Immigration... Understanding the Divide between Mexico and the United States

As someone who has served as a missionary in Mexico for over 25 years, there is one thing people from the US always want to ask me about, and no, it’s not water. It’s immigration, and usually it's phrased benignly, like this… “Dave, what are your thoughts on immigration.”

This question, perhaps as a result of the coming presidential elections, is not just being asked here in the US. I’m also getting the same question from my south of the border friends. But the  question there goes something like this… “¿David, que pienses de Trump?” Or “Dave, what do you think of Trump.”

For better or worse, Donald Trump has raised the immigration issue to a level not seen in years, both in the US, and in Mexico.

I believe that if you are going to be about Jesus in another country, you owe it to that country to get to know her. For me, that goes well beyond what many feel are the typical ‘missionary” issues, things like food and the local church cultures. For one to thrive in a foreign land, develop the relationships necessary for success, and convince locals you truly love them like God does, requires a strong dose of cultural intelligence, to use a phrase coined by noted author David Livermore.

I’ve thought a lot about this issue over the years. I’ve been an employer in numerous jobs, responsible for hiring thousands of people both here in Nevada and in Southern California. I’ve had to deal with I-9’s both as a boss, and as an employee myself. I’ve worked alongside and yes, have hired illegal workers from around the world. And I’ve had both good and bad employees from both sides of that issue.

While my Spanish is not perfect, and I doubt it ever will be as I came to the language late in life, I can sit and have the conversation with the two major sides of this issue fairly competently in both languages. This includes both my hard right and my lefty lib friends in the US and business owners and poor indigenous farmers in Mexico, and everyone between. 

In short, over the years I’ve built enough of a rebel image, that people from all sides feel comfortable talking to me and expressing their views, no matter where they stand on immigration.

My first real conversation about this in Spanish was with a group of college students in Guadalajara almost 20 years ago. We were at a weekend retreat and a few of them decided to ask me about immigration. Truthfully, back then I had no real “side” in the debate, but I could argue. We talked long into the early morning hours. It was, and remains, one of my favorite nights ever in Mexico. I learned so much that night. About immigration yes, but also about how people think, feel and experience life in general in Mexico.

That was the beginning of understanding the issue of immigration as much more than just a series of laws, fences, walls, and regulations designed to keep people in, or out. It is an issue that divides friends, countries, families, and even churches. Simply put, few issues between our two countries are as emotionally charged as immigration. 

Like all difficult issues, workable solutions are not going to be easy and no side will, nor should, get everything they want. Simply imposing one sided solutions from the US, no matter how good that might make us feel, will not get to the root of, or solve the problem. 

Conversely, Mexico cannot escape the fact that they have a role to play in this ongoing drama. It is the responsibility of government to care for her citizens, within her own borders. While the US is guilty of sometimes being a rotten big brother, the Mexican government has at times acted like a petulant adolescent and struggles to take responsibility for their own actions related to immigration, even as they are currently deporting more illegal immigrants than does the US.¹

Any solution is going to be difficult and costly. To be effective, it will involve political sacrifice, from the heights of the Mexican government, to the most seemingly insignificant US Congressman. On the line here are billions of dollars, years of political grandstanding, national pride, jobs, and of course, peoples lives.

We should also acknowledge that while many in the US are fixated on Mexico as it relates to immigration, a large percentage, 48%, of those who come to the US illegally are from countries other than Mexico.² Additionally, new research shows rather than allegedly sneaking in, the largest group of people in the US illegally enter under the full authority of the US Government, on approved VISAS, and then, overstay their welcome. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes not.³ 

Of the more than 11 million immigrants here illegally in 2014, over 5 million are from countries other than Mexico.  This means that even if we secure our southern border completely, no small feat, we will still have a significant amount of illegal immigration to our country.

Where do we start? First is education. 

Before you can have a solution, you have to understand the problem. I’ve laid out a few facts above as they relate to Mexico, but there is more. Here are a few questions I typically hear from folks in the US.

