October 2003-Adult Servant Trip
ST. MATTHEW BUILDS MINISTRY IN MEXICO
Ministries are built with cinder blocks and concrete,
with prayers, and relationships. The twelve-member mission team
from St. Matthew Lutheran Church, Barrington, discovered that truth
once again as they traveled to Mexico, October 11-18. This was the
sixteenth team the congregation has sent to work in Mexico since
1995. Most of the teams' efforts have been concentrated in Zaragosa,
Mexico, a community on the eastern edge of Ciudad Juarez. For three
days the parish hall of Santisima Trinidad (Holy Trinity), the Lutheran
church which serves Zaragosa, was transformed into a medical clinic.
Over two hundred patients were helped. This year the team members
worked in conjunction with a local Mexican doctor. This was a first
and should provide the opportunity for on-going care of some of
the patients. Other members of the team worked on the house of the
congregation's pastor, the Rev. Jose Hernandez. St. Matthew congregation
has funded a majority of the construction costs of this house and
it may be possible for Pastor Hernandez and his family to move into
their new home by Christmas. For the first time the pastor will
have a home of his own since he came to serve the congregation five
years ago.
For the second year, the team also provided medical
care to Oaxaca Indians near Janos, Mexico, a community 120 mile
southwest of Ciudad Juarez. The Indians are migrant farm workers
and live under squalid conditions while picking peaches, peppers,
and other produce on large truck farms. The team's work in that
community was by the invitation of the Municipal President of Janos.
"While our mission teams have provided medical care and completed
construction projects," reported the Rev. Gerald Schalk, "we
have also had the opportunity to share the love of Jesus Christ
with these people as we have prayed with them and cared for their
needs."
