After far too much time, I finally write to share about the World Relief medical trip. A lot happened leading up to this trip, which made me feel like it would maybe never happen. However, we finally were able to set off on our three day trip throughout Tamaulipas to visit three cities and share medical care and Jesus. We did not even make it out of Reynosa before the supply truck had engine problems and had to stay behind (they caught up later). Then, right outside of Cd. Victoria, our bus's tire peeled like a banana, so we had another three hour delay.
We finally wound our way through the mountains and arrived at Llera Thursday afternoon. The trip there was beautiful, green and mountainous, which is exciting to those of us who live in a very brown, dusty Reynosa. There were hundreds of people waiting for us so we got right to work. The clinic had several stations including: triage, doctor consults, dental care, physical therapy, counseling, pharmacy, health maintenance (where we hand out health kits, etc) and an area where kids can go to hear Bible stories and receive a Bible story book, crayons, etc. We ended up seeing around 350 on Thursday afternoon. When we finished up they took the team to stay in some cabins outside of town a little ways. We were all so tired when we finally ate dinner at about 10:30 pm, but we tried to appreciate all the special effort the local people had gone to to make us feel welcome. We had our carne asada in the moonlight and were serenaded, which was really special.
Friday morning, before we left, the DIF people, led by the mayor's wife Paty, made a breakfast for us. It was really delicious, and the biggest hit was the pineapple/chaya juice. Before we left we sang "How Great Thou Art," and were surprised to see the Paty weeping as we sang. She told us that that particular hymnhas been a prayer on her heart for the last few months. She believes that God gave the charge of Llera to her and her husband, as the mayor, and she had been trusting Him to provide help for them to do the work. She saw this group as His answer to that prayer.
Friday morning we headed to Soto la Marina and were able to attend again around 400 people. Some friends from Reynosa also came down and provided eye exams and glasses, which was a big hit. Saturday we headed back toward Reynosa and stopped to work in the small town of Mendez. We saw around 350 people. It was nice to get back to Reynosa to rest Saturday evening and Sunday.
Monday and Tuesday we held clinics in Reynosa. Although there is more access to medical in Reynosa than in the small towns we had visited further into Mexico, we found there to be more sickness. Probably in great part to the dust and pollution of our industrial city, many kids had coughs, colds, and skin conditions possibly related to being exposed to unclean water. Our first day we had clinic right outside a kindergarten and saw over 400 people. On day two we worked under a bridge, only a short distance from the Rio Grande river. We saw around 450 on day two.
Overall it was a beautiful experience with a lot of faith lessons to be learned. We understand that the medicines will only last a little while, and the food we distributed even less time. However, we were able to distribute God's Word, which He promises will not return to Him void but will accomplish the purpose for which it was sent (Isaiah 55!). We also were able to share the message of Hope and that God has not forgotten about the people of Llera or Soto La Marina or Mendez or Reynosa.
