Salvation

"Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved." - Acts 4:12

Salvation. It's a very religious word that gets tossed around and used in ways that have nothing to do with what it really means. What does it mean to have salvation? To be saved? Let's put away all religious fluff and presumption. I wager that the meaning of salvation is infinitely deeper than we could ever presume to understand.

The definition for salvation, according to Oxford's English Dictionary, is "preservation or deliverance from harm, ruin, or loss." Now, if we bring in the element of life and death, supposing that someone's life is at stake, then the definition of salvation begins to carry a lot more weight. It indicates a passage - from something destructive into something that allows life. In such an instance, it is nothing less than the difference between life and death, hope and hopelessness, freedom and helplessness.

Now. When I consider the act of Christ's crucifixion, it causes me to wonder where I fit into the picture. And here's where I think the answer lies: in salvation, from death into life.

At this point, it is necessary to consider a few things. First of all, do I believe that the soul is an eternal entity? Follow me here. Do I believe that after death, my soul doesn't just die right along with my body, but that it continues existing? Please, let's not be short-sighted and pretend that talking about this stuff doesn't matter. When I consider the reality of life's brevity, my fragility, as well as the depth of goodness that a soul can experience, it makes me highly question whether this is really all there is. This life that I am living here, I mean. I can't escape the question. Of course discussing this stuff matters.

Now I come to my next point, and that is this: What's the difference between life and death? I do not refer to mere physical death. If we're going to bring the salvation (or lack thereof) of the soul into question, then the stark differences between life and death must be considered, for there is no in-between. If salvation means life, and the opposite of salvation means death, then what does an alive soul look life? A dead soul?

I trust that we will all think for ourselves on this one, and so I will not delve too deeply into this issue. What I will do, though, is present a picture of what I consider to be a good illustration of the difference between life and death. So. Here goes.

I saw an image of myself. I was laying down on the ground, face down in the dirt, and suddenly a large herd of horses came running - loud, ominous, and fast. And then the herd was on top of me, trampling over me. It happened within a split second, my fate sealed before I could even try to get up. I felt helpless. Then, the image changed, and I saw myself actually riding one of the horses, galloping, my body positioned in a stance of determination as well as freedom, ruthlessness as well as carefree-ness, purpose as well as adventure. I was flying. I was utterly free.

The truth is, if I want life, in the great fullness of what it really means, then I must be saved. I am just being honest when I say that really, in-and-of-myself, I don't believe it can happen. I need something bigger than myself. I need the author of life itself.

To sum this all up, I feel strongly that the concept of salvation must not be trifled with. It must not be mocked, ignored, or misunderstood. Life and death exist, in all depth of meaning and actuality. And here's where the act of Christ's crucifixion comes in. What was it? An act that did not end with the hopelessness of death, but with the freedom of life. Christ did not stay dead; there is hope. And that hope is for me, when his life becomes my life. His hope my hope. His freedom my freedom.

Happenings

Today, we went to a local restaurant called Viva Mexico, which was adorned inside with colorful hanging decorations and had some of Mexico's most famous ranchero bands playing in the background over the stereo. It was a good time of being together - just hanging out, eating, and conversing.

After that, even more importantly, we went to do laundry at our nearby laundromat - a very special ritual that takes place every Saturday afternoon. Despite the wonderful fascination that folding clothes offers, being at the laundromat is an enjoyable experience for me in that I get to catch up on my reading.

What else might you want to know about the happenings at our YWAM base? How about Community Night? Every month all the staff from both El Paso (TX) and Juarez come together to worship, pray, and get updated on the ministry's progress. And last night, I was involved in two ways: music and brownies.

Since God has blessed me with musical abilities, I've had the privilege of helping out with the worship here. What I love most about it is being able to bless others with this gift, which happens as people worship God through the music.

Now about the brownies. Last night I got the chance to make desert for everyone to enjoy after Community Night. It most definitely satisfied any sweet tooth there, but the bottom line is that they were more gooey than I had intended. See, I attempted to create my own chocolate frosting recipe, but it was so wet that it ended up turning the brownies into a sugar-loaded chocolate mush. And my lesson was simply this: next time, I'll try altering my concoction. My opinion is that the fun of experimenting outside of a step-by-step recipe makes up for any unexpected outcomes.

And finally, let me remind you that in a month, my team is leaving for Southeast Asia, where we will be for a total of six weeks! We are very excited.

That's all for now! Have a great day.

Below: Some of the kids from Rancho Los Amigos, random people at Community Night, and myself with Jennifer.

