About the Trip

Well, it has been a great week. Being with my family has been very refreshing. There is a part of me that misses Mexico, but obviously, the faces of Lalainia and Caedence were on my mind throughout my trip.

For those of you wondering what the team actually did in Mexico, let me explain.
For the first week, we spent half the day working on building a farm house and clearing land for farming. Pastor Tomas Bencomo, from Juarez, has a heart for the Tarahumaran people of southern Chuihuahua. In order to teach them better farming techniques, he invites them 5 hours north to Rio Chico (his base of operations), has them live with him for several months, then sends them back to their people with a better farming techniques, a handful of pigs, a mule, and the knowledge of the Gospel. The farm we were building was for those he was teaching.

While in Mexico, I had the opportunity to preach in a small community called Pena Blanca (White Rock). It was quite an experience teaching with a translator, pausing for each sentence, so that Brenda(our guide, translator, and good friend) could translate for me. I also made some quick changes to my sermon, as I figured many of my illustrations were cultural in nature, and may have confused rather than enlightened.

On the day before we left Mexico, we found ourselves in Ciudad de Juarez; a city close to Vancouver in its size. Since Pastor Tomas was informed (by whom I still do not know) that I HAD a short career in music, he asked if I would sing at his church. After much prodding, and since I though his church would be similar in size to all the others we visited in Mexico (approx. 30) I agreed. However, when I walked into the church I found there to be more along the lines of 300 people. I was immediately nervous, but they were kind (it was my first "performance" of a song for which I played guitar). So it was a growing experience.
The Second week, we drove 6 hours further south, near the town of Creel. From there we drove 2-3 hours (lost all sense of time) driving off road. At times on pure rock, and at an angle I feared we would not be able to stop on. After this, and a night of rest we hiked further into the bush to deliver food to the Tarahumaran.
The hike itself was probably the biggest test of my will, and stamina I have ever experienced. Several were carried our via mule.

Check the post above for more shots of my trip; our work on the farm, some of the environments we traveled through, and some of the critters we encountered.