Why can’t Mexicans follow the rules like people who come here from other countries? 

This is a fair question, if there were in fact rules. The premise is also false, as the facts show. The difference between 48% and 52% is so small that in reality, people from other countries are no more likely to follow the rules than our neighbors to the south. To put it bluntly, you are just as likely to run into a person here illegally from Germany or China as you are Mexico.

But the problem runs deeper. Literally, for Mexicans there are few hard and fast rules, other than you cannot cross the border without permission. For someone trying to visit, or immigrate to the US from Mexico the process can be cumbersome, slow, and costly. If you desire to come for a visit, add arbitrary to the list. Our government routinely denies tourist VISAS without ever providing a reason why, after the applicant has seemingly met all the requirements listed on the appropriate web sites and has paid his or her fees. 

I call this “hunch or feeling based” judgement. And while we all know that at times, yes, hunches can be very accurate, they are not a way for a country to effectively conduct foreign policy. We certainly do not want countries determining how they relate to us based on hunches or feelings. We want, and expect there to be sensible, fair, dispassionate laws to govern those interactions.

To immigrate to the US, a person must have a passport and then make an appointment with a US Consulate office for a pre-visit, or immigration interview. The cost for that interview can be significant, depending on the number of people in your family. In addition to the “official” costs, there are costs for required medical exams, hotel stays, meals in transit, etc. Add it all up and the cost just for the appointment process can run into the thousands of dollars. 

All of that must be paid in advance, with no guarantee of your approval, sort of like a lottery. Imagine saving for years, paying all of your fees and then being told no.

Let me put that in perspective for you. For a family of four, that cost could easily reach $5000.00US when you include everything. That’s about half of the $10,000.00 family GDP in Mexico.⁴   Conversely, with the average US family GDP at $52,000.00, that family of four in the US would have to pay approximately $26,000.00 to have the same burden as a Mexican family.⁵ How many families here in the US can afford to play in such an expensive lottery, risking half their family income?

But rules are rules, and I get that. Just understand, that the rules are pretty stacked against the poorest of the poor, the ones who truly need a helping hand to feed their families, those that are sneaking across the border to put a few extra tortillas on the table, ala Jean Valjean in “Les Miserables.”

But Dave, people ask, aren’t illegal immigrants taking jobs from able bodied Americans?

Again, the answer to this question is multifaceted. I’ve stated that I have hired illegal workers in the past. That was primarily when I was in the construction industry in Southern California. Here’s a simple truth I encountered. Without this workforce, construction in So Cal and many other areas would grind to a halt.

Builders have to make a profit, or else they will not build. There is always a maximum amount a builder/developer can afford to spend on production and still make their margin. Contrary to what people may wish to believe, there really are caps on what people will spend on real estate, even in sunny Southern California.

No builder can pay a salary that makes the house he just built more expensive then the market will bear. The problem is this, hard as it is to hear, and even say… fewer and fewer Americans will work at the rate the builder requires to make his profit in the marketplace. A good example of this is the housing market in Southern Nevada. Currently the timeline from start to finish of new home construction is slower than normal and what would be most profitable for a developer. The reason for this? Lack of qualified workers in the construction trades, due partly to a net drop in immigration to the US from Mexico.⁶ 

When asked the obvious question, about whether higher pay rates would make up that difference, Keith Lynum, President of the Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors put it bluntly recently on KNPR, explaining that the increase in wages would drive prices beyond what people would pay.⁷ Simply put, it is often more profitable to use labor that will work for a wage that some will consider sub-par. Not illegal, but sub-par.

For years I managed a crew of primarily painters, working for $15.00 an hour, plus the taxes we paid for them. They lived together, pooled resources and saved money for the day they could buy their own homes. Again, many Americans will not work, or live like that. In the Los Angeles area, where simply renting a room in a middle class neighborhood runs upwards of $750.00 a month plus utilities, a job paying roughly $2400.00 a month before taxes will not go very far.

Today, everyone of those guys who worked with me is married, has kids, is legal and just like when they started, contributes to the American economy.

