Medical Missions- Parral, Chihuahua, MX

Since I mentioned missions in a recent blog, and looked at my paintings in the West Texas-Chihuahuan desert, it made me want to tell you about our medical mission trips. Our church takes a medical mission trip to Hidalgo del Parral, Chihuahua (the first photo), every August and I usually always go. I love to go on these trips. We are helping support a couple of Mexican preachers down there and they are growing two different Churches of Christ in the town of Parral. And they ARE growing. We have two dentists, several nurses, and a couple of native Mexican doctors and eyeglasses that we caravan down there and spend a week at one of the community centers and try to help as many people as we can in that week. It is exhausting work, but the most rewarding thing I've ever done. We have a couple of folks with us that are fluent or native hispanics that go with us, and a couple more including me that can get by and help out with translation. They always hold a revival meeting and invite the people who come to the clinic to their services and try to get them to set up Bible studies the week after. It's a great outreach to the poor communities they live in and we usually have 500-600 patients come through the clinic in a week's time. Some of the church member ladies fix lunch for us every single day and we go eat in one of their homes in shifts during the lunch hour. This next photo is me with some of the church ladies.

There are lots of Tarahumara Indians down there, too, who do not speak Spanish, but some other Indian dialect. This next photo is a little Indian lady and her granddaughter. The older lady came to find some glasses. Her granddaughter did not know exactly how old she was, but she knew she was over 100. The Indians are generally very small people, too. I work with the eyeglasses. The people down there sometimes have not been able to see well all their lives. And the greatest blessing for me is to see their faces light up when we are able to fit them with a pair of used glasses (from the Lions Clubs of America). The sun is so bright and the town of Parral is in the mountains and the people usually have some kind of granulation on their eyes as they age. There are also young people with terrible vision and their eyes water all the time. They have lots of eye issues down there for the lack of medical care and poverty.

A couple of special instances always stand out to me and bring tears to my eyes. The first time I went down there, a little old tiny lady came through and I was talking to her. She had not been able to sew or read her Bible in years. They do alot of sewing and handwork. She had such a sweet spirit about her and she waited very patiently while I looked for her some reading glasses. (The prescriptions are marked on the glasses but we still have to do lots of looking). We tried several pairs and when at last we came upon exactly what she needed, her eyes lit up and a huge smile came on her face and she had tears streaming down her wrinkled brown cheeks. She kept repeating over and over "Gracias, muchas gracias, que Dios te bendiga" (may God bless you). She came around the counter where I was standing and reached up as high as she could and grabbed me around the neck and hugged me tight. And I hugged her back, too. She was so sweet. And I was crying, too, to think that something that you and I take for granted (like running down to the Dollar Store and buying a $5 pair of reading glasses) could mean so much to her!!!!!! ANother little old lady this past summer sat quietly while I was looking for her glasses, whispering soft little prayers to God for Him to help me find her a pair of glasses. Over and over she prayed and even held her hands up in supplication and when I finally found them and she tried them on she hugged me and blessed me and thanked God. WHO IS GETTING THE BLESSING HERE???? me!

The poverty, the dirt, the smells, the illness, the unwashed bodies and all the other icky stuff that you might run into on a mission trip just melts away when there is God's love in your heart. These people deep in the heart of Mexico are precious - even the unchurched ones. Sure there is crime, just like everywhere. But I have found that these native peoples are kind and giving - they will literally give you anything they have. And they are so unencumbered by worldly "things" there, that they are truly thankful for what they have and what they are given. This is the great teaching and great blessing for me. Lord willing, I'll be able to go on many more of these trips. This past summer, Princess was able to go with me. She was a great hit with the kids! I think it touched her, too. She has said for several years now that she would like to do some kind of foreign missions - don't know if that will every materialize, but we don't know what God has in store for her. I was just so pleased that she's thinking along those lines. I think she has a soft spot for helping others. I don't know what direction that will take, but time will tell. She had a good time on the trip, as one of the preachers' daughters took Princess and a couple of other young people out to show them the town of Parral and they had ice cream, etc. It was a great trip!

Now let me tell you about Karla. She is 23 years, just graduated from college with a counseling degree and is going to continue her education to obtain some kind of master's degree. She was born with congenital scoliosis. They didn't know if she was going to live as she has had massive health problems. Now she stands about 4 ft nothing and her head is almost fused to her spine and she has pins in her back. She is the daughter of Ubaldo and Maria, the first preacher and his wife. I met them about 12-13 years ago when Karla was about 10 or 11. She has suffered many surgeries and they have to take her to Juarez to the Shriner's Hospital to obtain medical care. She has 2 older healthy brothers. She is beautiful, inside and out. Her paternal grandfather (who is not a Christian) told her parents that they needed to abandon her because she was so deformed. But of course, they couldn't do that. They have raised a sweet, capable, positive young lady with a sweet and gentle spirit and she already has her own patients - she loves to help young teenage girls and young ladies with their problems. She has overcome great odds in her young life, and has recently found out that she has no uterus. Now that's a great disappointment here in America, but imagine in Mexico where family and children are what defines a woman in the eyes of that community, imagine what Karla is going through. She is devastated and so are her parents. She even has a cute boyfriend right now and I think he wants to marry her, but she has not yet told him of her plight. I pray for her and her family. Her mother, Maria, and I have become friends, and Maria shares her problems with me about Karla. I think she is trying to be a strong and faithful example to the young church members and it is difficult for her to talk about problems with the other young Christian women, and so she shares with me. Here is a picture of Ubaldo, Maria, and me.

Well, that is all for now. This post got rather lengthy, sorry, didn't mean to. I can talk all night about Parral, and the goings on there. Slip in a quick prayer for Karla and her family. They have a tough battle to fight down there trying to bring the gospel to a pagan world. They are strong in the Lord, but they are human, too, and they need prayers for strength. Thanks - Vickie