Sitanachi Trip - July 07'

  On Monday the 2nd we left for the village of Sitanachi (Tarahumara for place of the red dirt). Those who went were Bro. Ernesto, four men from Morelia, Bro. Bertiz and I. We left Creel at about 6:30 in the morning and headed south into the mountains. We stopped at a Pemex station because I needed gas to run the little generator that powers the projector and sound system in the villages. When we got out to have the can filled we found out that the guy who was running the station had been robbed at gunpoint by two men on foot. They cut the phone line to the station, slashed the man's tires and  tied him up. Some people had found him when they came to purchase gas just before we got there. The Pemex man said that the men set out on foot in the direction we had come from. I remember seeing two men sitting on the side of the road before we got there and had even waived at them. God was looking out for us by delaying our leaving from Creel that morning.

  We continued on for a total of seven hours to get to the village. The roads got steadily worse the farther back into the mountains we got. We saw some of the most awesome rock formations you could imagine out in the middle of nowhere. We arrived late that afternoon with everyone tired from all the bouncing on the rough roads or trails you might call them. The village of Sitanachi was like stepping back in time, all the houses were either adobe, log or a combination of both. There was nothing made of concrete anywhere. The roofs of the houses were made of hand hewn log slabs at least six inches thick. Brother Ernesto knew one family that lived there, the only Christians in the village. After a good rest we set up our campsite and then the equipment to show the Jesus film. we also came to assess the water situation there in the village. We found out that a well had been drilled there a few years before, but the pump had broken and never was fixed. I plan on getting the part that was broken and fixing it. The people now have to walk about a mile to get there water.

  We had around forty of fifty people come out for the film that night. Those who didn't come might not have seen it, but  I can tell you they heard it all over that valley. The film was shown in the Tarahumara dialect. The Christian family invited us to dinner that night at around 10:30. We had beans, tortillas and a drink made from flowers called jamaica. They invited us for breakfast the next morning and we had the same thing again. They didn't have much to offer us, but we knew it was the best they had and we were blessed by it. One of the reasons for us to visit this family was to encourage them and let them know that they are breaking the ground for God to move in that village and to not give up. The father of this family got very excited when we told him there were other families like his in other villages where they were the only Christians.

                                                                     Singing praise songs before the film...

                                 One of the young men from the village translating for me...             Setting up the film equipment.