Let’s look at another example, farming. We are told to listen to those in the know, and for agriculture, that means farmers. Overwhelmingly they report that without immigrant labor, much of it illegal, they would be unable to harvest their crops at a reasonable price. Many farmers speak of leaving fields fallow for want of people to process the harvest.⁸

Farmers too have a maximum they can pay their help and make a profit. And that maximum resides in our pocketbooks. Most of us already believe we pay far too much for the trip to the grocery store. What if you were told right now you’d have to pay an additional 30% on every piece of fruit or vegetable you bought? Again, the experience of farmers is that most Americans simply will not do the back breaking work necessary at the rate they believe they can pay, and the market will support, and still make a profit. 

The bottom line is this… America is addicted to cheap labor and that cheap labor primarily comes from the hands of immigrants, legal and illegal. Think our addiction is not true? In 2011 the Texas State Legislature was working to clamp down on the hiring of illegal immigrants. The author of a proposed bill made sure to grant John Q. Public an exemption from fines and potential jail time for personally hiring illegal workers to work in his private home.⁹ 

In other words, this Texas legislator was ready to penalize corporations for hiring illegal immigrants and paying them subpar wages, but not someone living down the street, further feeding the addiction.

Be it farming, construction, gardening at your house, or even the twice a month cleaning lady, we simply talk a better game than we are willing to realistically face, especially if the issue hits us squarely in our pocketbooks. 

Why can’t they just work in their own country? Why do they have to come here?

To be sure, the short answer is a lack of good paying jobs in many parts of Mexico. But let’s look a little at how that came about. Years ago many men worked in the corn industry of Mexico. But US subsidies paid to our farmers soon radically changed that market, making it almost impossible for Mexican farmers to compete in the world market. Now with the planting of GMO corn imminent in the birthplace of corn, we can expect even more problems.¹⁰

I’ve written more on this specific issue both here and here, exploring the link between US practices as they relate to both the corn and sugar cane industry in Mexico and employment.

Suffice to say, yes, Mexico needs more jobs. But US actions have contributed to the unemployment for which many criticize Mexico. Here’s what Sidney Weintraub, a political economist with the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, DC., had to say about US practices in the agricultural world when they challenged the legality of what the US was doing… “The Mexicans never had a chance because their argument was based on fair play, and the US [argument was based] on law.”¹¹

Make no mistake, Mexico has employment issues. Too few people are able, despite educational gains, to find real, family supporting jobs. Official estimates run as high as 25% for the “underemployed” rate. In areas where I work, primarily indigenous villages, I think leaders would love to see a 25% rate. Few of the men in these areas have any kind of regular work. As the economy has struggled to recover from the world economic crisis of 2008 we are now seeing the peso getting crushed by the dollar.¹² Additionally, the employers, both private and public have been slow to embrace technology, perhaps knowing that will eliminate even more jobs, further exacerbating the situation.

Let me give you an example. 

I went to a papeleria, or a stationary store, recently in Mexico. I was greeted at the door by one worker and directed downstairs to find what I needed. I asked at the counter for poster board. The employee told me they had it and the price. I asked for five sheets and she wrote up a ticket. I then went back upstairs to pay and when I brought back the receipt, the employee directed another employee to get my five sheets.

Wrapping them up as I waited, they were then given to another employee to take them upstairs and confirm again that they had been paid for. I was finally given my poster board but before I could leave, the security guard had to check my receipt one more time. All told, 6 employees were involved in my transaction, valued at less that $5.00.

Technology and a better understanding of how to use workers would have undoubtedly cut down the number of people involved in my transaction. But that would mean fewer workers, and as we have seen across the globe, millions of idle unemployed young people, frustrated at the situation and the powers that be, can lead to social disaster. It’s the idle hands theory.

At some point, leaders in Mexico will have to address the situation in a real and practical way. Until that happens, we will continue to see the pressures of immigration, both legal and illegal from our southern neighbor. The question is in the interim, what should the US and Mexico do about it?

