Our First Missions Team

Is it legitimate to call one person a team? If so,we had our first "team" come down to help out in some of the areas we are getting involved in. Three months ago, Scott, from Grace Bible Fellowship, our church plant in CA, felt led to come here and do "something". He came for nine working days at the beginning of July, and each one was filled with more than enough work. We did take a little time here and there just to chill out a bit, for example, on his last day we took a walk through our village of Ajijic.

We arranged for Scott to help out in clearing land for our new church building in Ixtlahuacan, to work in the boy's home, work in the "casita" for missions interns, work in our missionary friends' house and to visit inmates at a local prison. (Casita for "gringos" is a small house on the property of a larger house). The photos show the work that was being done. Obviously we couldn't take pictures inside the prison.

We began by visiting the property to be cleared for our new church building. There were some more membrillo tree stumps that needed to be dug out, which we did. In the mud. Then we went to the house that will be the new boy's home within the next month. Clearly this is the one God wants for them since it is ready for the boys to move in to, doesn't require renovation, and the boys have already been removed from the main orphanage so they NEED a place right now. Since the paperwork still needs to be completed for the acquisition of the property we couldn't work in the house itself. But we took measurements for storage units or "cubbies" for the boys, designed the cubbies and then purchased the materials to build them. We will build the cubbies at a later date once the paperwork is complete. There are some pictures of the new boy's home and one of us eating lunch with nine of the boys. "Mario" is a real sweetheart. Imagine him being out on the street because there is no home for him? After not seeing Nancy for over a week he remembered her name - how touching is that?

While we were at the Ixtlahuacan church property we learned of a new church starting, the first all-Spanish evangelical church in our village of Ajijic. The story surrounding the Mexican who is beginning this church is very interesting. The building is an old restaurant that sorely needed painting. So Scott and Walt went the next day to help our Mexican friend, Enrique, paint the church. It was quite a challenge but we completed the job.

Enrique also asked if Scott would mind coming to a local prison and speaking to inmates. Enrique said he would translate for Scott. About forty prisoners showed up, six of whom were women. Scott did a commendable job sharing his own life and testimony and the inmates really connected with him. It was very touching to have almost every male inmate give each of us a true Mexican hug as they were leaving. It was very moving to see them listen attentively to what was being said, and to see many of them using their Bibles.

The casita we worked on is on the property of a house our missionary friends are renting that is being used for short term missions teams coming to work this summer. The casita, which will house 2 interns, was basically a one room building with a bare and filthy concrete floor, a raw concrete kitchen counter with a dilapidated old sink, a rusted front door, rotting bathroom door frame, a rough wood bathroom door and a kitchen cabinet that was bare plywood that had turned black over the years. In other words, barely livable. It had been vacant for many years. We swept and power-washed it several weeks ago, but it still needed work. So Scott, a master tile layer, put in a mosaic kitchen counter and both Walt and Scott painted the floor, doors, door frames and kitchen cabinet. After completion they both said they could easily live in it. It now is a jewel of a place and the interns, two young ladies, moved right in and love it.

Our missionary friends are renting a house that, in true village style, has windows at the two ends of the house and none in between. So the house tends to be rather dark. This is compounded by the fact that the house interior was painted a dark green. For starters, Scott and Walt painted the ceiling white so that it would brighten the house up a bit. The walls will be painted a lighter color at a later date - Scott, are you coming back to help?

During Scott's stay we experienced the worst rain in our year here. It actually rained during the day! All the arroyos were running full tilt. When water rushes down the arroyos it brings a lot of debris and rocks with it. Anything that catches the debris creates a dam. We have one way to get out of our development and three arroyos merge at the entrance and go through a small gate that became a dam. As Scott and Walt were heading out to work they were stopped because of flooding. But that was soon taken care of the Mexican way - just rip out what is causing the problem. Instead of unlocking the gate and opening it, which they probably couldn't do, they merely drove up with the tractor and ripped the whole gate out. Problem solved!! This was all an exciting time and we had fun. Even with the gate removed, we couldn't walk out of our development for several days because of the water.

When the arroyos run full of water like they did, that means the waterfalls near to our home are running too. So we took an afternoon to go up to the falls to see what they looked like. The challenge was that the pathway and the main river coming down crossed many times. So we had to wade through thigh deep water several times. But when we got to the falls, it was more than worth it. So, while we weren't actually schlepping through the raging jungle rivers to reach people or our house, we were schlepping to see God's beautiful creation in the way of the waterfalls. Worth the whole schlepping experience.

While Scott was here we wanted him to experience a little more of our life in this area. When we went to Guadalajara to get the materials for the boy's home, we took him to Tonala, a special artisan village. We took him of a tour of our village, Ajijic, and on the day of the weekly street market let him experience that as well.

All in all, Scott had a well-rounded and busy time with us. If any one else feels "led" to do something useful for mankind and especially for God's Kingdom, drop us a line!! You will be working hard but be treated like royalty. If you ask Scott you will find that his time was extremely rewarding. He left here a happy camper. As we said after we dropped him off at the airport "he is hooked - hook, line and sinker".