Community Missions to
Global Missions – Not Just a Theory Anymore!
By Sherry White and
Donna McCullough
I have heard repeatedly from the
pulpit, from missionaries at home and abroad, that missions do not have to
happen far away, nor do they happen exclusively at home. I have even been told – and have witnessed
first-hand, that the world is coming to our back yard. That seemed for so long to be the experiences
of others – friends in community ministries in melting pot cities like New York
City or even Atlanta. But through
ministry to the neighborhood at Forest Park Ministry Center, this reality has
been borne out in the flesh – and has become a global mission – literally!
Over three
years ago, my friend and colleague, Lou Ann, introduced me to a new family in
the Forest Park neighborhood. These were
people who appeared Hispanic but spoke a very different language that we could
not understand – even those of us with a little knowledge of Spanish. This opened the door to realize that there
are large pockets of families living in the Montgomery area who are Mixtec, an
indigenous Indian race of people from the mountainous regions of Southern
Mexico and Guatemala. Lou Ann had
learned that the children in these families were having difficulty in school;
their parents had no way of reading the papers sent home for them, and even if
a Spanish interpretation was provided, it did no good for them. She had begun tutoring these children,
assisting them with explaining the instructions and even filling out various
forms and papers necessary for school.
Convicted
about the need for Mixtec parents to learn English, we prayed for the way that
God would have us to do it. The
Conversational English school at First Baptist was our first choice, but the
cultural barriers that had kept these families sequestered into their own
subcommunities had fostered some misunderstanding, maybe even a lack of trust
coupled with fear of authority because of immigration issues, and the
socioeconomic differences between these families and the internationals in our
community associated with the military and with industries were tremendous.
So we
embarked upon an effort to teach Conversational English to a small group of
Mixtec women, some of whom were illiterate even in their own language – they
had oral language skills only!
Participation of many of the women was sporadic, as their duties at home
took precedence over any outside activities.
But one young mother, “Joselina”, became extremely consistent – and she
brought with her three preschool and toddler children who needed help,
too. Their two older siblings were
learning English in school, but these children, especially five-year-old “Omar”
knew only the Mixtec heard at home and were ill prepared for the kindergarten
class which he would enter the following school year.
Enter
Sherry. She had been on numerous medical
missions trips to Mexico, and had developed a love for the people of the
mountainous regions of that country.
When Donna and Carol, who had been teaching English to Joselina,
introduced Sherry to these children, she had the same heartstring pull toward
this family – and poured herself into tutoring the young ones, especially
concentrating on prepping Omar for kindergarten. He went from knowing NOTHING ENGLISH to learning
ABCs, and even reading – and when school started, he fit it beautifully,
earning excellent marks even the first reporting term!
Others
reached out to this family. Greg and his
family visited their home numerous times to assist the older children with
homework and other needs. Those of us at
the ministry center visited, assisted, provided rides to doctor and WIC
appointments. And as Christmas
approached, Raoul, Joselina’s husband, was so thrilled to be able to purchase
his children’s gifts from the Ministry Center Toy Sale,
Then
tragedy struck. Raoul, an otherwise
loving family man, had an affinity for drinking with the guys. One night in February, Raoul was arrested for
drunk and disorderly conduct. While most
who are arrested for such are fined, perhaps allowed to sleep it off or maybe
serve a small amount of time, Raoul was the exception. He had in his possession a gun, which we
believe had been purchased only for his and his family’s protection. But the right to bear arms is only a right if
you are an American citizen. Otherwise,
it is a felony. So Raoul, after several
months in detention, was deported back to Mexico.
Joselina
was heart broken, but she knew that she had to care for her children. With her limited knowledge of the English
language (we had begun with learning fast foods from flash cards), Joselina
found a job frying potatoes at a fast food restaurant! And we taught her how to navigate the MATS
bus route to work each day. The children
were doing great in school, Joselina was earning money for rent and food, but
they missed Raoul terribly, and he missed them.
Joselina had learned, about the time that Raoul was arrested, that she
was expecting another child, and Raoul wanted to see his new daughter,
too. So with heavy hearts, and fearing
for their safety on the journey, we said goodbye to this brave young woman and
her beautiful children, and they returned to Mexico. Sherry vowed that on her next mission trip,
she would try to locate this family.
Anna,
Joselina’s cousin, remained in Montgomery.