Many advocate for a simple, unilateral approach. Build a wall, send everyone home and call it good. It is after all, our country. America, love it, or leave it! 

This approach, while appealing to many on the surface simply denies the above realities and will only manage to anger our neighbor to the south, a major US trading partner and a source of serious economic activity in the US.¹³

That does not mean we should stand aside, do nothing, bury our heads in the sand and hope for the best, a charge leveled by many critics of comprehensive immigration reform. I believe we need a system that not only works to limit illegal immigration, but also deals compassionately, fairly and equitably with those who are already here.

I also think that any approach must be grounded in reality, be both operationally and politically workable, and ultimately, be seen as a net positive for all involved. It must also be honest about the 11 million who are already here.

There is absolutely no way we are going to be sending 11 million people back to their home countries, no matter how much people like Donald Trump, your neighbor or any other presidential candidate wishes it to be so. Strictly speaking, to do so would require an airlift not seen around the world since the days of the Berlin crisis, involving over 22,000 full Boeing 747’s to get everyone home.

So, what should we do? Or, as the original question asked, what are my thoughts on resolving this difficult issue? I do not have the solution, but I know this. Any solution that does not consider the above thoughts, is going to fail.

A final note...

The issues related to immigration are very personal to me, because I deeply love many people in both the US and Mexico who hold legitimate views on all sides of this difficult issue. As a missionary in Mexico, I believe it is my role to learn and understand as much as I can about the issues facing the Mexican people in their daily lives.

Part of that is understanding the politics, culture and history of the people I serve. Part of being effective when working within a short term framework, is putting those realities in context for the mission participants who serve alongside me.

I'd love to hear your thoughts...

1. Arce, Mark Stevenson and Alberto. "Mexico Now Deports More Central Americans than the US." Business Insider. Business Insider, Inc, 18 June 2015. Web. 28 Oct. 2015.

2.  "5 Facts about Illegal Immigration in the U.S." Pew Research Center. N.p., 24 July 2015. Web. 04 Sept. 2015. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/07/24/5-facts-about-illegal-immigration-in-the-u-s

3.  Krikorian, Mark. "On Immigration, Fighting the Last War." National Review Online. N.p., 1 Oct. 2015

4.  Pineda, Martha. "Home." GAIN Report, Mexico. http://gain.fas.usda.gov/, 19 Dec. 2013. Web. 04 Sept. 2015.

5.  Noss, Amanda. "Household Income." (n.d.): Household Income:2013. U.S. Department of Commerce, Sept. 2014. Web. https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2014/acs/acsbr13-02.pdf

6.  Barrera, Ana Gonzalez. "More Mexicans Leaving Than Coming to the U.S." Pew Research Centers Hispanic Trends Project. N.p., 19 Nov. 2015. Web. 29 Nov. 2015.

7.  "Las Vegas Real Estate Prices Stable As New Homes Come On The Market." Nevada Public Radio. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Nov. 2015.

8.  Tomson, Bill. "Farmers: Trump Terrible for Agriculture." Politico.com, 1 Sept. 2015. Web. 

http://www.politico.com/story/2015/09/donald-trump-2016-farmers-fear-argriculture-213201

9.  Riddle, Debbie. "82(R) HB 1202 - Introduced Version - Bill Text." 82(R) HB 1202 - Introduced Version - Bill Text. Rep. Debbie Riddle, n.d. Web. 04 Sept. 2015. http://www.legis.state.tx.us/tlodocs/82R/billtext/html/HB01202I.htm

10.  Bayless, Rick. "A Sad Day in Mexico." Rick Bayless. N.p., 22 Aug. 2015. Web. 05 Sept. 2015. http://www.rickbayless.com/a-sad-day-in-mexico.

11.  24, August. "WTO's Sugar Ruling Leaves Mexico Bitter." Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles Times, 24 Aug. 2005. Web. 05 Sept. 2015. http://articles.latimes.com/2005/aug/24/world/fg-sweets24.

