The group this week was a mix of three different churches: Rockvale from Murfreesboro, TN, Southside from Lexington, KY and Central from Sparta, TN. The translator line up was Sara Robb, Matt Moore and myself. You never would have known that this team consisted of people from different cities and states, because they worked so well together, and worked hard, also.
After the long week last week without much of a break between groups, we were pretty exhausted. And just our luck, this group stayed an extra day as well. This meant we got no break at all between groups, which means that I’m more exhausted that I’ve been in a long time. But it’s a wonderful kind of exhausted, the kind where I know I have to rely on God to keep giving me strength to do his work in the Baja.
The group in Camalu this week did a clinic, with a doctor, a pharmacist and an optometrist. I translated with Dr. Ty Webb, a general family doctor, and Sara translated for Dr. Terry Connor, the optometrist. Dr. Janet Webb (wife of Ty) was the pharmacist, and she grabbed me or the trip leader’s wife, who also spoke Spanish, when she needed some help explaining medications.
While the clinic was happening, there was a crew doing benevolence shopping, organizing, packaging and delivering and another crew doing carpentry, cement and roofing.
We knew that the group would be in Camalu until Friday morning and that Matt was leaving Wednesday night to pick up Baja Missions Director Rex Watson and his wife Phyllis in San Diego as they arrived early to prepare for their trip to San Quintin. What we did not know was the scary turn for the worse the trip would take on Wednesday and the impact it would have on the group, and in a small way on me in particular.
Wednesday morning I was woken up by Matt banging on my door at 5:20 a.m. When I stumbled to the handle and opened the door, expecting him to tell me one of my parents died because why else would you violently bang on someone’s door so early, I heard what happened.
Liz, 19 years old and one of the girls on the trip, had been complaining of leg pain for a day or two, and she woke up because her leg was hurting a lot more than usual. She asked the doctor to look at it, because she was loosing feeling in her entire leg and her toes were turning blue and black. His first thought and worst nightmare was that it was a blood clot, so Dr. Webb, Jay (the trip leader), Matt and Liz piled in a van and rushed to San Diego to get Liz to a hospital. If she did in fact have a blood clot and it moved to any vital organ, well you know what could happen.
Matt told me what might be happening to Liz, that he was headed to San Diego and that Sara was throwing up, so I’d be the only translator all day. He then told me to have a good day, shine bright and that this is what I’d been trained for. (We received no training). So that frantic Wednesday, we checked on Sara a few times, got phone call and text updates from the group with Liz whenever we could, and I ran around like a translator with her head cut off helping everyone I could.
I worked in the clinic, but then I’d need to run to the eye doctor, and then to the concrete crew or to talk to the registration table or the preacher about supplies. Luckily Elizabeth, the nurse who was seeing patients in place of Dr. Webb, knew Spanish so I only had to help when the patient’s problem was weird or hard to explain. Julio, the preacher from Erendira, came to VBS that night and saved the day by translating the adult class, while Elizabeth did the kids class and I did the teen class.
Liz is in the hospital in San Diego, and probably will be for a week or more. They found a large clot in her thigh and another clot behind her knee, which is completely terrifying and such a blessing that she made it to the hospital in time.
Jay and Ty got back Thursday night in time for church and to wrap up the trip with the last group devo. They were both obviously really impacted by what happened with Liz, since they were with her in the 3-4 tense hours on the way to the hospital. Ty talked to us in devo about how he was nervous that at any moment, he could turn around and Liz would be gone. He thought about the explaining he’d have to do to her parents about why he couldn’t help her.
Then he told us that he had a change of thought. “We put so much value and worth into this life we have. Now don’t get me wrong, I love this life. But if God came to me right now and said he was ready for me, I’m sorry but I’d be gone. When we got to the hospital and everything calmed down a little bit, I almost wanted to apologize to Liz for helping to save her life, because I know that if something did happen and she did die in the van, she’d be dancing and smiling with Jesus right now,” he said.
Someone else mentioned how impacted they were by the attitudes the people down here have towards material possessions. Spending time with Christian brothers and sisters is so much more important to them than having a nice house or a new car or designer clothes. Living as Americans, we are the rich man that the Bible talks about, and we need to stop putting so much meaning and value into the material things we have. They are going to rust and rot and decay. We need to focus and value things that are eternal.
As you can see, from events that happened and God-given wisdom spoken through some amazing people, I’ve adjusted my focus a little bit. And after 5 weeks, that was very necessary.
I’m at the point in the summer where I’m completely exhausted all the time. Until now, I’ve been able to catch up on sleep between groups, but now I’m relying on God and some caffeine to keep me awake and alert, and neither one of them has let me down yet.
This week is really special, because it’s my group and my church. I’ve worked with San Quintin each spring break and summer for the past three years. I’ve been coming with Mayfair for the last two summers, so I’m really close to this group.
Mayfair sets the standard for mission trips in the Baja. Though numbers are down this year due to a hotel fiasco and they’ve brought around 50 people, they normally bring about 90 people. This year, there are 3 dentists, an optometrist, a pediatrician and maybe another doctor or two. Besides the clinic, the group entertains hundreds of kids during the day and hosts them for a VBS each night. They also do a ladies class, men’s class and teen class. Rex’s wife Phyllis runs the kitchen, and let me tell you, it’s good eats all week in San Quintin. Put that on top of getting to stay at the Old Mill, a beautiful hotel on the ocean, complete with a pier and palm trees, and you see why it’s my favorite place to be It’s safe to say that their group is a well-oiled machine.
The people I’ve grown the closest to and love the most are in San Quintin. While it’s been fun getting to know new kids and preachers’ families, I’m excited to go where I’ll see some familiar faces, and get to give out some pictures from spring break!
Hope everyone reading this is having a great week. Keep praying for the work down in Baja and thanks for your continued support!
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