Crossing Borders: all about relationship

This update is from Lee Berger, director of Crossing Borders, one of GCI Generations Ministries’ short-term mission groups.

This June, we conducted our 15^th Crossing Borders mission trip into Mexico. Ten GCI missionaries spent eight days sharing services and resources with our ministry partners in Mexico.

Those we served in Mexico deeply appreciated the food, clothing and other physical resources we gave them. However, they told us over and over that, “if you came to see us and did not bring even one box of any physical thing, the most important thing is that you came.”

These people need to be noticed, listened to and to know that God loves them and to know that we are their friends and are glad to share life with them. It is all about relationship!

While in Mexico, we spent two days building a new home for a family; we fed and prayed for people who had been deported from the U.S.; we handed out hundreds of meals and clothing to the homeless and other needy people; we reconnected with a family we built a house for last summer; we held a worship service in a park; we distributed $1,000 worth of Bibles; and we cared for dozens of orphans and other children—playing with them, feeding them, taking them on outings, laughing with them and hugging them to the point that we all had tear-filled eyes when we said our goodbyes.

A few weeks before the trip, we arranged with one of our Mexican pastor friends to help build a house for a needy family in Mexico. We sent money ahead to buy supplies and hire workers, but a week before we arrived the family’s baby girl—their only child—died from a birth defect. With all the emotional trauma and the funeral, we were not sure about the status of the house-building.

As it turned out, we were able to build the house. The father worked with us every day and we visited with the mother and other members of the family on several occasions. Not only were we able to help provide the family with their first home, we were blessed to spend time with them, praying with them, and offering comfort in their time of great loss.

Each mission trip is truly a blessing from the Father, Son and Spirit—an opportunity to share in their love for people. Whether close to home or “across the border,” it is all about relationship.