12.  Irwin, Neil. "How a Rising Dollar Is Creating Trouble for Emerging Economies." The New York Times. The New York Times, 16 Mar. 2015. Web. 29 Nov. 2015.

13.  Villareal, M. Angeles. "U.S.-Mexico Economic Relations: Trends, Issues and Implications." U.S.-Mexico Economic Relations: Trends, Issues, and Implications (2015). www.fas.org. Congressional Research Service, 20 Apr. 2015. Web.

Culture and Missions... Don't get caught with your pants down on your mountaintop moment!

Culture. 

noun cul·ture \ˈkəl-chər\ 
     1. The beliefs, customs, arts, etc., of a particular society, group, place, or time
     2. A particular society that has its own beliefs, ways of life, art, etc.

Few things in long term cross cultural missionary work or service are, or should be as important as culture. The moment we cross a border we are entering into another culture, that essentially has, another culture.

Sadly, in my experience in the field, and within personal relationships with hundreds of missionaries [both long and short term] and pastors, the understanding of local cultures and mores takes a back seat to all the other things that are believed to more important.

Recently a group of tourists in Malaysia was hiking on Mount Kinabalu. One of the members of the group decided to issue a challenge to the others. Who could strip and stay naked the longest on the cold mountain top. Despite pleas from their guide to not do so, the group was soon buck naked on the mountain top. You can read about it here.

What they didn't understand was that this particular mountain is considered to be sacred ground by many locals. That lead to arrests after an earthquake hit the region, killing 18 other climbers. The people who stripped, the Deputy Chief Minister said, had disrespected the mountain by posing naked, thus causing the earthquake.

Now, we can argue all day whether or not their nakidity had anything to do with the earthquake, but that misses the point. If the travelers had understood the culture, or had listened to and respected the advice of their guide, they would not have been arrested and facing a host of charges and fines.

One of the hallmarks of Adventures in Life has always been our desire to learn, and give others the opportunity to learn about the culture of the people they are serving.

The Cathedral of Guadalajara

Years ago, on our first mission in Guadalajara AIL Ministry Co-founder Grady Martine and I took our team to the Cathedral of Guadalajara. As we toured the cathedral and walked on what for many people from Guadalajara was sacred ground,  one of our team members came up to me.

"Dave" he asked, "why are we wasting time here when we could be outside witnessing and saving these people?"

That attitude, that any time spent learning about the culture, is time taken away from "real" Gospel work, in my opinion, tells locals that their culture has no value. It is a prideful attitude that hurts, and ultimately builds barriers to the types of relationships we need to share about Jesus.

Chances are you will not find yourself in a situation like that group of tourists in Malaysia. But a refusal to learn the culture of the people you are called to serve, can render you just as clueless as they were, and negatively impact your Gospel mission.

When you understand the culture of people you are trying to serve, whether they live across town, or on the other side of the globe, you will be a better witness and ambassador for Jesus.

Think about it.

Want more info? Check out the resources from Dr. David Livermore on Cultural Intelligence, or CG.

Avoiding Self Absorbed Short-Term Mission... why you shouldn't just paint the fence!

Imagine you are sitting in your church one day thinking about ministry when you hear some noise going on outside.  Getting up from your chair, you decide to head out and have a look.

As you come around the corner of the building, that’s when you see them, 12 smiling faces of kids, many of them with paint on their clothes out in front of your church facility.  But it isn’t the fact that they are there that surprises you.  What really catches you off guard is what they are doing.

Those 12 young people, along with their leaders, are painting the fence in front of your church.  That’s right.  In front of your church, there are 12 people, all with paint brushes and rollers having a great time painting your church’s fence.

As you struggle to maintain your composure, you ask the leader for a moment to talk. When he comes over you ask him what exactly his group of kids are doing.  He explains that they are a mission team from another part of the country and that they have been teaching the kids to think about random acts of kindness and how they can be serve people in the name of Christ.

One of the ideas the kids came up with after driving around the city was to come to your church and paint your fence, because it “looked like it needed some work.”  And so here they were, just trying to bless you as the pastor and your congregation.

