Where is Home?

Where is Home?

We traveled 30 hours over the course of 3 days this week to get to Florida to spend time with our family for Christmas. That’s right, we DROVE our car from Mexico City to the Tampa Bay Area. We did it with 2 little kids, too.

Are we crazy? Probably. But the question that I have been asking myself is “Where is home?” Something weird happens to you when you live for a while outside of your homeland. You start to wonder where your home really is.

Someone once said that home is where your heart is. But what do you do when your heart is in two different places?

One of our missionary friends tells the story of his son who was called out of the audience when they went to an amusement park in Nicaragua. When they asked him where he was from, he said, “I’m from here”, even though everyone in the audience knew that he wasn’t born in Nicaragua. But to him, he was “from” there. Sometimes, I feel the same way.

So, where is home for us? Our house is in Mexico. Our family is in Florida. Our job is in Mexico. Many of our friends live in Florida. I honestly don’t know where home is. It’s confusing.

I guess it shouldn’t be that confusing, though. Our citizenship is in heaven (Philippians 3:20). This world is not our home. Our home is not in Florida or in Mexico.

But sometimes it’s hard to explain that. So, “going home” for me is always going to the location that is different than where I am at the time. Next week, we’ll be “going home” to Mexico. Last week, we were “going home” to Florida. Are you confused yet? We are.

Anyone else ever felt that way?

The Wonder of Christmas

The Wonder of Christmas

I love Christmas! It’s definitely my favorite time of the year. I love everything that comes with the Christmas season. I love both the secular and the sacred parts of Christmas.

We recently took the boys to get their pictures taken with Santa Claus. In Mexico, it seems as though the malls compete with each other to see who can have the best Christmas display. The one we took the boys to had a little area where the kids could write their letter to Santa and then stick it in the mailbox for him.

I love the look of wonder and excitement (and hope) on Nathan’s face as we do all of this stuff. Christmas is a wonderful time. Wonder-Full, or full of wonder. It’s because a long time ago, baby Jesus came to save the world. I’m filled with wonder as I contemplate all that this celebration entails.

Writing a letter to Santa Mailing our letter to Santa

One of my favorite bands, Third Day, sings a song called “Christmas Like a Child.” The lyrics go like this:

I want to feel Christmas, how it used to be
With all of its wonder falling on me
This season has felt so empty, oh for quite a while
I want to feel Christmas like a child

I want to see snowflakes fall to the ground
My brothers and sisters all gathered around
Singing “Away In A Manager” as we sit by the fire
I want to feel Christmas like a child

It’s been so long now, I can’t say
Just when I lost my way
But I’m going back to how it was
When this day meant everything
And we spent our time remembering
The baby Child born for us

It’s all about Jesus, asleep in the straw
This infant, this King, this Savior for all

So I don’t need bells to be ringing
‘Cause I’ll join with angels singing Gloria
And I can feel Christmas like a child
I want to feel Christmas like a child…

I pray that your Christmas will be filled with wonder and that you can experience it like a child, with all of the excitement and joy that comes with it.

Christmas Newsletter 2008

We can’t believe 2008 is already coming to a close. It has been exciting to see all the things that have happened this year. This year has brought many great things, and we want to thank you for your support, prayers, and encouragement throughout the year.

You can download our Christmas Newsletter right here (PDF).

We are looking forward to 2009 and what God is going to do in our personal lives, our family, and in the ministry in Latin America. We are attempting great things for God, and we are expecting great things from Him.

Keep coming back here to ymimexico.org to see what is happening in our lives and in the ministry. You can also subscribe to our RSS feed here.

If you want to receive our email newsletter or our snail mail newsletter, please sign up here.

Thanks again for your interest in our family and the ministry of Youth Ministry International in Latin America.

Culture, Youth ministry, and a Japanese guy

Culture, Youth ministry, and a Japanese guy

“Identify the culture to use the culture to reach the culture” is a phrase that comes up often at both Youth Ministry International and the youth ministry classes at the Mexican Baptist Theological Seminary. Today it was something that slipped my mind.

I was in the airport with Jon and Nicolle awaiting their flight back to the United States, and we saw the Japanese guy who has been living in the Mexico City airport for a few months. Since he’s pretty much a celebrity, we decided to ask if we could have our picture taken with him. But we went about it completely wrong.

Jon and I approached the guy and asked him if he spoke Spanish. He just stared at us. Then we asked about English. We thought that surely he would speak English. Again we were met with a blank stare. Finally I motioned like I was taking a picture and he nodded in approval. We finally got what we wanted, but things could gave gone so much better.

As we returned to our table in the food court, we started talking about what we should have done differently.

For starters, we should not have assumed he would speak English. How ethnocentric of us! We looked up a few Japanese phrases after the fact that would have been useful in our quest. Basic phrases like good morning and how are you would have helped greatly. It’s always a good idea to speak people’s language.

We also should have treated him as a person. We really just wanted to say we had seen him, so we didn’t try to ask how he was or engage in small talk. People are much more open if you treat them like people and not like objects.

No wonder he’s looking at me funny in the picture.

I’m sure there are other things that we did wrong today, but reflecting on these two big mistakes will hopefully help me in the future.