Rancho Los Amigos

The way this place works where I am studying, is that it is not just a school. It's an organization that plays a big role in the local Mexican community, namely through a children's home called Rancho Los Amigos. Behind our campus on the same property sits the children's home, which houses the director, his wife, and fifteen boys and fifteen girls ranging in ages from three to seventeen. It is considered by the Mexican government as one of the best children's homes in all of Mexico, due to the structured nature of how it's run, the respectful behavior demonstrated by the kids, and the amount of financial resources that are poured into its success and effectiveness. (If you really want to know more about it, look at http://www.ywamepj.org/).

I just thought this might be interesting for you to know. Sometimes we get to see the large vans pulling out in the morning, one filled with girls and the other with boys, as our staff members take them to school. And in the afternoons, we hear the shouts of the kids playing on the playground behind the chapel. It's just a cool thing to be connected to here, even though we don't necessarily get to interact a lot with the kids, since we've got our own schedule and requirements. Currently, there are nine full-time staff members who work with the children's home (which is not technically an orphanage, since some of the kids aren't orphans, but come from social services because their parents can't take care of them).

On September 15, Mexico's independence day, we got together with all of the kids and staff for a big dinner. The Rancho staff cooked all the food, which included elotes, chicken mole tacos, agua de horchata, and flan imposible. Suffice to say, Mexican food is good. And you'll probably be hearing more about it from me in the future.

So there's a little bit about Rancho Los Amigos, our children's home here. Have a great day!

Above: Me and Hayley.

Purpose

If there's one thing I enjoy, it's relaxing in the evening with a hot cup of tea while having a meaningful conversation with another human being. So last night, I made a hot herb brew, added some honey, and conversed with Jennifer (one of our staff members) about purpose. Purpose being that substance which gives us a drive to move forward, or perhaps better said, the definition of our reason for living. And if there's one thing I don't want to live without, it's purpose.

Ed Sinke, our visiting teacher last week, helped me to sort out some of my ideas about purpose. He said that we all have a purpose unique to who we are, and it is so central to our individual identities such that to know it (which doesn't actually imply using it for something good), one must simply know the gifts, callings, abilities, or desires that are inside of them.

Now, I'm not a huge fan of the feeling-oriented discover-yourself exercises, but in all seriousness, this wasn't one of them. It had more with the creativity of God that we see among the differences in people. See, it's true that we are, in our personhoods, separate. We have an individual identity, a name that signifies who we are, a soul that no one else has. But what does this have to do with purpose?

If you ask me what my personal reason for living is, I will not answer you with what I think my individual purpose is. My first response will be, "I live to intimately know Jesus Christ." And then I will tell you that out of this intimate knowing will flow an outpour of life to lavish on others, the way Christ lavishes an outpour of life on me. I say this because I want to give life to others, and because I know that through Christ, I can. This is my drive to move forward.

Maybe my individual purpose is "to encourage and challenge minds to seek truth" or "to help people by meeting their specific needs," because after all, both of these desires are inside of me. And maybe this purpose will manifest itself through what I'm doing here in Mexico and plan to do in different countries. But the reality of it is, I don't care too much about the words used to verbalize this or how it ends up looking; what I really care about is not missing what's most important. And in my pursuit of this, I mean, in my pursuit of what's most important, I can say with certainty that my life will not lack purpose.

Culture!

So far, adapting to a different culture hasn't been a huge issue for me. And the reason is not because I already understand and fit in with the Mexican culture. On the contrary, I feel more American than ever (well, I suppose the correct terminology would be "North American"). My cultural mindset - the social norms I adhere to, the understandings upon which I interact with people, the way I perceive myself within the larger context of a community of people - is not Mexican. And maybe even the term "Mexican" doesn't really fit what I'm talking about. But either way, cultural differences are real between people groups and countries, and they go much deeper than just your typical food and dress.

I just finished writing a letter to a friend, and in it I was describing a few things that came to mind regarding culture. For instance, here in Mexico, if in attending a social event you bring a friend who doesn't know anybody at the event, and if upon arriving you don't immediately introduce your friend to people, you either have poor manners or are a bad friend. And, if you are one of the persons at the event to whom this new guest was introduced, and you don't immediately engage him/her in conversation, then you also have poor manners, because you don't know how to make small talk. In many places in the U.S., a simple, "Hi, I'm Cynthia," and a handshake will suffice, and you can then proceed with whatever else it is you were doing at the time of the introduction, such as conversing with someone else, eating, etc. Or, as some do after meeting someone new, you can also just stand around quiet-like, as if your presence were embarrassing. (Thank goodness for people who can lighten a conversation with conversational ease). Anyway. The Mexican culture, in general, does a good job of making a new guest feel welcome.

So why did I say that adapting hasn't been too difficult for me? Because even though I am in Mexico, I am not actually immersed in the Mexican culture! I am living with American people, eating quite a bit of American food ("North American" rather), and speaking a lot of English.