Like many pastors, you were stunned.  How could a group of people from another city, presume to know how they could serve you and your congregation without ever having had a conversation with anyone in your church?  As you shared your struggle with the leaders of the group, they were unable to understand.  As they explained to you, they were just trying to serve you, believed God had led them to your church, and were only trying to be a blessing.

Sound far fetched?  Maybe, if you live here in the United States.  But every year thousands of people leave the US on mission trips to every corner of the globe convinced that they know best what the local church over there needs, and involving themselves in mission work just like this.

How does this type of self absorbed mission happen?  I am convinced there are three main factors that are contributing to this dilemma.

Arrogance

Incredibly, it is very hard for many of us to believe that people in another country might know more about God, the Bible, Christianity, or even evangelism within their culture than we do.  I recently sat down with a few 20 somethings to talk about mission in Oaxaca.  They were convinced that they could open a training institute in that diverse area to teach pastors how to reach into indigenous villages and evangelize people and plant churches.

These well intentioned young people had never lived in the area, spoke little or no Spanish, did not speak any of the indigenous languages and understood nothing of the local culture.  Yet they were ready to get on a plane, head out to a few local villages and begin to teach locals everything they needed to know about church planting.  When I pushed them, they responded that “biblical values” would trump any cultural differences.  I could almost hear David Livermore screaming “No!” in his widely read book, Serving with Eyes Wide Open.

Like the kids above who were painting the fence, the group that wanted to serve in Oaxaca was simply assuming that they knew best what the local church needed.  It was if they believed the local leaders and pastors were just sitting around doing nothing because they did not know how to reach their people.

You see, this group of young people had the idea that if they did not get to Oaxaca and teach those local leaders, they would never know how to evangelize their unreached brethren.

Their belief in the importance of their upcoming mission was rooted in an arrogance that discounted the already ongoing work of thousands of Oaxacan Christians in sharing the Gospel under intensely difficult conditions.  Everyday Oaxacan leaders were praying for and sharing Jesus in villages across the state.  A belief that only we, as Americans know the best way to reach people for Christ is, simply stated, rooted in missiological arrogance that gets it’s expression from American Exceptionalism.

Money

Following closely on the heels of arrogance is money.  Perhaps nothing impacts current mission work and leads to the types of problems I presented above more than money.

Robert Guerrero, the Church Planting Catalyst for City to City in New York City and formerly of The Red del Camino in Latin America has worked extensively with short-term teams in his church planting ministry in the Dominican Republic.  Guerrero says that one of the most important things leaders of short-term mission teams can do is visit the field and their perspective mission partner well ahead of time.

It is this visit that gives the potential goer guest a chance to see the mission, envision what his or her team will be doing, establish a communication link and relationship with the field missionary and hear how the short term team can best serve the local mission.

With his type of personal connection, and the first hand knowledge of the mission that comes with it, it is hard to imagine a scenario where a team shows up unannounced and starts working on your facility.

Unfortunately many leaders and churches, struggling to make ends meet in an era of declining budgets, frequently eschew this vital step.  It is a penny wise and pound foolish decision.

Last spring a local church here in Las Vegas where I have my office, contacted me about sending a team to support our ministry in Oaxaca.  After a few telephone calls and a couple of face to face meetings, I suggested they come and visit our ministry in Oaxaca so they could get a real personal feel for what I was telling them.

We had a great few days last August as I was able to show them first hand how their church could get involved.  They met our partners, and perhaps most important, saw first hand what their church members could do to support the Missio Dei where we were serving.

Did it cost money?  Yes it did.  Was it worth it?  Of course, unless you believe that showing up at a strangers church and painting their fence is good mission.

The bottom line is this... good mission costs money and there are no short cuts, and that includes the final factor that leads to inefficient self absorbed mission.

Lack of Training

Perhaps more than anything else, lack of training, for both leaders and participants, leads to sub par, self absorbed missions.  That’s because the attitudes that lead to missional arrogance and a desire to do mission on the cheap have their basis in a lack of effective training.

