Mexico City Spring Break

As I mentioned in the prayer letter, I (along with Marta Fraser, one of our regional directors) took 10 of our St. Louis Area graduating students with me to Mexico City for a week of campus training and outreach. Here is a quick recap of the week, then my daily journal will follow.

Our campus assignment was La Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM), a campus of 250,000-300,000 students. As we talked with the staff team there, we realized that a large scale effort to expose the campus to the gospel would serve them best. Over the course of the week,

· 10% of students received business cards with our website printed on them, leading them to an online presentation of how they could know God personally. We stood at the subway stops at peak hours, passing about 32,000 cards to students with a “Buenos Dias!”
· 1% of the student body filled out spiritual interest surveys at our tables set up in strategic areas of campus. We printed over 3,000 surveys asking students to rank their desire to know God personally and join a group that seeks to grow spiritually. Over half of the students surveyed indicated positive responses.
· Students surfaced at each of the eight follow-up meetings that gave them specific opportunities to know Christ and get involved with our group. Some of these students even joined us in reaching out to their peers.

It was an exhausting, yet fabulous, week of ministry. As I traveled home, I was deeply grateful for all that God had done through our time in Mexico City. I was also deeply grateful for the godly, talented, compassionate set of student leaders who will work with us next year. They are quite a blessing!

I kept a small journal while I traveled and I wanted to share a portion of it with you...

Saturday

Travel days are a mixed bag for me--I am excited to go where God has called me to be, but it is hard to say good-bye to Holly and the kids. I won't bore you with all the times that I recorded in my journal that I missed them and was praying for them.

Of all the 11 people traveling to Mexico City, I was the final one to arrive. Their questions about the week and their anticipation for the week quickly led me to believe that we were in for something special.

We should have seen travel troubles brewing through when the gate agent offered 4 tickets to anyone willing to be bumped. I told our crew that we had to catch our connecting flight, so they weren't allowed to volunteer! That proved pointless when we missed our connection due to weather, a fuel shortage and an overflowing bathroom! The short version is that after waiting for about four hours at Dulles we spent the night at our layover city (Washington DC) without our bags and with no promise of a flight the next day!

Sunday

No, United didn't pay for the hotel--we were on our own for that. But, we made the best of it. The direct flight to Mexico City didn't depart until late afternoon, so I encouraged the students to spend extended time with the Lord. After enjoying the extended time with the Lord, we spent time discussing some of our training material and praying together. This may have been the richest time of the entire trip--talking about the grace that God has extended toward us and our humble response!

We headed back to Dulles for our flights--something wasn't right when some of our group didn't receive seat assignments. I was settling in for the flight in my assigned seat when two from our group alerted me that we weren't all going to be on the flight. United had overbooked this flight and we were getting kicked off--Seriously, I felt like I was in a movie! Four of us ended up taking a 6:30pm (eastern time) flight to LA to catch the 1:05am (pacific time) flight to Mexico City. We arrive in Mexico City on Monday morning just in time for the campus briefing at 8:30am.

The travel story rings humorous now as I type, but in the midst of all of the delays and disappointments, I was so impressed with our group--they fully embraced the entire trip as an opportunity to trust God and grow in their relationship with Him.

Monday

I must confess that I was a bit blurry on Monday. We joined the team of four Mexican national CCC staff members working at UNAM--a campus of more than 250,000. Can you imagine a campus that is 10x the size of Mizzou? It is arguably the most influential campus in all of Latin America. At this point, there were probably only 30 students actively involved with Campus Crusade for Christ.

I learned that Mexico City sits at about 7400 feet above sea level so drinking lots of (bottled!) water was going to be an important part of our week. It was on Monday that I fully embraced eating the food from the vendors on the street. I am pleased to report that I ate that food with no ill effects!

Tuesday

We set up our tables at 3 different faculties (majors) at UNAM to begin meeting students. Early in the day, I had an unusual experience. As two students approached the table, I sensed that God was leading me to have a conversation with them rather than simply giving them a survey. This kind of leading stood out because it seemed so clear that God wanted me to talk with them. So, I introduced myself to Christian and Cesar.

