Mexican pastor tracked down a lost boy; set his feet on path toward Jesus_100404

Posted: 10/01/04

Mexican pastor tracked down a lost
boy; set his feet on path toward Jesus

By George Henson

Staff Writer

LONGVIEW–Even though he only was 13 years old, Javier Elizondo already had gone to work and bought his own books and clothes. Since he bought his own shoes and wanted some that would last a long time, he bought a pair of work boots.

“As far as I could tell, I was the only one in Camargo with those kind of ugly shoes,” he said. The distinctive footprints he left in the dirt streets of Camargo, Mexico, attracted the attention of a pastor starting a church in the Mexican border town. After seeing Elizondo's tracks all over town, the pastor asked one of Elizondo's friends to introduce him.

“Brother Margarito was not interested in shoes; he was interested in the person who wore the shoes, and what he could use to make a connection to the person who wore the shoes,” Elizondo explained.

Elizondo, now academic dean at Baptist University of the Americas in San Antonio, came to First Baptist Church in Longview to describe the impact of the Mary Hill Davis Offering for Texas Missions on his life.

He grew up in Camargo, just across the border from Rio Grande City. He could not afford to continue schooling beyond junior high school, and education was the thing he wanted most in the world. His parents were divorced and he lived with an aunt and uncle.

“It was a time in my life when I did not feel like anybody loved me. I did not feel like my parents loved me,” he admitted.

He also didn't have God to look to as a source of love.

“I had never seen a Bible. Nobody had ever told me that Jesus Christ could save me from my sins. No one had ever read me any verse of Scripture. I was not anti-God, but I did not know anything about God,” he said.

He felt like his door of opportunity to live the life he wanted was closing.

Pastor Margarito started Elizondo on a journey he could never have imagined.

The pastor came to Elizondo's home the evening they met and shared the plan of Christian salvation with him. The young teenager was skeptical, but interested. Many family members had told him he was a sinner and no good, but “what I didn't know was what to do about it,” he recalled.

Pastor Margarito filled that gap in his knowledge.

“He told me God loved me. You can imagine how that made me feel. Later, I learned that the Scripture has a verse that says even if your parents forsake you, God will never forsake you. Then, I did not know that verse. But that day, for the first time, I felt someone really, really loved me, and he was God. He sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to save me,” Elizondo said.

Still he was doubtful. “There has to be a catch,” he told the pastor.

He was interested enough to borrow a Bible and study for himself, though, and six months later accepted Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord.

“If you gave to the Mary Hill Davis Offering in 1969, you had an opportunity to help me to come to know the Lord, because the salary of my pastor who stopped me in the street and witnessed to me, was paid half by Texas Baptists and half by Mexican Baptists.” he said.

“If you were a member of a Baptist church in Texas in 1969 and gave a tithe to the church, and the church gave a percentage to the Texas Baptist Cooperative Program, and then you participated in the Mary Hill Davis Offering, you had an opportunity to win me to the Lord. You had a part,” he stressed.

“My life changed that day I received Jesus Christ. It has never been the same.”

Elizondo was the first believer in his immediate or extended family, but a Texas church mission group soon changed that. Church members were coming to Camargo to lead Vacation Bible Schools, and Pastor Margarito asked if one could be held at Elizondo's home. The family gave their permission, even though they were not believers.

His aunt was working in her kitchen as children gathered around her table for Vacation Bible School, and by the end of the week, she was the second convert in the family. Today, many in Elizondo's extended family are Christians.

“It all started with some people giving and some people going to share Jesus with us,” he said.

Still, Elizondo had a desire for education that looked like it would be unfulfilled.

Before he became a Christian, he said, “My definition of 'hell' was staying where I was with no education.”

Texas Baptists once again delivered him when a director of missions along the border arranged for him to attend Valley Baptist Academy on a scholarship.

“If you gave to the Mary Hill Davis Offering from 1970 to 1974, you helped me achieve one of my dreams–to learn English and get an education,” he said. “All I needed was an opportunity, and Texas Baptists gave that to me.”

An older brother had dropped out of school in Mexico in fifth grade, but he also later attended Valley Baptist Academy on a scholarship even though he had passed his 20th birthday. He agreed to give up smoking, drinking and cursing for a semester to give it a try.

He did well and accepted Christ during that semester and eventually graduated. Elizondo finds an easy answer as to why his brother was able to excel in a school taught in English and yet failed in a Mexican school.

“Do you know what they difference was? Jesus. Jesus makes all the difference. Anybody can tell you you are dumb, but if Jesus tells you you are worth it, you believe Jesus, and it makes all the difference,” he said.

The difference made in his family is a picture of the impact missions giving and action make, he said.

“That is the best of who we as Baptists are–people who give generously to see people come to know the Lord; who go with passion to share the gospel wherever they might be,” he said.

“If I serve Texas Baptists for another hundred years, I will never repay what Texas Baptists have done in my life, because they gave me Jesus.”