Tlapa Thoughts

Last week I went to Tlapa, a town of 80,000 indigenous people with the HADIME students from MBmission's Matthew Training Centre.

The goal in the trip was to observe, serve, and learn. The way that this was to be accomplished was simple: live with the locals, and do what they do. 

I listened to 16 year olds talk about taking selfies in their ancient indigenous language. I played the ever-epic camp game "ninja" with some kids. I listened to a mother talk about her husband's tireless work to provide for the family. I watched SpongeBob SquarePants after school on a Tuesday afternoon. I watched as a worried mother took care of her baby with a stomach infection. I sat with a family mourning the loss of their father and friend. 

These are the simple every day things. This is what missions looks like. It's not so much saving the world as it is sitting with the world. Saving people is Jesus' work. Sometimes we're just called to sit, observe, serve, and learn. 

There is so much more that I could say of my experience of Tlapa. I was able to receive a glimpse of the rich cultures that are there. I was able to approach a culture that is totally different from the Latino culture in Guadalajara and see that everyone is human. I'm not an anthropologist. I can't tell you why people resort to illegal activities to provide for their families. I can't even begin to understand the funeral traditions of this culture. I don't know why we had a flat screen TV but no running water. What I can do is approach humbly, give up my biases, see another human as a human and respect that. I can see our mutual need for Christ as our Savour whether rich or poor. 

Please pray for me as my time interning is coming to a close! Only two more weeks and I'll be headed back to Canada! Pray that I would remain focused on the things I have left to accomplish in GDL. 

Pray for the team here as they continue to share God's love with the people they come into contact with every day.

 Funeral procession in Tlapa. Beautiful flowers were taken to the cemetery.* 

View from the cemetery*

 Views of Tlapa*

 Street views. 

 Gorgeous sunset 

Me and my host family. So blessed to have been able to stay and learn from them. 

*Photo Cred: Jen Schmidt

Change of Plans

There's been a change of plans.

At the beginning of February, I went to Ixtapa (on what was supposed to be a two week trip) to see what other missions looked like in Mexico. Upon arrival we met with Sid Reimer, a man who uses his vacation time in Mexico to help a school at a garbage dump. I moved in with my lovely billet family, Christian and Elsa, a pastoral couple in Ixtapa/ Zihuatanejo, and began to see what their ministry is all about. From them, I learned that ministry happens when we die to ourselves and offer our time, our families, and our lives to the One who saved our souls.

The first day we went to the school at the dump, I saw kids who, by comparison to me, have nothing. But I also saw a light in their eyes. And I think that light is Jesus. Where there is darkness, there is hope found in the eyes of children. Upon arrival we found out the main teacher, Olga, had gotten sick the night before and wouldn't be able to come to school for a couple days. Then we found out that she was in the hospital. Doctors told her that because of her health conditions, and the poor conditions at the dump, that it was too dangerous for her to ever go back and teach at the dump again. This left the school which usually has three teachers with only one, because the daughter of Olga, had to leave the school to take care of her Mom. A few doors opened, and I received the opportunity to stay at the school helping until March 10.

After I finished my two week stay with Christian and Elsa, I moved in with Cindy, the other missionary/teacher at the school. From her I've learned that leaving everything for the sake of the Kingdom is worth the sacrifice.

 I've been working at the school every day, helping teaching reading, writing, and math. School starts in the morning with breakfast at 8:00. After breakfast the elementary and high school students go to their classrooms and start their lessons. Recess is at 10:30-11:00 and we finish the day at noon with a Bible story.

I can't even explain how beautiful it's been.

It felt like waking up.

It hasn't been easy, but it's been important. I think the most important things in life are the hardest. Through this experience I've discovered that at our most basic level, all people are the same. We need to have a safe place where we can be loved. Which is really cliché, but it's really true.

We can have all the riches of the world, but if we don't have a safe place where we can go, and if we don't feel loved, we're going to feel a void. We need places where we don't have to live up to expectations. We need places where we can be ok with being ourselves.

Only Jesus is that safe place. Only Jesus is that love. Only Jesus fills that void.

At the end of the day, working at the school at the garbage dump is like working at any other school. Yeah, there might be a couple of different disciplinary issues because of the environmental circumstances that the students grow up in, but the remedy is the same: love and safety.

At first I thought I could love these kids by asking myself "How would I love this person if they were Jesus?"

And that's all happy sunshine and rainbows until you have to pry kids off the wall.

On my own I don't even have the capacity to love a perfect God, how will I ever love an imperfect person?