Both guys initially indicated that they believed in God but that God wasn't relevant to their daily lives. Simply, the issue boiled down to their view of God. They were not convinced that God was good so therefore they were not willing to believe that they could be forgiven or to trust God for their lives. We talked for almost an hour looking at different verses and reasoning together. Nearing the end of our conversation, I asked them if their opinion had changed regarding God's goodness toward them. They indicated that it had changed and that they wanted to receive Christ. So, in the middle of a very busy area of campus, we bowed our heads and prayed together.

Since our conversation, we talked a couple of times while I was in Mexico and once since returning to the US. The CCC staff in Mexico City are also following up with these two students.

More Tuesday stories...Mackenzie emailed me to say that she got a 104 on her history test! That makes a dad happy...

Another Tuesday story...I literally broke up a fist fight between two students on campus. As I ran toward them (yelling in English, of course), I had this fleeting thought, "Maybe this isn't such a good idea." Well, I drew enough attention that they broke up the fight (they were both bloody!) before the campus security arrived.

Wednesday

We were up and going very early in order to catch the first students arriving on campus. Our plan was to give away about 20,000 business cards with a web address that would lead students to a gospel presentation in Spanish. (We eventually gave out about 32,000 cards--over 10% of the student body!) Our advantage was that virtually all of the students coming to campus walked on to campus through one of two spots after getting off of the bus or subway. So, we placed ourselves in those bottlenecks and greeted people with a friendly "Buenos Dias!" while giving them the cards. I was shocked at how few were trashed in the area. Our prayer is that many students that we would not have been able talk with would be able to read the gospel in their language and respond to Jesus.

As I was handing these cards out, I thought about how much my Uncle Steve and Grandpa Allan would have loved this. Our days was about making friends and broadly sowing the gospel so that everyone would have an opportunity to say "yes" to Jesus.

We finished this mega-day watching the sunset over Mexico City from the Latin American Tower which stands as the tallest building overlooking this impressive, sprawling city of 28 million people. Again, our team took some reflection time with the Lord after I did a devotion from Jonah where God asked, "Should I not pity Ninevah, that great city, in which there are more than 120,000 persons who do not know their right had from their left..." During my reflection time, I was reminded of God's care for each person even when I can be overwhelmed by the vast number of people.

Thursday

Our day started with a bus that was more full than usual. Space was very tight on each of our days, but several of us would not have gotten on if Devin hadn't played blocking back and literally squashed us onto the bus. It wasn't comfortable, but we were all together! It did remind me, though, of how much my neck was hurting from all of the walking and lifting and hauling that we had done through the week.

In addition to our tabling and our broad sowing, one of the highlights for the day was meeting the national campus director, David Bedolla, and his team who joined us for the day of outreach. I took a portion of the afternoon to sit with David and talk with him about their strategy for reaching every student in Mexico.

Friday

Friday was dedicated to personal follow up with students that we had met during the week and doing the group follow ups from the tabling and card distribution. We finished with a party near our housing for students to join us. My journal entries were getting shorter and shorter at this point in the week due to fatigue!

Saturday

After a full week of outreach, we slept in and spent some extra time with the Lord before traveling to the ancient city of Teotihuacan, the most visited of Mexico’s archaeological sites. The site is impressive for its scale, both in the size of the Pyramid of the Sun (the third largest pyramid in the world) and the majesty of the Calle de los Muertos (Street of the Dead) - originally 4km long and flanked by temples, palaces and platforms.

There is a restaurant in a cave at the ruins. We had a fantastic meal there as our final special time together as a team.

Sunday

We had a final breakfast at the hostel before heading to the airport for our travel day. At the airport, we gathered for a debriefing time to share stories of what God had done and to talk through some practical "next steps" as we head back to campus. We arrived back in St. Louis at about 11:00pm.

It was a long week, but so fruitful! Thanks for helping to make it possible.