October 1999-Adult Servant Trip
VOLUNTEERS COMPLETE MISSION PROJECTS IN
MEXICO
For the eighth time in that past five years, St.
Matthew Lutheran Church, Barrington, sent a servant team to Ysleta
Lutheran Mission in El Paso, Texas, to undertake construction projects
and to provide medical care.
The team left Chicago on October 9 for a week
of work in El Paso and also in Anapra and Zaragosa, Mexico. These
two communities are in the Cuidad Juarez area. During their stay,
the team took on three major projects.
A five-member medical team, headed by nurse Pat
Marks, saw approximately 125 patients during the week. For three
days they set up shop at the clinic in Anapra which a team from
St. Matthew had helped to build in 1996. On the other two days patients
came to the church in Zaragosa.
While most of the cases were aches and pains and
respiratory infections, the team also had to deal with a heart attack,
a spider bite, a pregnant 14-year-old, and a man with a severely
injured leg. Diabetes, hypertension, and vitamin deficiencies are
common health problems in Mexico.
Medical help is do desperately needed in both
Anapra and Zaragosa that people would begin lining up for help as
soon as the medical team arrived on site. A second project which
was completed by the team was a 16-foot by 27- foot frame building
on the grounds of Santisima Trinidad, Holy Trinity Lutheran Church,
in Zaragosa. This building replaces one which was constructed of
old shipping pallets and will serve as an office for the pastor
of the congregation as well as secure storage.
While this structure is spoken of as a "temporary
building," mission teams have long since learned that in Mexico
temporary answers often become permanent solutions.
In 1997 and 1998, team members from St. Matthew
helped to build the church at Zaragosa. During the last two summer
adult/youth teams from the congregation have conducted Vacation
Bible School at this site. Santisima Trinidad has only been served
by a full-time pastor, the Rev. Jose Hernandez, for the past year,
but church attendance now approaches 100 for Sunday worship services.
Repairs at San Pablo Lutheran Church within the
Ysleta Mission compound was the team's third project. Work needed
to be done to the floor of the church as well as to the doors. This
church serves both an English-speaking and a Spanish- speaking congregation.
The physical and spiritual needs in the Ysleta
neighborhood of El Paso and in the two communities in Juarez are
nearly overwhelming. The eighteen members of the servant team from
St. Matthew returned on October 16 with the knowledge that they
had at least made a difference in three communities. The response
of the people they served demonstrated that they had accomplished
their task.