Anna continues to learn English, does know Spanish, and continues to be
a great help in interpreting Mixtec to Spanish and even to English. When Sherry’s mission trip agenda had been
set, she asked Anna for the location and phone information for Joselina and her
family. Oscar, our missionary friend who
now lives in Puebla, was able to phone Joselina and learned that they are
living in poor conditions, there are no job opportunities for Rauol, the
children had been ill, and there was no money for them to travel to Puebla for
a visit with Sherry while she was working at the medical mission in Soto Y
Gama, a village near Puebla.
In Sherry’s words:
In 1998, I went on my first mission
trip to Mexico with my church and was overwhelmed at the level of poverty and
need to just have someone look at them with concern and love. I know that
anyone who has been involved with mission work
or even just helped someone in need would say that they got way more out
of the experience than the person or persons they helped and I feel that way
every single time. I have returned to Mexico every year that God has opened the
door for me to go and will continue to travel back there or anywhere God leads!
In the spring of 2010, I spoke to
Donna about wanting to help at Forest Park and would she let me know what I
might could do and she told me that she had the perfect job for me, if I was
interested. Once she told me I was very excited and very scared about how I was
to teach a young boy how to read and write in English when I cannot speak
Spanish and certainly could not speak Mixtec, but when God is in control
nothing is impossible. I worked with Omar all through the spring and summer of
that year and he was ready for kindergarten. His 2 younger sisters would also
learn with us each week and I fell in love with all of them.
When the family started to talk to
us about going back to Mexico we were so scared for them, because we knew of
the danger and the limited resources in the country. Donna and I both knew
that, since the children had all been born and raised in Alabama that this move
was going to be a complete shock to them.
I told Donna that, if
God sent me on a trip to Mexico I would find them and make sure they were ok.
When the opportunity came for me to
go on a mission trip to Mexico I reached out to my friend, Oscar there and
shared the story about this family from Alabama and that I would like to try
and visit them, if possible. The report back was that they were living in the
mountains about 6 hours away from where we would be working and they had no way
to come and visit and we probably would not be able to see them. I was sad but still thought maybe I will
figure it out when we are there and can talk more, but I never had the chance.
The second day our group was in
Mexico, Oscar had been asked to find a birthday cake for one of the ladies on
the trip with us and he had heard of a man in the church that owned a bakery.
Oscar spoke to this man, Herbert and called me over to meet him and Oscar says
to me this man Herbert owns a bakery in Clapa, which is only 3 hours from your
family and he is willing to take you and your husband with him to visit your
family. I was completely shocked in that I had made an assumption I would not
be able to see the family, but with God nothing is impossible. The only other
thing that would need to happen is the family would need to be willing to
travel the other 3 hours for our visit and they were. We contacted the family
and set up a day and time to meet.
Once we arrived to meet the family
I was shocked by the weight loss and look of despair in the children that had
once been so full of life and happiness. We offered to take them to eat lunch
and they were starving. We found out during our visit the Dad had not been able
to find any work and they were living with the clothes on their back and day to
day with finding food for everyone. My heart was broken!
God had plans for this family! I knew that God had not
brought me on this journey to find the family in this situation and not help,
so I started trying to find out how much would it cost to pay for housing and
utilities. Oscar was able to locate a house that would cost very little in a
town where we have a connection with a church. We decided to offer the family
to move to this town, if they were willing to have the children in school, go
to church and find local work. We called the family up and they wanted to move
that day!
One important lesson to me I think
was more of a way to answer a question that is asked many times and
understandably, Why travel to Mexico when there are many needs right here. Many
will have an immediate answer and many will agree with the question. The answer
is very simple go where God leads.
This story has taught me many other lessons that I have to
remind myself of daily.
Nothing is impossible with God.
Follow God’s plan and it will not fail.
Love and care for God’s people.
God speaks to us daily; we just have to listen.
Friends, we
feel that God has shown us – and this true story is proof positive – that He is
working, whether in our neighborhood or in another country, and we must be
willing to surrender to the call to go – where He leads. Only an omniscient God could orchestrate the
events and God-moments that brought us together initially, and brought us back
together, along with fellow Christians in another country, to continue the
discipleship. You never know – a simple
trip into the neighborhood could lead you to the mountains of Mexico – “For man
makes his plans, but God directs his steps.” Proverbs 16:9
