It begins...

Ange and I packed today, bought travel insurance and various other errands. The photos show me with the luggage, Ange at the computer, then later saying good bye to her sister. Don't they look sad.
Tomorrow we rest up for the journey because we leave Saturday at 5:00am for San Diego (Ange's first flight). Sunday we meet up with the True North Helping Hands crew and drive down into Mexico to build a school in the village of Zorrillo. We're all very excited.
38 years ago I went to the Arizona/Mexico border town of Nogales with my parents and sister. It was a mix of adventure and shock. I remember standing in a two room house with thin towels hung for doors and a dirt floor. The family we visited were new Christians receiving relief help from the church in Sierra Vista, AZ. I didn't understand much of what was happening except that this was another world from how I was raised. The image has never faded in my mind.
Now I'm finally returning to Mexico and on a mission to help out a poverty-riddled village. How will I feel when I see families in destitution? It feels good to know that I have something to give this time, instead of being a little kid just staring in shock while half hiding behind my mother's skirt.
Somewhere back in that childhood of mine the radio was blasting out that song "If I had a hammer, I'd hammer in the morning." It stuck in my head (the song, not the hammer) while I was packing tools for the trip.
There is a sense that I am on Jesus' mission. He saw people in their human need and had compassion on them. Not only that, He ministered to them. Not only that, He taught His disciples to do the same. Not only that, He said if you minister to people in need (sick, hungry, naked, etc.) you are actually ministering to Him. I've preached a lot of sermons in my years of paid and unpaid ministry. Somehow I have the feeling I'm about to learn a whole new way of communicating the gospel to people. I can't speak a word of Spanish. But I swing a fluent hammer!

Preparing for Mexico Mission..