Spotlight On: Yo Creek

By Ludimir Nah

Meet Pastor Jose Mendez, his wife Alma and son Jair. Pastor Jose is currently the pastor at Alpha and Omega Church in a small village of a little over 1000 people named Yo Creek Village.

A lot of the people in Yo Creek still practice their cultural backgrounds, eat cultural meals, and speak the Mayan language in their homes. Recently the ancient game of “Pok-ta-pok,” a ball game consisting of an 8 pound rubber ball and the hips, has taken this tiny village to competitions in nearby Mexico and other places. From afar the mountains of the Mexican border can be seen, giving this village a beautiful view.

Many of the men work in farms in the village raising pigs and cattle or planting corn or grains. Some work as drivers in a Mennonite community not too far from the village while others leave for work in the nearby town of Orange Walk to work in stores, food markets, restaurants or to be teachers.

Thirst Missions partners with Alpha and Omega church. Pastor Jose has led this church for almost six years and dedicates his time fully to ministry and their village. Alpha and Omega has some outstanding ministry. Their church has about 30 active youth that gather every Saturday night to worship and spend time with each other. They also have a women’s afternoon where the women gather to teach each other crafts using ordinary found or recycled materials either to decorate the church or their homes: it is the perfect time to talk about the Bible, personal issues, and to pray for each other.

Alpha and Omega and their youth group have a monthly schedule to give back to their community and assist the elderly. They work in community service projects around the village to the point that the residents of Yo Creek see them as inspirational. They work hard to clean up the village drain systems, maintain the local park and cemetery, keep up the streets, and help out at the school. They also do street evangelism, sharing tracts and talking about Jesus in public buses.

On top of this the youth group meets with other youth groups from around the country to train and fellowship with each other.

Pastor Jose and Alma work closely with Compassion, a local Christian primary school with about 100 students and six teachers for first through eighth grade. Each teacher is responsible for two grades at a time in the same classroom.

Originally opened at Pastor Jose’s home, Compassion is a growing school that needs intern teachers or volunteer teachers to help in the development of the students. One teacher per grade has been seen a couple of times when students from local colleges do internships at the school, but unfortunately it is not a long enough internship to let the kids develop to their full potential.

Pastor Jose is an inspirational man of God. Over the past couple of (few) years he has hosted around four teams from Thirst Missions teams, though none of them turned out to be a long-term partner. Pastor Jose says he has learned so much from those teams. He watched closely to see how the teams ran their vacation Bible schools and he’s adapted those lessons and started a huge summer VBS camp for the entire village every year.

Pastor Jose would have close to 200 kids for that week of VBS: they would parade down the streets and have a nice giveaway to the kids who would learn all their lessons for that week. Short-term missions has helped Pastor Jose and Alpha and Omega over the years. We pray and are excited to see what God has in store for their church in the years to come. If you would like information about partnering with Pastor Jose and Alpha and Omega, email us here.