So the questions becomes not "How would I love this person if they were Jesus?" but, "How does Jesus love this person?" and the answer is found in asking, "How does Jesus love me?" When we understand that we can actually only love because he first loved us, everything changes.

When I look at the ways Jesus loves me, I find joy comes like manna every morning.

When I look at the ways Jesus loves me, I find freedom to do the things that God created me for.

When I look at the ways Jesus loves me, I find the Holy Spirit inside of me waiting for me to let him love people through me.

All I want to do with my life is die to myself and let the Spirit love through me.

Please pray that Olga's health would continue to improve. She is out of the hospital now and is recovering back at home. She plans on teaching the high school students in her home as soon as she is able.
Praise God that He provided new teachers to take on the kindergarten class! He is faithful to provide if we just ask!
Pray for continued health and safety at the dump.
Pray that the Light would shine into the deep darkness that is evident at the dump. Pray that hope would burst through in a crazy way, and that the love of Christ would be deeply experienced by the kids that come to school, and by their families.
Pray for safety as I travel back to Guadalajara on the 10th.

Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. 

O, Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love; For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; it is in dying that we are born again to eternal life. 

-St. Francis of Assisi

 Ocean view from the dive from Zihuatanejo to Ixtapa

 Some of the students at the school with teachers. 

 Angel- One of our Kindergarten students 

Miguelito- One of our Kindergarten students

 DINOS!!

Language Learning

Five months of language learning.

Approximately 108 hours of class. 

171 pages of grammar. 

Over 1,000 vocab flashcards. 

Here's some fun words/ phrases I have learned:

"Bueno como pan"- "[A person/ thing is as] good as bread"

"Dar a luz"- Directly translates to mean "give light" but really means "to give birth"

"Susurarr"- "to whisper" Also, that word to me sounds exactly like a game of hide and seek.

"Bienaventurado"- Looks like it would mean "good adventure" but really means "blessed" and that's close to the same thing. 

"Sacarle la sopa"- Directly translates to "get the soup out" but really means "to interrogate" 

Having never embarked on the huge, important task that language learning is, I've learned a couple of things more than the language itself. 

1. Language learning is hard and will give you a headache. 

You know when you go to the gym and workout really hard and the next day you wake up and are like, "Why does this muscle hurt? Is this even a muscle? I never even knew this muscle existed!" That is what language learning is like. It worked a part of my brain I didn't even knew existed. After a few hours this dull ache occurs that is mind numbing. The cure: coffee. 

2. You can only study so long before you have a slight mental breakdown. 

While memorizing the books of the Bible in Spanish, I broke down after three hours when I forgot the word "Lamentaciones." 

3. The buddy system will save you from having excessive mental exhaustion. 

For me at least, I found it a whole lot easier to not be in class alone. Having another student to learn helped me to know that I was not the only person in the world who didn't understand subjuntivo and pasado anterior. I'm sure you have also found that mutual suffering creates a special bond between people (think of finals week, or when there's no internet), and the same goes for language learning. 

4. Learning a language with a completely different alphabet would be nuts-o. 

Sometimes, you can guess at a word by making an English sounds Spanish, and it kinda works out (but not always). This would be impossible if it was a totally different alphabet. 

5. Failure is part of the learning, mistakes are part of the journey. 

Don't know what a word is? Go for it. Don't know what a person said? Ask them to repeat it. 

It takes humility to do something knowing you might fail, but we should do it anyways. It takes bravery to make a fool of yourself, but we should do it anyways. Because when you do succeed, magic happens. 

I think that when we get to Heaven, we'll all be able to understand each other. I don't know if we'll all speak in tongues, or if we'll just all miraculously understand each other, or what it'll be like, but I'm pretty sure that we'll understand each other. It's heartbreaking and lonely wanting to say something, but not being able to, or wanting to understand someone and not being able to. One day, every tongue, tribe and nation will be able to talk about how their hearts feel, and what makes their soul sing, and we'll be able to understand it. I can't wait for that day. 

Please continue to pray for the ministries that are happening here. A new Bible study has sprung up seemingly over night and it is exciting to see that God is working! God brings people to himself in himself in really remarkable ways and it's a privilege to be a part of it. 

Please pray for the new intern, Jesse, and I as we will be going to Ixtapa for the next two weeks and helping with a garbage dump ministry, a seniors home, and churches there. Pray for safety and that we will be able to minister where needed. 

Please pray that in everything, we would have the love of Christ pouring out of us. 

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels,

 but do not have love, 

I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 

1 Corinthians 13:1

Thanks for praying. Prayer changes everything. 

