M300 Ministries - Home of the Mighty Warriors - Mexico: What If The North were South?

Mexico USA

WHAT IF THE NORTH WERE SOUTH?

This question came up about 5 years ago when I was on mission to a very poor Hispanic country. Right now, being on mission in the poorest barrios (neighborhoods) on the Mexican side of the border has stirred this question up again. This question feels as big as Hurricane Katrina and it vexes both the heart and the spirit. What if the North were South?
You may ask yourself what could that question possibly mean to me? Open your eyes, your heart and your mind to consider this thing...

If the North were South and the South were North, then how would you feel about the following?

How would you want your super elite and rich "neighbors" of Mexico to treat you?
What would you want for them to do for your starving children?
What about when they come to you to "do missions"...How should they act around you?
What would you want for them to think when you being dirty, cold, sick and hungry praise God and thank Him for the Mexicans sharing their food and resources with you?
How would you feel when a rich Mexican came up with the bright idea to have a game of soccer, but you and your friends just look around and shrug knowing that none of you have or have ever had a soccer ball?
What about playing street soccer in the rain and in the middle of the street with a plastic water bottle serving as a soccer ball? Would you do it or just go home?

Street soccer at Rio Bravo, Mexico using a plastic water bottle

     Questions like these are at the root of the question: What if the North were South? It is at the root because Jesus became all things to all men, as did the Apostle Paul, who did so with the intention of saving some. Are all people in Mexico poor? Certainly not but there are overwhelming numbers of economically poor peoples here. Many are economically poor but spiritual treasure houses. They Christians here are a people refined by trials and fire. A Christian people who rise up and say, "Bless you and bless the Lord".
      These thoughts have been swirling in my mind this week like a loudly in my mind this week like a great hurricane. The fact is that most of my fellow countrymen have never been to a place where God's physical blessings are not poured out abundantly and daily upon the inhabitants. Think about that thought because the USA is a blessed nation only because God is blessing it. The times are quickly approaching when God will not be able to bless our nation in such a way. Many will wonder why and the answer is that our nation on many levels has turned it's back on God. Our nation has thumbed it's nose at God. God cannot bless a nation that does not exercise justice and righteousness.
     Randy and Donna Denton of Spirit and Truth Ministries operated feeding programs for the poorest barrio children in several border towns and cities. Today in Rio Bravo, Mexico on a day when normally over 150 kids would be here getting what may well be their only meal for the day...they are not here.

The weather was too bad causing the water and mud to be to high and thick to cross. The children and their parents made a decision to stay home today. To forgo the meal in order to preserve health. How do you stay home and not eat in order to preserve your health? The choice to stay home was likely made by parents who have no hot water to bathe their children in. If they chose to stay home instead of eating it will likely mean that they made a choice to not eat today, or at least this morning, in lieu of coming out and wading through the high water, rain and cold weather. For the third world areas these choices are ingrained in survival. Questions like:

Do I risk going to get a meal and risk getting sick or is it better to stay home and try to find a dry spot to ride out the storms?

What if the North were South? What would you choice be... brave the storm and risk sickness or trying to find a dry spot to preserve your health?
Make the choice...go ahead... I dare you to think in those terms when you think about what missionaries and those they work with are faced with in simple matters of do I eat today or not?

The missionary has to be aware that kids and families make such choices based on reasoning and intellect that we may not have. That reasoning and intellect is often derived over years of exposure to poverty and hurting. Most of us can't even go there, not even in our imaginations! Have you ever held a sick child in a 3rd world country and heard his mother say, "Take him...I have no way to care for him". Or have you ever prayed with 150 hungry kids who were thanking God for the blessing of a single meal by telling the Lord how great He is for caring for them.

What if the North were South? How would you think? What choices would you make to survive?

There are kids here who speak like this... "Alla en el Norte, todo esta bien" ...meaning "there in the North everything is good".
This creates in me a thought of the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus and how the rich man had all that he desired in life. He had all that he set his eyes upon.

I wonder what would the rich man look like today?

Would he be a guy like you?
Would he have a nice house, a nice car or two or three... a really nice bass boat and a RV?
Would he casually golf several times a month dropping large sums of money to entertain himself?
Would he spend his life on all of the pleasures of the eye and spices of life?
Would that Rich man look liks you?
Would he be clothed in fine linen like Nike, Polo, or Abercrombie?
Would that Rich man and his wife and kids spend 10 times as much on dog food in an average year, than his church family combined spends on missions.
Could it be that anyone could be this Rich?

From right here in Rio Bravo, Mexico not far from our national borders it is pretty easy to catch a glimpse of what both the Rich Man and Lazarus may have looked like. That Rich man in the Bible may have plenty of twins running around in our country.
What about the poor man...what woud he look like today?

Would the poor "like Lazarous", be like these folks who sacrificially give of themselves 5 days a week to cook for hungry kids and to serve them, even as their own feet are overtaken by rising flood waters?
1. Could the poor man, Lazarus, look like most everyone that you would meet in the barrios (poorest neighborhoods)
2. Could Lazarus look like that guy across the street who has been washing out his radiator for 3 days straight because the dirt, grime and mud are overpowering here?
3. Could Lazarus look like one of these hungry kids?

Lazarus was blessed by God with rest in the bosum of Abraham, while the rich man suffered in Hades. How could that be? Why would it be? It is because Jesus said that the greatest commandments are to Love the Lord our God with all of our heart, mind and strength and to love our neighbor as ourselves. Do you love your Mexican neighbors? Do you love your Canadian neighbors? Do you even know your neighbor?

Kids here say these kinds of things: "Cuando soy adulto me voy a pasar alla al Norte".... "When I am an adult I am going to pass over to the North" The hollow spot in that dream is that some do and find that it is not what they thought. Some do so legally and some illegally but this border region is like a great gulf that is fixed between us, just like the great gulf fixed between Hades and Paradise so that passage is not possible.
The kids ask: Es todo el dinero Americano hecho de cobre.... ? "Is all of the American money made out of copper? They think copper is of high value and it does have value. Some wayward adults break into homes or buildings under construction and steal the copper wiring to melt down and sell. You can see as a child in this environment the idea of all American money being made of copper would mean that it is very valuable.
They point out a few kids here and there and they say: "Ella es de alla...del Norte...", "She is from there...from the North..." and it is usually a child who was born in the US or had been carried in to live with family members there. Sometimes they come back to visit local family and they are always seen as different. They are not from here any longer because they have passed to the North.

What if the North were South? What would you do? What would you say? How would you feel? How would you feel about your Lord? How would you want to be treated? How would all things be?

Job 24:5 Like wild donkeys in the desert, the poor go about their labor of foraging food; the wasteland provides food for their children.