Hellooooo everybody!
¿Como estamos?
The 12:7 Serve team is in Guatemala at the moment, and we will be relaxing and serving here for five days. Then after that comes El Salvador! But now, I'm taking a look back at South Mexico, and what the Lord did in me during those three weeks.
During our time in South Mexico, we served in the state of Oaxaca, in a town called Chahuites. There are five churches in Chahuites, led by five awesome pastors. Also, we had three additional team members serve with us during this time - Naara, Sergio and Luz. That now made us *15:7 Serve! On a side note - wanna know what Romans 15:7 says? - "Therefore, accept each other just as Christ has accepted you so that God will be given glory." It was quite fitting for us at this time!
The 15 of us were split up into groups of three, to work in the five churches in Chahuites - my group being me, Alan and Estela. :) The first weekend in Chahuites we held a Maximum Mission with around 100 youth participating. This is an something I've talked about before on here: A community service/evangelistic event to develop leaders and to grow churches. So over the weekend, many people accepted Jesus as their Saviour! Praise the Lord! This leads us to our project in South Mexico - this was called 'Projecto Pablo' - or 'Project Paul'. This is a discipleship project, where the main focus is visiting new converts and beginning lessons with them alongside the church you are working with.
So over three weeks, Estela, Alan and I along with some of the church members in the 5th Nazarene church of Chahuites, visited the new Christians and began to teach them. It was great to get to know the church members and to serve and get to know the community in Chahuites. At the end of our time, we traveled to another town to serve in another Maximum Mission, which Sergio - one of our three extra team members - was coordinating. It was an amazing weekend! There was youth as young as 12 who were there to serve over the weekend. We did a cleanup of the plaza, donations of clothing, children's ministry and evangelism. God really spoke to and through the youth over this weekend, and it was so exciting to see them step out in serving the Lord!
Backyard church service!
LOVE kids ministry!
Cleaning up the plaza at the Maximum Mission!
Singing time at the Maximum Mission! (Yo canto como David!)
Pastor Edgar, his wife Martha, and their children Manuel (left) and Victor (middle)
- I will never forget them!
But there's also another side to my time in South Mexico. These three weeks have probably been the hardest part of 12:7 Serve so far. I reached a point in my culture shock/journey where I grew tired of everything. Tired of trying to speak and understand Spanish, tired of always been watched by everyone, tired of being away from home, tired of always being tired. I honestly reached breaking point. But the Lord was so good to me. For many days, it was He who held me together. I couldn't have gotten through without Him.
Reaching my low point in my journey here really taught me that I can't serve on the mission field in my own strength. Daily, I've had to ask the Lord to help me through, and I am so thankful that He has still used me in my weakness. This is the same for all of us. If we try to serve the Lord in our own strength, we will eventually run dry. But remember "The joy of the Lord is your strength!" (Nehemiah 8:10) and "His power is made perfect in [your] weakness." (2 Corinthians 12:9). When faced with hard times, you won't crash and burn because "[You] can do all things through Him who gives [you] strength." (Philippians 4:13). The Lord is with you!
On the journey,Dani
"But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us." - 2 Corinthians 4:7
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