SAVE THE DATE: April 27- May 4

Adult Service-Learning Border Ministry Trip

The New McKendree Border Ministry Team hopes to lead two adult mission teams and a youth (8th-12th grades 2024-25 school year) mission team to work with Border Perspective in 2024.  One of the adult and youth teams will be experiencing the service-learning trip.  Participants will be immersed in border life, history, culture, and mission work.  The other adult team will be doing construction on the second phase of the church—the addition of the cold storage room, kitchen, and dormitories.

The Border Ministry Team will be having an information meeting soon.  The April 27-May 4th trip will be a service-learning trip for adults only.  Please fill out the form below to let us know you are interested in these trips.

Our relationship with Border Perspective began last July with 17 New McKendree youth and adult missionaries who journeyed to “far away Pharr” on their annual summer mission trip. To a person, our missionaries were transformed by the work God did in and through them as they gained a new perspective on immigration while serving immigrants displaced by oppressive regimes. With a newfound passion for serving God’s displaced children, our missionaries have continued to lead our church family toward this new kingdom-building opportunity: a partnership with Border Perspective. 

On December 2, 62 of our church family members attended a two-hour learning session on the reality of immigration offered by Jenn Moya and Caroline Quintero, Border Perspective team members who live and serve on the Texas/Mexico border. Then, during our weekend services, Jenn and Caroline offered us a biblical perspective on immigration and God’s call to serve and offer hospitality to his displaced children. As a result, what began last July with 17 New McKendree missionaries has now spread to over 400 members of our church family and counting.

As one of the 400+ members who’ve been challenged and inspired by what I learned about the reality of immigration and the plight of those legally seeking asylum in our “land of plenty,” two eye-opening realities have touched me: First, thanks to Jenn and Caroline, I’m for the first time separating the “immigration issue” from the immigrant. Immigration is a governmental policy/political issue. The immigrant is a person…a displaced person…who, like me, is a child of God created in God’s image. The second reality is that the theme of displaced people immigrating runs throughout the Christmas story. The Holy Family—Mary, Joseph, and yet-to-be-born baby Jesus—were refugees forced by an oppressive regime from their home in Nazareth to Bethlehem. In a barn on the outskirts of Bethlehem, our Savior came into our world as a refugee! And then, when our newborn King was only a toddler, Herod’s violent regime forced the Holy Family to uproot once again and take up asylum in Egypt. That’s twice during our Savior’s early childhood that he experienced displacement at the hands of oppressive, violent regimes!

Sadly, not much has changed. Corrupt governments, violent crime syndicates, and natural disasters are still displacing families. And God still invites us, his servants, to join in “protecting the foreigners and defending the orphans and widows” (Ps 146:9). With that in mind, this year’s Christmas offering will support our new ministry relationship with Border Perspective. Under the leadership of our newly formed Border Ministry Leadership Team, our vision goes beyond assisting Border Perspective financially. Our goal in 2024 is to send at least two adult teams and one youth team for a week of learning and serving alongside our new Border Perspective friends. Your special Christmas offering will help fund our church family’s budding Border Perspective partnership and help them to serve immigrant communities year-round via their “Peacemaker Fund.”

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