{Side Note: I've eaten every taco on the menu at this taco truck}

1,000ish vocab cards.

Where are you?

This past weekend one of our missionaries, Diane, celebrated her 50th birthday party. She threw an unusual birthday party as she had her teachers from her exercise dance classes at the gym lead some sessions and we played street hockey. This unique party was in the hopes that she could bring together people from many different parts of her life and celebrate her 50 years God has blessed her with, and also bless others and show God's love.

I think of a lot of ministry has to do with seeing where people are, meeting them there, and sharing Jesus with them. Here, people love parties, the bigger the better. If that's where the people are, that's where we need to be too.

Here, we go to breakfasts and coffees with people, we bike with people, we go to the gym with people, we hang out with the Moms after school. It's really not that complicated: See where people are, go there, and love them like Jesus does.

It's important to be in the world, but not of it.

What does this actually mean? Does this mean that we imitate the culture around us but just Christianising it? Does this mean that we need to go and create a completely separate Christian-culture? Does this mean that we simply deal with the way the world is without actually diving into the mess?

I'm not sure what this means.
But I know that Jesus dove into the mess.
And I know that Jesus met us here, on earth, where we're at.

So if Jesus dove into the mess, what's keeping us from diving into it?

Are we content with our Christian circles? Are we content with always being fed, and never feeding anyone else?

Christmas was a couple of weeks ago and I think it's important that we keep marvelling at the story. That God, sent Jesus not to take over the government, but to challenge it. Not to affirm the self-righteous, but to take the broken, the rejected, and the sinful by the hand and bring them into His kingdom.

We weren't perfect when Jesus came to us.
He came to us when we were still in our stench.
Jesus still does that.
He meets us where we're at.
So it's going to be a messy life.
And that's ok.

Please pray for our ministry as we enter into this new year. It's an exciting time and I feel like big, exciting, unexpected things are going to happen. Please pray for creativity, endurance, and the joy of the Lord in our every day work. Pray that the gospel would resonate with people deeply, and shake them to the core.

Having fun at Diane's birthday party! 

Nativity scene outside of the coto (housing complex)

I also had the amazing opportunity to go to Mexico City and spend Christmas with my host family and their relatives! Here are some pictures from that trip.

A Child-Like Learning

Learning a new culture has been one of the most amazing, and difficult experiences of my entire life. To be fully submerged in a new culture is a beautiful adventure that never ends. Sherwood Lingenfelter and Marvin Mayers write in their book, Ministering Cross-Culturally, that "becoming incarnate in another culture will be a trail by fire, a test of inner strength, of personal faith, and most of all a test of the veracity of one's love. An individual who is not ready to give up being an American for a time, and to begin learning as a child, is not ready for the challenge of cross-cultural ministry."

We must begin to learn as a child. This month, I've begun to understand more and more what Jesus was talking about when he said that "unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matthew 18:2-4, NIV). In order to enter the kingdom of heaven, we need to leave our old, earthly culture behind, and adapt to God's culture. To do this we need to relearn everything. Everything changes when we enter the culture of Christ.

I don't believe that every Christian is called to go to a new county and be a missionary there, but I do think that every Christian is a missionary. I do think that every Christian is a pastor. I do think that every Christian is called to full time ministry. I do think that every Christian is called to give up their old, earthly culture and learn God's culture. Just because we aren't called to vocational ministry doesn't mean that we are exempt from the command to love God, then love our neighbour. That's all that missions is. Just loving God, and loving people.
That's it.
I just want to love God, and then love people.

But I need to become like a child to relearn how to love, because sin has broken my ability to do so. The Holy Spirit enables me to learn his culture, so I can love God, then love others.

Part of what I've found most remarkable about the ministry in Guadalajara is that it seeks to simply love God and then love others. We're not building a church building. We're building a church. We're not having revival meetings. We're experiencing revival in our work and in our relationships. This past weekend, we had a convivio, where all the cell groups get together to have fun and share what God's been doing in their lives. Over thirty people showed up! It was awesome to see how God united the group despite people being from different backgrounds and not knowing each other.

This month we had a prayer team from Canada come and pray for specific situations and people. God listens to the prayers of his children, and it's amazing to experience that.

In November, we also had a staff retreat at San Pancho. I think the ocean is one of my favorite places in the world. God knows how to give his children good gifts, and this time of prayer, rest, and playing in the waves and sand was one of those good gifts!

Looking ahead into December, please pray for all the travels that our missionaries will be doing for Christmas. I will be going to Mexico city with my host family and a missionary family for a few days over Christmas.