As I depart from the writing of this post, I leave you with a few questions for thought. If you could intimately get to know another culture, which culture would you choose? If you had to live in another country for five straight years, which country would you live in? And finally, what aspects of your own culture do you appreciate the most? Dislike the most?

Hasta luego.

Above: In class. Below that: Rain damage in a side street. Floods can occur during the summer.

Jesus

Tonight we gave book reports again, and this time our book was Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell. It's the kind of book that makes you think a lot. The kind I like to read.

One of the overarching messages in the book is the fact that Jesus leads us into reality. He was not meant to be a choice out of many possibilities, nor a doctrine by which to live, nor a ticket into something good. The picture is bigger than that.

Here's a question: Who is Jesus? History proves he was a real man who really walked the earth, who really was crucified on a cross. Furthermore, history tells us things that Jesus actually said about himself. So let's first ask, Who does Jesus say he is? Now. If you ask me who I am and I say, "I am Cynthia," that probably won't mean much. But if I say, "I am Cynthia, daughter of Laura and Alex, who were raised in Mexico, and I have two brothers, and I play piano and sing, and I like to read," then we might be getting somewhere. So, I think it's very logical to look into what Jesus said about himself. Here are a few things (emphasis mine):

- "When a man believes in me, he does not believe in me only, but in the one who sent me. When he looks at me, he sees the one who sent me." (John 12:44,45)

- "I have come in my Father's name, and you do not accept me; but if someone comes in his own name, you will accept him." (John 5:43 - here, Jesus is expressing frustration)

- "Whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life." (John 5:24)

- "I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me - just as the Father knows me and I know the Father - and I lay down my life for the sheep." (John 10:14)

- "The Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father and entered the world; now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father." (John 16: 27,28)

There's a lot of words there, but the basic essence of it is this: Jesus says that someone has sent him, in fact, it's his Father, in whose name he has come. And who is his Father? It's God. The creator of the universe and of mankind. A loving Father, who sends Jesus his son, "the good shepherd," to lay down his life, so that it might become possible for us to "cross over from death to life." But I've gotten ahead of myself.

There is a very famous argument made by C.S. Lewis for the deity of Christ. It goes like this:

"I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish things that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Him Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic - on a level with a man who says he is a poached egg - or else he would be the devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to." (C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, pg. 40-41)

Basically, if we look at who Jesus was as a historical figure, it's pretty hard to claim that he was a liar. Bereft of integrity. Morally corrupt. It's also fairly impossible to claim that he was crazy. Facts tell us that he was a highly educated Jewish rabbi, and anybody who knows about the traditions of rabbinical schooling, understands the level of knowledge that they attained through study. Jesus was not stupid. His teachings make that clear. So the question is, in sum: can we trust that what Jesus said about himself was the truth?

I am saying all of this because I started out by saying that Jesus leads us into reality. I am learning, as I said above, that the picture is bigger than what I thought it was. Jesus is the big picture. He gives us, through his sacrifice, a way of life that is the way life was actually meant to be.

Picture above: Jessica, me, Mandy, and Hayley, at White Sands, New Mexico!

Random Stuff

Well. In case you didn't know, the second half of this school that I'm doing here in Juarez will take place in a different country. It's called the "outreach phase," which really just means that we get to apply everything we've been learning in a real-life setting. I'm not sure yet what that will consist of. But nonetheless, I do know where we are going! And I can't tell you. Yes, that's the unfortunate truth. All I can say is, that we are going to Southeast Asia, which, considering the world, I suppose is pretty specific regarding location. The country remains unnamed because of safety purposes.

Above you see a picture of myself in my oh-so-fashionable apron, cooking breakfast with Myrna, one of the staff members. She is a great person. A Mexican native, she chose to start working with YWAM more than ten years ago, and has since led many Disciple Training Schools, taking them to different places all over the world. But on this particular morning, she taught me how to make chilaquiles! Which I will proceed to describe. They are fried pieces of corn tortilla, covered in a spicy tomato salsa, topped with sour cream and melted cheese. Pretty tasty.

The other picture you see is of me and Hayley. She is a recent high school graduate who, like me, has a passion for music, and so we often just jam together on the guitar and the djembe. Sometimes she plays guitar and I play the djembe, sometimes the other way around. And we usually harmonize together, too. It's such an amazing thing to express oneself through music. Such a gift from God, to not only master the skill, but also to involve the heart and mind in the music-making act. I love it. And I hope I'll always remember to thank God, who gave it to me.

Well. That's probably enough for now. You've heard about our outreach to Southeast Asia, my breakfast of chilaquiles, and how much I love making music. Hasta luego! Have a great day.

Conquering

Good evening! Or day, or morning, or whatever it might be as you are reading this. Another beautiful day to live, in all the fullness that it offers. I find my fullness in many things, but one of them is the beauty of God and his creation. Now, the beauty of his creation does not limit itself to outdoor nature, but I must say, that my home in Colorado has some of the most beautiful places I can think of.


