Office of Public Relations
Missouri Baptist University
One College Park Drive
Saint Louis, Missouri 63141-8698
314.392.2307 / fax 314.392.2265
www.mobap.edu / pr@mobap.edu
For Immediate Release
RE: My Christmas Gift
My Christmas Gift
March 10, 2005
It was the day after Christmas. The lines were long, and the gathering crowd grew louder by the minute. Eric Farmer began to anxiously drum his fingers, wondering how long his patience would last. It’s not uncommon to be standing in line the day after Christmas. Holiday returns make the day after Christmas rival the day after Thanksgiving for the title of the busiest shopping day of the year.
While most of his fellow collegians spent time with friends and family, Eric was riding a soon-to-be-gift across the border. With nearly 200 college and high school students from across the nation, Eric celebrated Christ this Christmas by using his time off school to serve on a mission trip in Matamoros, Mexico.
Right from the start, the trip was unlike any other. A large truck filled with donated bicycles met the mission team just north of the Mexican border. After unloading, each mission participant claimed a bike and road toward the border. To the Mexican guards, a truckload of bikes would have been deemed suspicious and, therefore, stopped and searched. But two hundred young Americans riding them was somehow less conspicuous.
Without a single problem, the team rode safely across the border to their destination. After a quick luggage drop off, the mission team began to transform a barren area into a fiesta – complete with games, food, and gifts. 
Excitement resonated throughout the small area as hundreds of people arrived. Children and adults who had witnessed the mass American exodus on wheels were given the bicycles that had been so carefully delivered to them.
The giving didn’t stop there. The sea of volunteers, all cloaked in bright blue t-shirts, invaded a local grocery store and nearly depleted their supply of canned goods. With their purchases in hand, the mission team was off to a nearby landfill. Intertwined with the rubble and trash that filled the dump were cardboard boxes and slabs of wood that served as shelter for families who could afford nothing more. The mission team formed a line near the dump’s edge and waited in silence to give away boxes of food and supplies.
A little girl poked her head above a pile of garbage. A mother with two small children in tow peered from beneath a cardboard flap. One by one, they came – drawn by the offer of food. The number of people who called this place home was simply astounding. And from the top of a van, a man was preaching the Gospel – in Spanish – and he was heard loud and clear from every direction.
“As we began to run out of food and supplies to give,” Eric recalled, “students all around began giving away their own things – like shoes and backpacks – because the need was so evident. I saw brokenness in our group. It was amazing.”
And in what seemed like a moment, the mission team was on the long trek home. Five days brimming with activity had left Eric exhausted, yet somehow exhilarated. The trip had been a great way to wrap up 2004. Even more so, it had been a great way to celebrate the gift of Christ.
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Missouri Baptist University is a premier Christian university in Saint Louis, offering graduate and undergraduate studies in over thirty specialized fields and nine degrees. MBU's education and fine arts programs are nationally known in addition to business, religion, administration of justice, and more. MBU is one of the fastest growing higher education institutions in Missouri with an enrollment of over 4,500 students at five locations in the bi-state region — West County, Lincoln County, Jefferson County, Franklin County and the new Illinois extension at Lewis and Clark Community College.
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