Please pray that my studies would continue to go well, and that God would give me perseverance and courage to learn whole heartedly.

Please pray that people would experience the hope and joy of the Christmas season in a whole new way; that their eyes would shift from seeing Mary, to seeing God in the form of a baby. Pray that people would see the Creator of the universe here, on this earth, just for us, to teach us how to live in his culture, to actually come to us, and save us!

Oh what a wonderful Saviour!

Christmas Convivio 

San Pancho beach staff retreat 

Prayer team

The Significance of Stories.

One of the things that has stuck out most to me this past month is the importance of stories. Not just our individual stories, but also our story as cultures, and our story as humanity.

In Mexico, Spain conquered forced the indigenous people to become Catholic. They built cathedrals over indigenous temples as a sign of their dominance.This caused the religions of the indigenous people to be blended in to the Catholic practices. This past month Mexico celebrated Day of the Dead. Day of the Dead is a day in which people remember their loved ones and try to please their spirits. The family of the dead builds alters where they place the dead person's favorite things and traditional bread. It is said that the spirits come by at night and eat all the flavor out of the bread and come have a good time. People commune with the spirits during this celebration. Generally speaking, the majority of the Mexican culture accepts that death is not the end, so this was a celebration of a life lived on earth, and a spirit continuing on. I had an opportunity to go to one of the high schools to watch a performance and celebration of the day. All of the teenagers had skeletons painted on their faces, and there were alters set up everywhere for the alter competition. This spirit of life is engraved into their culture as a way of thinking, not just as a tradition. There is a lot of value in this tradition, and the Catholic Church approves of it, but there is also a lot of things in this tradition which go against the gospel.

When Spain came and conquered, many families were often composed of a father from Spain and a mother from Mexico. The fathers would leave and the women had to raise their children by themselves. This caused the children to place the mother at the highest level of the family system. The mother is central in the children's lives, but the man is still the more powerful, dominant head of the household. If you want to get to the father, you must go through the mother. In the Catholic religion here, there is a lot of Mariology, where the Virgin Mary is sometimes placed on a pedestal higher than Christ. If you want to get to the Father, you must pray to the Mother. The religion is rooted in their story as a people.

As a Canadian/Western culture, what is our own story? Why do we do the things that we do? Why do we care so much about being on time, or why is it ok, and even encouraged, not to believe in God in our own culture? Why is our culture obsessed with making money? Why do we value education so much? Why are family systems so broken? This is rooted in our story.

As a humanity, what is our story? Why do we go looking for things that we think will fill us? Why are we so desperate to be fully loved? Why do we hurt one another? Why do our hearts ache when we see other people hurting? Why are we never satisfied?

This too is rooted in story.

As I continue to figure out my own story, and how God is developing my story, please continue to pray for me. Please pray that I would continue learning Spanish quickly (Spanish classes have been going really well, praise God), that I would be open to letting God use me however he pleases, and that I would grow in my friendship with Jesus. Also, please pray that I would figure out bus roots quickly and that I would continue to fall deeper in love with this amazing culture.

Also continue to pray for the ministry that is happening here. This past month, we had a thanksgiving dinner and it was so amazing to hear people's stories of how Christ was impacting their lives. We have a prayer team this week from Canada, so please pray for them as they become prayer warriors and pray for the missionaries, and the city. Please pray for the bible studies that are happening weekly. Pray that God would speak and move through these studies and that his grace and love would be felt no matter where the group is spiritually.

Please pray that we would see people's stories collide into God's story. Pray that God's story of redemption, freedom, grace, and healing would impact people so much that they would join into that story. God is already telling a story here. We just need to listen to it.

Thanks so much for your prayers and support. It is such a blessing to know that I am loved and cared for. Your prayers impact my story. Prayer matters.

 Day of the Dead alter at the High School

 Dance performance for Day of the Dead

Mural of Miguel Hidgalgo Costilla, leader of Mexican Independence

Thanksgiving dinner set up for 45 people

On Life and Loneliness

I would like to say that life is always easy, that I have made 100 best friends, I am now fluent in Spanish, and I have single handedly started a culturally conscious youth group that every Christian teenager in Guadalajara attends. But I can't say that. That was my unrealistic expectation of where I would be by November in this internship. The truth is, that God has brought me through the loneliest month of my life, that I have maybe one good friend, and that I struggle to remember the conjugations for "ser" and "estar" in the present tense. I have not started, or even hardly thought about starting a youth group.

But God is doing immeasurably more than I could ever ask or imagine. 

