into the shore sounding like thunder.

The next day was our last day in Mexico that wasn’t traveling. After a devotion time of watching the sun rise over the ocean, and an amazing worship time with the students of the Roca Blanca bible college, we drove to Puerto Escondido and went to the beach. We went out on a boat to the middle of the ocean and hung out with a sea turtle – God had such imagination when creating creatures! We then jumped out of the boat and swam in the ocean for a while.

We then went in to Puerto Escondido, had a delicious lunch at an Italian/Mexican restaurant and spent a couple of hours shopping for souvenirs and gifts. That night, back at Roca, we gathered $500.00 to give to the Pastors. We then went outside to play a night game of soccer in the grass soccer field. The dew was heavy and we were slipping and sliding everywhere, but had oh so much fun. We woke up very early the next morning, drove 3 hours to Hualtuco, flew 1 hour to Mexico City, laid over for 3 hours, then flew home for 6 hours. I got home around midnight, unpacked and went to bed.

Some of the highlights or memories from this trip include learning the Spanish language. It sure can be frustrating when you just want to talk to the people and can’t, but was also funny when you know only one word “TOPE!” and use it excessively. It’s so funny to watch the Mexican people just stare at you because you’re white, and many of them rarely, if ever, see a white person. Especially one desperately trying to speak Spanish. A little boy, hung out at our meeting place a lot as his mom is one of the church members in Nopala. He was very cute, and would sing us Mexican songs. His longing for attention and love was so adorable, it captured our hearts.

I was really opened during this mission trip and feel that God has so much more planned for my life as long as I surrender it to him. I am so excited to see where it is God wants me to go – Alberta, Nova Scotia, Mexico, USA??? I am excited to go on another missions trip again! Thank you again for your prayers and support. All of the above would not have been possible without them. Just because I was the one that went on the missions trip, you were all a part of the team. Some go, some give, some pray.

Proverbs 19:21 – “Many are the plans of a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.”