Several years ago, Laura and I took a group of kids, including our son Travis and his sister Ali, to Mexico on a mission trip. All of the kids we took were twelve to fourteen years old and slightly naive. The mission was to work with a local pastor, Rafa, in serving the people living in poverty in the area around Tijuana.
They weren’t hard to find!
Rafa was working with an international mission introducing well-fed Americans to the unfed poor of Mexico. One of his favorite locations to expose people to the reality of true poverty was the Tijuana landfill where people lived off the refuse of other rather poor people.
An hour and a half south of Tijuana, we turned on a dirt road that wound between a couple of large dairy farms up into the hill country. We were headed for the new location of Tijuana’s garbage burial ground. We traveled in a strange caravan of garbage trucks and private vehicles billowing clouds of dust that limited sight to about twenty feet. The clouds of dust preventing us from seeing oncoming vehicles until we were practically on top of each other, as the road twisted and turned for five miles of powdered dirt.
Eventually, we crested a hill that gave a narrow view of the landfill entrance where we separated from the trucks and followed a small path around the side of the hill. We dropped into a primitive village of shacks that made up one of several camps around the dump. We drove into the camp and parked just below the mountain of garbage where 400 to 500 people dug through the city’s trash looking for food, clothing and anything else of value that could be sold to the recyclers. A couple of girls we met were looking for clothes they could wash and resell in their neighborhood on the outskirts of town.
Our mission was to meet the people who lived at the dump and give them water and food, hopefully, with them seeing Jesus in our eyes.
So, we unloaded the water and several bags of ham and cheese sandwiches that we had made the night before. Then, with the boys carrying about 500 bottles of water and the girls carrying 300 sandwiches, we went on our way to feed the hungry.
And, as usual, we soon found out that we were short a couple hundred sandwiches but we would feed who we could.
As we were leaving the vehicle, not really knowing what to expect, Rafa encouraged us to smile at the people as we dished out the goods. We proceeded on our way with a sense of purpose to feed and water as many as we could and try to let them see Jesus in our eyes.
Since we had enough kids to attack the mountain of refuse from different directions, we divided everything up for three groups and headed for the mountain. It stretched three hundred yards wide and forty feet tall and it was covered with so many people that looked like ants swarming a carcass. It was kind of an eerie sight resembling a natural disaster of remnant survivors.
Speaking of carnage, most of us had to pass a maggot infested pile formed from the slaughter of several cows and within a few yards from the mass of slaughter were the living quarters of some of the landfill entrepreneurs.
As we began climbing the pile, people just seemed to appear before us with open hands and broad smiles as word reached them that someone was handing out food and water. We tried to focus on women and children when possible, but the men were the greatest recipients as there were simply more of them.
At the front of the pile, the dump trucks backed in as 10-15 people stood ready to sift through the treasure about to be delivered. The trucks drove between the pile and a small city of huts manufactured from cardboard boxes, sheets of plywood, tarps, old freezers and refrigerators and just about everything imaginable that could be found in a dump.
These crude huts provided a refuge of sorts from the sun and each other.
It was so obvious that a child could never feel safe in this environment of crazies.
The place reminded me of a twisted society where absolutely everything goes. A team member spoke of seeing a pile of crack pipes lying beside a hut and Rafa took a picture of a fellow shooting heroin in the doorway. He told us that the drug addicts would sift through the pile to find enough metal to sell to a recycler and then walk around the corner, buy drugs, go to their hut, get high and swelter in the 100-degree heat until the drugs burned off and repeat the cycle. He said they chose their poverty, while others were there from all parts of Mexico merely trying to scrape up enough to feed their family working hour after hour digging for survival.
As we passed the ‘Good News’ of water and food, some faces met us with blank stares, some with toothless smiles, some with begging eyes, some with crazed looks, and some with angel faces…and all were glad to receive what we freely gave.
We left covered in the dusty landfill stench, hot, dehydrated and blessed with the notion that on this day we served the Lord and his people.
THOUGHTS OF THE HUNTER KIND:
In thinking back on how many times I have looked into the eyes of the poor, I remember one consistent sight… it’s gratitude. It’s so humbling to see a child or elderly person just hoping for enough food to live another day and hand them a sandwich. They usually always smile and I cry inside suffering for them in the moment as I think Jesus did.
But, He gave them everything he had. And, I never have…
PRAYER OF THE HUNTER KIND:
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger, or sword? …For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8: 35, 38-39
Lord, I know that you have exposed me to the least so that I may be convicted to move…so move me Jesus. Create in me a heart of generosity, as it has always blessed me. I love You Jesus! Amen.
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