Recent news reports from Northern Mexico have focused on violence between rival drug cartels vying for lucrative drug trade routes and territories. While most of this violence involves the cartels battling with each other and with law enforcement, there have been a few (apparently) innocent bystanders affected. Seems that all we hear is gloom and doom and that the entire region is a hot spot. For that reason I wanted to share a testimony of what is happening in Hermosillo.
On Sunday, March 15 a volunteer team of 31 Southern Baptists arrived in Hermosillo from FBC, Borger, Texas. The team included two staff members, several adult sponsors, and a mixture of high school and university students. They drove three of their church vans from the Texas panhandle (approximately 1000 miles one way) and entered Sonora via Nogales. They passed through Nogales without incident and drove south along Mexico Highway 15, also without incident. The group stayed at the La Siesta Motel in Hermosillo. Over the next 4 1/2 days they accomplished a number of evangelistic events and had a tremendous response from the people. Here’s a recap of the week:
Sunday, March 15–participated in Sunday evening services at a local church “In Christ There is Hope”. Afterwards they enjoyed late night carne asada at a local taco stand.
Monday, March 16–In the morning, in support of church planting project “Las Lomas” the group knocked on 400 doors and presented gospel portions, evangelistic tracts, and invitations. At least three people received Christ at their front door. In the afternoon, the group hosted a block party which was attended by about 80 people. The group performed an evangelistic drama called “Freedom” There were a number of decisions for Christ and a significant number of people gave their names and addresses for followup. They had lunch at the food court of a local mall, and dinner at a local hot dog stand.
Tuesday, March 17–In the morning, the group performed the same drama at two different parks, not far from the block party site. There were at least 40 people at the first site and at least 100 at the second site. Again, a significant number of people indicated a desire to follow Christ and gave their names and addresses for followup. In the afternoon, the group returned to the block party site, where at least 130 people came to participate and view the drama once again. Final count was about 12 professions of faith and a total of 50 follow up names. They had lunch again at the food court and dinner at VIPS restaurant (similar to Denny’s).
Wednesday, March 18–The group moved to a different area of the city in support of church planting project “Villas del Sur”. In the morning, the group knocked on approximately 450 doors with gospels, tracts, and invitations. At least 5 people prayed to receive Christ at their front doors and many more gave names and addresses for followup. In the afternoon, the group performed the evangelistic drama in two nearby parks and registered a similar number of decisions and followup opportunities. On Wednesday night, the group performed the drama at the “In Christ There is Hope” church. At least 50 people viewed the drama (mostly church folks) and there were about 5 decisions for Christ who gave followup data. The group had late night tacos again at the carne asada stand. The group enjoyed lunch at the university plaza (food vendor carts) and dinner at Tacos Jass (carne asada).
Thursday, March 19–The group performed the evangelistic drama in two more locations in Villas del Sur. At least 50 people viewed the drama and about 20 people made decisions and/or gave their names for followup. In the afternoon, the group returned to the park nearest the literature distribution area (Wednesday morning) for a final drama presentation and block party. At least 250 people showed up for the block party consuming 300 hot dogs, 200 ice-pops, 56 liters of beverages, and a zillion suckers. We are still tabulating the contact cards from the event, but the response was tremendous. The group enjoyed Pollo Feliz (Happy Chicken) for lunch and an all-you-can-eat Italian buffet for dinner.
From Monday through Thursday, the group drove back and forth across the city for a total of about 600 kilometers per vehicle. We saw ZERO violence. We encountered ZERO military checkpoints, we heard ZERO gunshots, we saw ZERO police checkpoints. As far as we know, there were ZERO drug-related murders in our city this week. The group members jogged near their hotel. They stopped at Starbucks and Dairy Queen for treats. They went downtown to shop. The situation in Hermosillo is calm. Because the peso is weak right now, few people are making the trip to Arizona to shop. Businesses here are booming. Traffic is growing heavier. There is housing market slowdown, and some layoffs in certain job sectors.
During the week. at least 17 different national partners participated in one or more of these events. That made a total of 50 on our evangelism team this week.
Two young couples in the group are seriously considering service with the IMB. Two or three university students asked about the possibility of returning next summer to spend the entire summer working with us. One parent on the trip promised to help her daughter raise funds to return next year for the summer.
We are deeply grateful for what God is doing in our city. We are also grateful for this dedicated team of Southern Baptists who came to help us. Please pray for us as we begin a process of followup with at least 120 contacts or more.
