Sarah and her three sons were living in a bus with no heat or plumbing when seniors and sponsors from Puget Sound Adventist Academy met her during a recent mission trip to Mexico.
Sarah's son, Jesús, suffers from epilepsy and complete loss of motor skills, which keeps him from doing most activities aside from sitting. Students offered a prayer for Sarah's family, and specifically for Jesús, as they concluded their visit.
The following day, Howard Munson, PSAA's Bible teacher, accompanied the Mt. Olives Orphanage director to deliver a stove to Sarah's dwelling. While there, Jesús was standing and walking around, something no one had seen in four years, demonstrating to the student missionaries the power of prayer.
Mission trips are typically life-changing experiences for participants, and PSAA's mission trip in late November 2008, to Uruapan, Mexico, to expand an orphanage was no exception.
After seeing the quality of life in Uruapan and the surrounding area, students could no longer casually buy whatever they wanted whenever they wanted. Students indicated their world view expanded and their appreciation for family and friends increased, saying the mission trip had a "lasting impact" on their lives.
During the two weeks spent in Mexico, PSAA's missionaries learned from a master mason how to prepare blocks for a waiting foundation, butter the blocks, and finally level them for interior and exterior walls. In addition, students built a small garage, began building a laundry room, painted the existing house and a medical clinic, dug trenches for rain water, and assembled a new trampoline.
Through each task and interaction, the PSAA seniors connected with families in the community, each other and, most importantly, the children in the orphanage. "I would never have thought," says Derek Dizon, PSAA senior, "that I would connect with the kids as much as I did."
Prayers surrounded Puget Sound Adventist Academy seniors and sponsors as they spent three weeks ministering and making connections in Mexico. (Heidi Martella)