An effective training program that crosses all phases of your mission, from pre-field orientation to post-field debriefing will catch many potential mission errors long before they become on field disasters.

When you are guided in your training and preparation by a person knowledgeable in where you will be serving and the pitfalls of short-term mission, your effectiveness in mission increases exponentially.

Effective training makes sure that participants are culturally prepared, understand the needs of the field, know that partnership is important and provide a strong biblical foundation upon which to base your mission.

Just the other day I received a telephone call from John, a Youth Pastor in the Pacific Northwest.  When he was younger, he served on numerous teams with me in Mexico. Clearly he had an idea about what he wanted his group of students to do, but then as he was sharing those ideas, he stopped.  He stopped because he wanted to share something else.  He wanted to make sure that I knew he really wanted his group to serve us, and our mission.

John grew up in a program that had been prepared for short-term mission by a first class training organization, DELTA Ministries.  His youth pastor when he was young believed in preparing his students and modeled the value of a relationship with the field through frequent non mission visits to the field and conversations with his missionary partners.

This type of experience only comes from good preparation and training.  But here’s the rub... good training costs money and unfortunately, if a group or team is looking to cut expenses, professional training and preparation is often the first to go.

Conclusion

The story I shared above is 100% true.  I was sitting in a church I had served for many years in Northern Mexico when a group of kids and their leaders from a major US Mission agency showed up and started painting.  When I heard them I went outside and asked their leaders what they were doing and if they had asked permission or had talked to anyone at the church.

They were stunned that I would even question them.  After all, they were missionaries serving God in Mexico.  Arrogance.

They were unhappy when I asked them why they had done no prep on the fence they were now painting and they said each team had a budget for these projects around the city.  Money.

And when I asked them if they were aware that they were using the wrong type of paint for the job, they explained that they just figured any white paint would work.  Lack of training.

Missions work, particularly across cultures, is hard.  It requires, in spite of what many articles and short term mission advocates may tell you, lots of time, money and preparation to get it right.

It also requires a relationship with local leaders, pastors and missionaries on the field. Almost every problem a short-term team might encounter in the field could be alleviated if only they were working alongside someone who knew the ins and outs of the culture and area where they were serving.

But this perspective comes from taking a long view of ministry and a willingness to invest mightily for effective mission.

Missions, Art and the Gospel... bridging the cultural divide

Culture: the beliefs,values, customs, arts, etc., of a particular society, group, place, or time.

That word culture is such a loaded term, especially when we get into the church related world.  Culture, and the understanding of it to many, is simply a waste of time.  Our job, as Christians, as many define it, is to convince people of the truth of Jesus and save them from Hell.  

Leaving behind the theological ramifications of that, let’s focus on the practical.

Years ago I led a team of college and young adult people on a two week short-term mission in and around Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico.  Guadalajara is literally the birthplace of what a majority of Americans know about Mexican culture.  Charro, Mariachis, Mexican pride and machismo all run deep in this region.  Arts and crafts from Guadalajara show up all over the world and who isn’t familiar with the “Jarabe Tapatio” popularly known as the Mexican Hat Dance.

But there is another sub culture if you will, that is also strong in Guadalajara, that of Catholicism.  Nowhere else in the country, including Mexico City will you experience the influence of the Catholic church like you will here.

On one of our free days with that team of young adults, we took them to the historic cathedral in the center of town and later to the Instituto Cultural Cabañas to see the great murals of Orozco. 

What I heard from the group that day might surprise you.  I was asked why we were spending time in a Catholic church when we could be outside preaching to people so they would know Christ.  After touring the museum, a couple of people asked me why, as a missionary, I was taking people to see secular stuff like art when we were there to be missionaries.  

Grady Martine, co-founder of Adventures in Life Ministry and I made an important and valuable decision that day after hearing those criticisms and reflecting.  We would always try to make sure people on mission with us returned home with a stronger understanding of the culture of Mexico.  

