A Tale of Green and Brown

Since I haven't written in a while, I decided to make up for my lack of communication with a long story. Apologies for its length; it's something that has remained powerfully engrained in my mind the past few weeks. Hope you enjoy it.

On the outskirts of this valley-bound city under the shadow of tan, rugged hills spotted with scraggly bush-trees, lies a forgotten suburb named Albergue (pronounced "Ahl-BEAR-Geh"). Just recently has this part of the city of Parral been connected with the outside world with a paved road. Before, dirt truck-paths were its only access with the city itself, even though it's only a mile from one of the busiest parts of town.

Although I'm still being educated on its demographic makeup, Albergue apparently has a large Tarahumara Indian population, who are the native peoples of this part of the world. They were here long before the Spaniards arrived in the 16th Century and mixed their white European blood with the sun-tinted Talahumaras.

Most Tarahumara are on the fringe of society here. Many don't speak Spanish and live in the mountains, far away from the bigger Chihuahuan cities, completely disconnected from society in a way similar to the American Indians, but even more so due to the language barrier and cultural prejudice. Some come down from the sierra to live on the streets of the cities, begging for money. On the streets of Parral, I often encounter them: dark-skinned, ebony-haired women in brightly colored clothing, carrying little babies with dirty faces on their backs, asking people for money with their native tongue. "Codima?"

The people in Albergue are of this heritage of poverty and social rejection. This is the torn, stained curtain of a cultural backdrop for the story I'm about to tell.

In the church here is a guy named Mike. He's a good 6 inches shorter than I am and sports a good lookin' mustache, like most Mexican men. But unlike many Mexican men, Mike truly, humbly, and passionately loves Jesus Christ. And it shows. It's hard to have a conversation with Mike without out feeling the bombshell effect of love, joy, grace, and humility that Jesus has caused in his life. I heard one day that Mike was in charge of leading an outreach to this place called Albergue, and they were in need of somebody to lead worship. Being able to pluck a few strings on the guitar, I signed up and started going with Mike and a sweet spitfire of a lady from the church named Lucy.

My experience in Albergue can be summed up easily: Mike (or occasionally Lucy) picks me up from my house around 4:00 pm every Saturday, and we drive to the other part of the city, where Albergue is located. We descend off the paved road onto a dirt one which leads to a dusty soccer field, whose goals are made of rusted iron posts poorly welded together, ready to fall apart. The boundaries of the field are piles of dirt and rock on one side and a dirt wall on the other, on top of which is the paved road. There are often young boys and girls playing soccer there, covered in dust and yelling at the top of their lungs in the midst of a spirited game as we drive up.

We begin to talk and play with the kids as they arrive, knowing that we come every Saturday at this time (of course, the fact that there will be something yummy towards the end of the Bible lesson never hurts). My friend Judith (a young single girl from the church) also comes and accompanies me in leading worship, so we get out our guitars and begin tuning up. After a short worship time, we engage the kids in a short Bible lesson about Jesus' life. When we finish learning the memory verse for the week, the yummy something always emerges from the trunk of Lucy's car and we enjoy a snack on the dusty field as the yellow sun sets behind us.

Last week, I was privileged to play an important part in the lesson and become the man blind from birth in John chapter 9. One of the guys that comes and helps out with the outreach played the part of Jesus, and in place of putting saliva-made mud on my eyes, we substituted chocolate. It worked out just fine - I threw off my dark sunglasses and began declaring the technicolor wonder of my newfound reality (in less-than-perfect Spanish, of course).

After getting the chocolate fully off my face, I sat down with some of the kids as we enjoyed Lucy's snack. The sun was setting; its soft, warm yellowness bathing me as the casual mountain wind brought a slight chill to prick my skin. I sat in the evening's fading glory, the sound of chattering children filling my ears. Like every foreigner often does, I reflected on the oddity of my situation: a privileged white nerd from the US, sitting on a bare, brown soccer field on the outskirts of a city I had never heard of a year ago.

Suddenly, gazing at the stretching brown before me, my eyes saw something unexpected. There was green in the midst of the brown. On this dry, dusty soccer field, I saw a few small patches of green grass, subtly yet stubbornly holding its place in the brownness. The revealing power of the sun's yellow light drew my eyes to the clear contrast of emerald on dirt. I had never seen it before. It smote my vision like Rembrandt masterpiece. How was it possible for green grass to grow on this overused, tramped-on field that hasn't seen rain for months?

In the midst of the wonder, I saw a metaphor emerge. There was life in the midst of death. There was a clatter of awakening bones in the dry valley. It was springing from the dust, like Lazarus out of the tomb. Light issuing from darkness. There was something, a work of divine sovereignty and mercy, materializing in front of my eyes. The Kingdom, arriving humbly but powerfully in a place of desolation and brokenness, brought by the dusty, beautiful feet of those who preach the Good News.

Not only for Albergue, but this metaphor soon brought its guns to bear on my own broken life. I don't wear my frailty obviously, like this poverty-stricken place, but I'm poor nonetheless. Weak. Dry. Withered. Cracked. Dust itself cannot produce verdant fields. Only mercy brings life out of death and produces lushness in the desert.

I will open rivers on the bare heights,
and fountains in the midst of the valleys.
I will make the wilderness a pool of water,
and the dry land springs of water.
I will put in the wilderness the cedar,
the acacia, the myrtle, and the olive.
I will set in the desert the cypress,
the plane and the pine together,
that they may see and know,
may consider and understand together,
that the hand of the LORD has done this,
the Holy One of Israel has created it.

Isaiah 41: 18-20