A reoccurring theme in the leadership positions that I've had is this: loneliness. 

I experienced loneliness in my leadership position at Columbia Bible College, and loneliness in my leadership position at Echo Lake Bible Camp. I thought that I had a pretty good grip on what it meant to depend on God during these times. I also found a pretty good coping method called, "doing so many good things that I am too tired at the end of the day to think about that lonely emptiness inside me" and man, was I good at it. 

But God is doing immeasurably more than I could ever ask or imagine. 

Last month I was plagued by a feeling of loneliness deeper than I had ever previously experienced. I'm going to be honest, not because I want pity, but because I know that others feel the same way. And I think we should talk about it.

I was alone, in a different county with a different language. I felt unable to fully express myself to the people I lived with in my own language, and I had no peers that I could relate to. Everything was unfamiliar and my mind was constantly analysing, and over analysing, and trying to understand language, and body language, and any language that I could find. Moreover, I couldn't cope in the way that I usually did, because I didn't know the people, culture, or language enough to be a do-gooder. 

I probably cried at least 3 times a week. 

I complained to my sisters a lot that I was so lonely. 

I pitied my poor, lonely, single self. 

But God is doing immeasurably more than I could ever ask or imagine. 

And then one night the internet went out and I had no way of complainacating (the act of communicating solely for the purpose of complaining) to my sisters. 

"So what are you going to do now?" God asked me. "Who are you going to talk to now? Who are you going to tell your fears to?" 

I laid in bed and cried. 

And then this light bulb moment happened that was painfully obvious. 

"Oh, I should talk to Jesus about this." (Duh).

yeah. people. all my life I have known Jesus was with me and was my "friend." I've sang songs with the phrase "he's my friend" so many times I can't even count it. I've told other people that Jesus was their friend. So why didn't I have Jesus as my friend? 

Jesus had been, and is my Savoir and Lord, but he was never was really my friend. 

I laid in bed and started talking out loud to Jesus through my tears. 

And then I felt this peace wash over me. I had been understood. Completely and fully understood and completely and fully loved.

Jesus is my friend now. 

When I finally became friends with Jesus, I could give myself the freedom to fail because I realised that my identity rested in him, not in my successes. 

This changes everything. I no longer have to analyse if I am good enough, if I am everything that everyone expects me to be, or if I am even everything that I expect myself to be. 

Things started to change. I met this CBC grad who is working with MB Mission and who can pretty much relate to everything that I am going through in my internship because a) she's done her internship, b) she's living in Guadalajara for the first time, and c) she's learning Spanish.

I'm making friends with Mexicans. 

My Spanish has started getting better. 

I started getting less culturally awkward. And when I am culturally awkward, I laugh about it. So many giggles recently. It's fantastic.

I still get lonely and have moments of missing familiar things and people. But then I tell Jesus and he says "I know. I get you."

He gets me. Completely.

I realised that I need God more than I need myself. I came into this internship really dependent on my gifts, how God was going to use me, and how I could change the world. Now I am dependent on what God is doing, and how he is changing the whole world into his Kingdom. I am but a breath. What freedom I have experienced from being a single exhale. 

Jesus, and only Jesus has made me happy. Every good and perfect gift is from him. Only Jesus can make me happy. 

When I pray, I don't ask God to help me, I ask God to let me see that the harvest is plentiful. 

God is doing immeasurably more than I could ever ask or imagine. 

So I give up all that I was asking for and imagining. 

I give up. I'm just going to be who God created me to be. And if anything with "ministry value" happens because of that, neat. If not, then I will still have glorified God by simply existing and having been made in his image. I'm just a container for his Spirit. 

We don't have to be lonely in our leadership. Jesus is there. Talk to him. He will give you a way out of your loneliness. I'm not saying that we don't need human friendships, humans need humans. But Jesus is the only one who can fully meet our physical needs, relational needs, emotional, and spiritual needs. He is the one who makes us happy. 

So friends, if you are lonely, it's ok. Your situation is probably vastly different than mine and maybe you are already best friends with Jesus, and he's bringing you through this for a completely different purpose. Maybe you are suffering from years of loneliness, of years of crying out to God, but only hearing silence. I don't know your situation, and I don't know why suffering exists, or even if God has a purpose for it. But I do know, with all of my heart, soul, and mind, that Jesus is there beside you. Jesus hears your crying. Jesus cries with you. Jesus loves you. 

God is doing immeasurably more than we could ever ask or imagine. 

We are not alone. 

All we need is Jesus. 

"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen."

Ephesians 3:20-21