Another new birth that we celebrated
this past year as a family is that of Just Coffee (www.justcoffee.org).
Frontera de Cristo has played an integral role in the formation
of this cooperative and Miriam and Mark (along with many others)
have volunteered much time to help birth hope into the life of
the Salvador Urbina community in Chiapas. In fact, Anna Flor participated
in the weekly meeting of Just Coffee that meets in our house before
she even turned one week old. Neither Miriam nor Mark would have
ever believed that God would use them to help start an international
coffee cooperative.
In January of last year, two of the farmers came up for the inauguration
of the roasting facility. Many of the farmers did not believe
it would be possible for them to own their own business and to
be able to stay on their lands instead of migrating north. Eri
Cifuentes commented: “The Good Book says we are to rejoice
in all times, but over the last 10 years with the drastic drop
in coffee prices, with all the desperation in our families, and
all of the suffering, it has been hard to know how to rejoice.
But now I know why. Because if we had not passed through such
a difficult time we would not be experiencing the depth of joy
we are experiencing now.” Ildefonso Ortiz commented after
the inauguration: “I am filled with great hope.”
The goal for the first year was 1000 pounds, but God’s
plans went well beyond ours and Just Coffee sold 26,000 pounds—13
tons of coffee. The farmers have placed next year’s goal
at 35 tons—70,000 pounds—so more families can participate.
If you are a coffee drinker, we invite you to put justice into
your coffee and hope into the lives of the farmers who grow your
coffee.
God has brought us new understanding of the incredible story
of Christmas each year we have lived here and this year was no
exception. With Mom and daughter receiving tremendous care from
the nurses in the hospital—much better medical care than
Jesus received in the stable—we appreciated more the profoundness
of Emmanuel—God with us. We give thanks that Miriam did
not have to give birth to Anna Flor in a stable or on the street,
but we could not help but marvel at how God turns our expectations
upside down—who in their right mind would look for the Divine
One in a barn wrapped in rags or beside a garbage can swaddled
in discarded paper and lying on cardboard. Most of us would look
for the baby Jesus in a royal hospital not in a back alley.
On December 30, as we were handing out blankets with Healing
Our Borders around midnight to people who had been caught by our
border patrol and “voluntarily returned” to Mexico,
I am certain that we had an encounter with la Sagrada Familia,
the Holy Family.
It was about 20 degrees when a very young, and very pregnant
couple was dropped off by our officers—there was no room
for them in the U.S. Inn. As the young woman hobbled toward us
with her hands on her back and the young man supported her with
his arm around her—we thought to ourselves “Here come
Joseph and Mary with child.”
The couple hesitantly assured us that they had a place to go
in Agua Prieta and kindly rejected our offer for housing—but
I wondered to myself if they were more scared of me as a white
person than of the cold streets of Agua Prieta?
Such is the world that Anna Flor has been born into—a world
of joy and suffering, a world of life and death. Join us as we
pray that Anna Flor, and all of our family, will be God’s
ambassadors of joy and life as we confront the realities of the
world’s suffering and death.
May we have eyes to see, ears to hear, arms to embrace, feet
to follow, and hearts to serve Emmanuel in strange and sometimes
scary places throughout this year.
Mark Adams
The 2004 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p.138
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