This past week I went on a mission trip with twenty other people from The Crossroads and a couple of other churches. This was somewhere in the neighborhood of my 13th or 14th Mexico Mission Trip, but this was honestly the best one yet.
I first began traveling to Mexico several years ago as I took trips to Ciudad Juarez, a city directly across the border from El Paso, TX, in the Chihuahuan desert. That initial experience really developed in me a passion for international missions and for connecting others in mission. Nothing I have ever experienced as a pastor causes greater growth in people's lives than participating in an international mission trip. As a result, missions is a central piece in the vision of The Crossroads. We believe that the church has a responsibility to the ends of the earth, not just paid missionaries, and that every Christian needs to be engaged on mission in some capacity. Our Mexico trips are the first piece of that puzzle. They enable people to get a first exposure to international missions and are a training ground for future mission endeavors.
A couple of years ago, the intense violence resulting from warring drug cartels seeking to gain control of Juarez forced us to seek another mission opportunity. We connected with the First Baptist Church of Brownsville, TX, and began doing some mission work outside of Matamoros in a small fishing village called Las Higuerillas.
This year, however, we felt it was time to go further into the interior of Mexico. This area is known as the Heart of Darkness and is home to a number of unreached people groups. So, we traveled to Tula, Tamaulipas, MX, working with Pastor Nemias Ruiz Tadeo, who serves as a missionary/church planting pastor. We had quite a bit of difficulty getting into Mexico (the Mexican authorities didn't like the wording on some of our paperwork), so we were delayed an entire day getting to Mexico.
During our week there, Pastor Ruiz took us to the village of San Francisco, a small community in the Sierra Madre. It is only 36 miles from Tula, but it is so remote and the roads are so difficult that it took us nearly two hours each day to get there. The remoteness of the village only made it that much more exciting for our group. In fact, we intentionally chose the village because of its remoteness. Our people are so pumped about taking the gospel to the ends of the earth.
San Francisco is the southernmost village in Tula province in Tamaulipas. It is literally at the end of the road, and it is the last village in the Sierra Madre. It is located at the base of a mountain that is roughly 11,000 ft. high. It is in tropical forests, and there is a mountain river that runs just next to the village. It is honestly one of the most beautiful places I have ever been in my life. The people of the village earn a meager existence raising cattle, corn, and sugar cane in the rich, but rocky and steep, mountain soil.
Our first day, we were late getting to the village because we had lots to do before we headed out. The pastor of the tiny mission in the village was so concerned that he drove halfway back down the mountain to come find us. When we arrived, we did an abbreviated Vacation Bible School and held evangelistic services. Five people gave their lives to Christ. As I shared with the people some of the difficulties we had getting their and our determination to come, they raised a loud cheer, certainly one of the better receptions we have ever had.
I found out the next day why they were so excited. After lunch I did some discipleship with the church/village leaders. Afterward, with tears rolling down their faces, they thanked me over and over for coming to their village. They shared that they had been praying and praying for someone to come help them spread the gospel to their village and to neighboring villages. Come to find out, we were the first Americans who had ever been to their village. One of the men, completely broken, expressed his gratitude for our coming, and how his son who recently was lost, had been found. In gratitude, he said he was going to kill a calf and hold a barbecue in our honor. A cheer went up from the other men. I had to go outside and weep because I was so humbled by the beauty of it all.
There's lots more I could share, like kids whose lives were transformed, more people who gave their lives to Christ, getting to do some swimming and cliff diving in a mountain river, helping the men with slaughtering and butchering the calf, and the incredible beauty of our women serving the women who cooked for us all week by washing their feet (another weeping moment). However, I'll just close by saying that God has given us an incredible opportunity with this village. We are able to get in on the beginning point of doing missions here, and hope to continue our relationship with these people. Please pray with me for our continuing relationship and for the beautiful people of San Francisco.
