Wednesday, March 28, 2012

South of the boarder...


The picture above is one that we see every time we cross the boarder to and from Mexico.
It may look silly, but the reality of it is very serious.

Friday we leave to take some students from our youth group across the boarder into Tijuana, Mexico for a short term missions trip.


Although I've been to Tijuana many times, I'm very excited for this particular trip because we are able to go back to the dump to visit some families and hopefully bring some fruit and veggies to their homes.

On a trip to Tijuana in high school, we built a house in a neighborhood that was in the dump. I can remember standing on a pile of trash and looking off into the distance and seeing the tall buildings of San Diego, California. I remember thinking

"How awful to live here, every day of your life, in a dump, and look off into the distance and see American, the "land of opportunities" and maybe never get the chance to move out of the dump."


We're also going to a neighborhood called Zona Norte, the red light district of Tijuana. I've been there once before, and I can't say that I'm 'excited' to go back, but I am hoping for an opportunity to share Christ with the young men and women who work those streets.

Our boys will be going to a juvenile hall and running a small youth group for the boys who are imprisoned. Last year most of our boys said that was one of the most powerful parts of the trips was being able to interact with the inmates.

One thing I'm most excited about is that we'll be visiting some orphanages. Orphanages in Mexico are a nit different than what you think of when you think of an orphanage. Many of the children who live in the orphanage are not 'orphaned' children, but are there simply because their parents can't afford to care for them, or possibly because they're troubled youth, it's much like the foster care system here in the US, only like a giant group home. Some children may actually be orphaned though. The conditions are not ideal at all, the ones we visited in the past do not have water and have no electricity, but lots of children that need love, and need to hear about Jesus.

These children need to be looked after and cared for.

A year ago this trip, God very clearly laid adoption on our hearts, I'm very excited to see how He'll work this week.

If you're someone who prays, would you pray for our team? We leave Friday morning at 4:30am and will return a week later.

If you'd like, follow our Facebook page! Our students will be blogging, and vlogging (this is new to me..) daily about our experiences.

We also have a team of students going to Ecquador the same time! Please pary for them as they travel and then go into the jungel to work on a bible institute for the local people.

Check out our missions blog!

And our Facebook page!


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