If you are not familiar with what a "fourteener" is, it's basically just a mountain that is 14,000 feet or higher. Colorado proudly boasts the most of any U.S. state: fifty-four of them, to be precise.


There is this one fourteener near my hometown called Long's Peak, famous for its level of difficulty and fierceness. Some people have even lost their lives trying to make it to the top. But frankly, the challenge of climbing it is a sweet one, and therefore, Long's Peak is one of the most-climbed fourteeners in Colorado. (Of course, for people who climb Everest-type mountains, I'm sure it's "nothing," but I would say it's indisputably an authentic experience in mountain-climbing).


I wonder. What is it about a challenge that sometimes excites us to take it on? Why does difficulty sometimes engage our sense of adventure, so that we cannot just stand back uninvolved, but must dive in, just to see if we can conquer it? And when we do, wow, that's sweet indeed.


I've been thinking lately about something I recently read. Floyd McClung, in his autobiography Living On the Devil's Doorstep, says that sometimes we suffer because we are not making sacrifices. In other words, too much contentment can breed discontentment if sacrifice is not a part of the picture. It makes me think about some of the difficult challenges that might be calling out to me, inviting me to get involved, asking me to come and conquer. What's more, I expect these challenges to involve sacrifice, because otherwise, where's the difficulty? Void of it, the word "challenge" would cease to mean anything.


For me personally, choosing to give up my own dreams in order to follow Christ is not just a challenge, but an adventure, an invitatation to live, an experience of sacrifice that has a sweet end. I expect difficulty, but I also know that it does not come without a conquering. How do I know? Because "We are more than conquerors through Christ, who loved us." (Romans 8:37).

Relationship with God?

Above: Juarez!  From a lookout point.

I guess it's kind of obvious that I really like the sky.  So here's another sky picture, taken in the morning before one of my runs.  

This morning I woke up at 6:30.  (Now, don't assume I'm one of those structured people that wakes up every single morning at dawn to go through a ritual of exercise and whatever else those people do.  No way).

Our class this morning focused on what being a Christian means.  I feel like every class so far has been like a wave of information that makes me think and process.  But that's good.  It means I'm not wasting my time; it means I'm really taking it all in.  
 

So maybe you want to know what they actually tell us about what it means to be a Christian. May I explain it in terms of how the information has affected me personally, rather than just give a pat answer?
 

You might have heard the term, "having a relationship with God."  And to be honest, for me, being a Christian has come to mean that.  Before, it meant, "to believe a certain set of beliefs." Now, to be more specific, it means "being made acceptable to God through Christ's sacrifice." See, if I have been made acceptable to God, then I can freely relate with him, as a friend.  And, therefore, I have a relationship with God.  

But.  I also don't like throwing around a bunch of terms without defining them, because then the full meaning of what I want to say isn't expressed.  So.  Here are some questions: Who is God, really?  And, why would I want to have a relationship with him?  Man, these are loaded questions that I don't know how to answer.  But what I do know is this: that God has integrity. That I can trust him.  And that deep inside of me, is a desire to be known.
  

I would hate for the term "relationship with God," to be passed over because it's been said so many times.  That's why I ask:  Who is God?  What does relationship with him mean? Meanings can get lost in words because we think we know what something really means.  

My personal experience has taught me that God is worth knowing.  And until I'm not walking on this earth anymore, I'm going to keep pursuing relationship with him.

The World

I am aware of the fact that none of the pictures I have put up so far include pictures of the Mexican people, nor of the actual city of Juarez (where all the traffic and businesses are found). See, I'm actually living in a suburb of Juarez called Sauzal. It's got more open space and tranquility. But don't worry, more pictures will come! (Eventually. When I take them).

In our cafeteria we've got this giant map of the world hanging on the wall. I am not the only person who loves to stand in front of it for more than five minutes at a time, just wondering things about each country. What might be taking place in all the different parts of the world? It's so vast, and yet so traversed already by mankind! I like to envision visiting each place and experiencing its unique culture.

So now I'm going to seg-way a little bit, if that's okay with you. The world is fascinating. But I think most would probably agree that it's got some problems. (And no, I am not referring to the environment). What I mean is the problem that lies within a person's heart, causing him/her to manifest hate, violence, disloyalty, and basically every other bad thing imaginable. What is it? Certainly something lies behind every action.

I don't believe that there is an excuse for any of it, but I do believe that there is a hope for all of it. And that hope is redemption, available for anyone who wants it, through Jesus Christ.

Below: Map of the world.
Below that: The farthest building contains both girl's and guy's dorms, as well as the cafeteria. The closer building is our chapel and classroom.