The Mixes and the Zapotecos

(Note: Mixe is pronounced “me hay”.)

In 1981 we were working in Oaxaca, Mexico with Gospel Recordings. Our job involved interacting with the tribal groups of Mexico, of which about 120 lived in the state of Oaxaca. We lived in the small village of Mitla, nestled up against the mountains at the end of the paved highway.

There were two main tribal groups in our area, the Mixe and the Zapoteco. Mitla was a Zapoteco village, but it formed the gateway to Mixe territory. Mixes going out to the city would pass through Mitla and, because I made frequent trips into Mixe territory, before long the Mixes did not consider a trip to town complete until they had stopped at our house.

The Mixes and Zapotecos shared many things in common. They were both divided into several sub-groups, some living in cold mountains and others in tropical valleys. They grew cash crops of coffee, and the women wove colorful embroidery.

In one way the Mixes and Zapotecos were complete opposites. While the Mixes thrived on unity, the Zapotecos relished diversity. Part of our job consisted of doing language surveys to see how much mutual intelligibility existed among the various sub-groups. The task was complicated by the attitudes of both the Mixes and the Zapotecos. We would play a portion of a recording from one area in a neighboring area and ask how much of it they understood. When I did this in a Mixe area invariably I would get the reply, “Yes, yes, we understand all of it. That is our language.”  But on further questioning I would discover that they had missed a great deal of the content. Yet because it was Mixe, they readily accepted it all.

In Zapoteco area the response was opposite but equally frustrating. When my partner David would play a short recording they would say, “No, we don’t understand any of it.”  Further questioning would reveal that they actually understood quite a bit, but, because they recognized it was from a different group, they rejected it.  Not surprisingly, there were at that time 56 different varieties of the Zapoteco language.  Researchers had even discovered significant linguistic differences in one household.

There were Wycliffe missionaries working on Scripture translation among both tribal groups and we knew most of them personally. The senior missionary working with the Mixe, Serle Hogshagen, was a competent, yet quiet and reserved man. He preferred to remain in the background and let others take the spotlight. When a group of believers developed in the Mixe village where he worked, they started gathering at his home in the evenings to sing choruses while his wife played a small organ. Before long they suggested meeting on a regular basis for fellowship and to study the Word, and they wanted Serle to lead them. Serle’s reply was, “No, you don’t need me to lead you.  If you want to meet, you do it on your own.” So they did.

As a result of differences in attitudes and leadership, the church among the Mixes grew much faster and stronger than among the Zapotecos. The Mixe church belonged to them. It was of their own making. And because it was theirs, a Mixe church, it was accepted by the tribe at large.  In contrast, the Zapoteco church had a hard time crossing tribal boundaries.

While we were there, a group of Mixe believers formed a Bible School to train their own people for church leadership. They organized the school, not around a traditional Western semester schedule, but around their harvest schedule. In planting and harvest times the students were free to return home. When they returned after harvest, they brought part of their crop to pay for tuition and to feed the school. To my knowledge, there were no foreigners involved in the Mixe Bible School. And it was so successful that before long the Zapotecos began sending their people to the Mixe school.

As missionaries there is much we can learn from this example. Three principles can immediately be derived from this: ownership, self-sufficiency, and unity.

Ownership

Ownership is something we try to give people, but it doesn’t work that way. As Western missionaries and mission agencies we develop a project then give it over to the local people and expect them to own it. And we don’t lose interest in the project; we check up on it, encourage them in their ownership, and at times continue to supply manpower and funds for the project.  The unfortunate result is that the project, at least in the eyes of the local Christians who are supposed to own it, remains a foreign project of which they are custodians.  It is not their own in the sense that their children are their own. To have full ownership, it must be of their own creation. They must give birth to it.

It is difficult for us to allow other poorly equipped and trained people to develop a program when we know we could do it much better. But “better” in our evaluation is often short-sighted. Is a program that is fully funded and uses modern (Western) equipment yet flounders for lack of leadership better than one that is poorly equipped, poorly funded, yet continues because it is locally maintainable? A few years back I was involved in planning a training program in Mexico that was to train Mexican church planters.  The question came up about where to print literature. My reply was, “It depends on what we want to produce.”  If our goal is to produce good literature, print it in the US. But if our goal is to produce good men, then let them print it in Mexico.

Stimulating local ownership often involves promoting ideas but stepping back and allowing those ideas to take shape locally.

Self-Sufficiency

Self-sufficiency will result when we allow others to develop their own programs and projects. When we develop a program and hand it over to local leadership, we are teaching them that they are not capable of developing it on their own. It may take longer for them to develop their own programs, but if the church cannot grow without Western initiative, it will never succeed.

Unity

The concept of unity runs headlong into our emphasis on people groups and cultural identification. Yes, we must recognize the distinctive characteristics of each people group. The approach we use among one group may not work in another group. We study the language and customs of our target culture and encourage, to a certain degree, the contextualization of the Gospel into the target culture.  All these things are good, but we dare not lose sight of the Biblical principle of unity. As Christians are born in any culture, they must be taught that now they are part of a new culture—the kingdom of God. They do not leave their own culture, but they join in a broader level the culture of Christ that we call the body of Christ. As members of His body, we are to function together for the common benefit of that body. This does away with rivalries, skirmishes, and jockeying for position that characterize too many churches, not just on the mission field, but also in our own countries. We must recognize divisions without promoting them. When we emphasize divisions, we reduce the potential for the spread of the Gospel. For penetration into a culture, the Gospel must be encapsulated but not isolated.

Contextualization

This is a subject that is often debated in missionary circles. The idea is that we must divorce the Gospel from our Western culture and present it to our target audience in a form that they can relate to. After all, the Gospel was not first proclaimed in an Anglo-Western context. The good news of salvation was born in a middle eastern culture.

But the concept of contextualization is only partly true. Yes, the message must be delivered in a way that fits the target culture. The language, not only the words but the idioms, expressions, and analogies must be familiar to the audience. The messenger of the Gospel must as much as is possible fit into the culture so that his appearance, attitude, and mannerisms do not detract from his message. But the content of the message does not change. The communicator of the Gospel must be contextualized, but the truth of the Gospel remains the same.

The Apostle Paul gives us a great example of contextualization. He said in 1 Corinthians 9:20-23,

20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. 21 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. 22 To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. 23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

He was contextualizing himself. But the message of the cross did not change. Was this message offensive to some? Yes, indeed. But he refused to change the message. He said in 1 Corinthians 1:22-24,

22 Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, 23 but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, 24 but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

Contextualizing in America

All this may be interesting to a foreign missionary, but why would we need to be contextualized here in America? This is our country, we speak English and are perfectly at home here. Why should we change?

Well, if you haven't noticed, those who need to hear the Gospel for salvation are not sitting in the pew next to you. They probably don't frequent the places we frequent or use the type of language we use. They may not even smell good. Instead of living in upper west Bend, they may be in a makeshift tent behind Lowe's or in a camper on China Hat Road. But they are the people Christ died to save.

Ownership, Self-Sufficiency, and Unity

Instead of telling those we meet about "our church", we should introduce them to their Savior. There are many needy people right around us. Instead of a hand out, we should offer a hand up—help them learn that with God's help in Christ's community—unity—they can live better. And though we may not speak the same words they use (our jargon may be strange to them), let love show through our actions and attitudes so the Spirit of God can reach into their lost hearts.