{"id":1216,"date":"2015-03-13T09:59:45","date_gmt":"2015-03-13T14:59:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/?p=1216"},"modified":"2015-03-13T09:59:45","modified_gmt":"2015-03-13T14:59:45","slug":"voy-a-mexico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/2015\/03\/voy-a-mexico.html","title":{"rendered":"Voy A Mexico"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Today I am leaving for Monterrey, Mexico. People keep asking me if it\u2019s a mission trip or a vacation. I like that they have to ask.   <\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s mostly a vacation. I have a friend down there, and I live nearby, and I like tacos. But the more I think about why people keep asking me if it\u2019s missional, the more I realize it is a part of who I am, and I can\u2019t not bring it with me.    <\/p>\n<p>The last six times I have gone to Mexico it has been to serve the poor in some way as a part of a Christian Church or organization. Each time, the relative value of what I offered was pretty low compared to the value of the cultural exchange and emersion experience. Those experiences have helped form me as a person who loves other cultures. The good times I had helped encourage me towards more hard rewarding work in my life.    <\/p>\n<p>Now as I head in search of good times and cultural exchange, I go as a person who cares about the poor, and about Christian organizations. I can only hope that God will continue to find a way to use that attribute he has built into me, in Mexico as in Texas.    <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Today I am leaving for Monterrey, Mexico. People keep asking me if it\u2019s a mission trip or a vacation. I like that they have to ask. It\u2019s mostly a vacation. I have a friend down there, and I live nearby, and I like tacos. But the more I think about why people keep asking me&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":391,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Voy A Mexico - A Fear of Whales<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/2015\/03\/voy-a-mexico.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Voy A Mexico - A Fear of Whales\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Today I am leaving for Monterrey, Mexico. People keep asking me if it\u2019s a mission trip or a vacation. I like that they have to ask. It\u2019s mostly a vacation. I have a friend down there, and I live nearby, and I like tacos. But the more I think about why people keep asking me&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/2015\/03\/voy-a-mexico.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"A Fear of Whales\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-03-13T14:59:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"rgaffney\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Voy A Mexico - A Fear of Whales","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fearofwhales\/2015\/03\/voy-a-mexico.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Voy A Mexico - A Fear of Whales","og_description":"Today I am leaving for Monterrey, Mexico. 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