We needed to enter into the local culture, learn it, understand it and live it so as to give our voices credibility.  Unknowingly, we were adopting a Hudson Taylor missiology.  

We believed then, and we still do, that to serve people effectively, you need to understand their culture.  For us, confronting culture, as many missionaries did then, and still do, was not an option.

If one of our goals for people returning home after a short-term mission with us was a better understanding of Mexico, her people, the issues facing that great country and her values, we had to work hard with our participants to give them cultural learning opportunities.

It was as if we decided almost 20 years ago to embrace Cultural Intelligence [CQ] that David Livermore has popularized recently.  He defines CQ like this... Cultural intelligence is the ability to be effective across various cultural contexts—including national, ethnic, organizational, generational, ideological, and much more.

These are the reasons AIL Ministry celebrates and highlights the cultures of Mexico.  If you visit our Facebook page, you are just as likely to see in our opeing banner a picture of the Guelaguetza or an alebrije from Jacobo and Maria Angeles [carved, painted wood sculpture] as you are a group of people praying.  You might see a picture of the ancient Zapotec Empire at Monté Alban or some of those colorful Oaxacan rugs from Teotitlán del Valle.

The Apostle Paul, in his famous address on Mars Hill spoke to the philosophers of that area, the Stoics and the Epicureans.  He was able to hold his own in that particular marketplace of ideas because he understood their culture.  He was a student of culture.

Shouldn’t we be also?  Would not our mission, be it here in the United States, or somewhere else around the globe, be better for it?

You tell me...

[To learn more about the culture, art and life in Mexico, visit Dave's personal blog.  All of the pictures used here are from davemiller.mx 

The Real Work of Short-Term Mission... reflecting on the journey for long-term impact...

Your church group has just returned from a fantastic mission trip to some far-flung corner of the world, or from someplace much closer to home.

But once people get home, CNN, Twitter, soccer, school, work, and church activities have a way of crowding out the spiritual focus that, just a few days earlier, seemed certain to shape their lives.

That’s why it’s important to have an effective debriefing plan in place even before leaving home.

Roger Peterson, author of Maximum Impact Short-Term Mission and one of the founders of the Fellowship of Short-Term Mission Leaders [FSTML] says that the debriefing process, a time of reflection after your short-term mission, is more important than the actual mission. While not discounting the work that’s been accomplished, real life change comes as people return home and reflect on their experience.

Over the years I have served alongside thousands of people on mission trips in Mexico and attended countless conferences sponsored by denominations and mission organizations. Here’s what I have learned: the most effective people in God’s kingdom are the ones who take seriously the need to stop, reflect, and consider what God is saying to them through their mission.

Tim Dearborn, director of faith and development at World Vision International, says that in order for people to really gain insight from this debriefing time, they need to know what to look for. This means letting your team know ahead of time what you expect of them on their return.

Here then, are ten potential debriefing questions adapted from Tim Dearborn and Dr. David Livermore, author of Serving with Eyes Wide Open. Share them with your team before you leave, and then make sure you carve out time upon your return to reflect on them.

1. What did I learn about myself on my short-term mission?

2. What did I learn about God?

3. What did I learn about the people, the church, and the Christian community in the area where I served?

4. What did I learn about how culture impacts the ways people live and understand the gospel?

5. What did I learn about justice, economics, poverty, and politics during my short-term mission?

6. As a follower of Christ, what did I learn that can help me be a more fully devoted disciple?

7.How might my faith be different if I had grown up where I was serving, as opposed to in my home community?

8. What did I learn or experience that will change the way I live and represent Jesus in my home community and church?

9. What have I learned about my own Christian calling?

10. How can I continue to support the ongoing work in the area where I served?

There you have it. Ten questions to consider as your team returns to your home church. But let me go one step further and give you a bonus question: What difference would it make if you lived each day with the same intensity and focus on Jesus and others as you did on your mission? And then ask your team this follow-up question: What keeps you from living life at that level now?

For most of us, the lessons learned from serving on short-term mission trips may take years to fully grasp.

But that’s okay. It’s a journey.