Weaving a lesson of love
Navajo missionary ministers through hardships on the reservation
By Jami Becher
Life on the Navajo reservation in Tinian, New Mexico is not easy. Neighbors are spread far apart, alcoholism and broken homes are common and jobs are hard to come by, but shared culture and tight family bonds keep Native Americans on the reservation despite the difficulties.
“We’re surviving,” says Terri Winters, a full-blooded Navajo and mother of three, who, without the benefits of electricity or other amenities, spends her days chopping firewood, gathering water and caring for her children in a home she and her husband built themselves.
“We lived in Albuquerque for a short time,” she says. “There are more opportunities and activities in the city, but we like the space and freedom of life on the reservation—it’s much more of a home life. It’s difficult, but that keeps us tight together as a family.”
Fortunately, the Winters and other families living on the reservation have a helper, full-blooded Navajo and North American Mission Board missionary, Rose Ignacio. “It’s always a good thing when Rose comes,” Winters says. “She watches the kids while I work outside and she just starts cleaning the house. Not many people would do that, but that’s Rose, and it means a lot to me.”
Earning the privilege to share Christ with the Navajo is often a long process. Rose, a Mission Service Corps missionary, spends many days going house to house on the reservation, bringing donated clothes, helping with chores and serving in other ways. If there is a need, she finds a way to fulfill it. It’s her way of loving her community.
“I like to help because that builds relationships,” Rose says. “You get to know people and then one day, they’ll be open when you talk about the Lord.”
Rose compares the process to weaving the Navajo blankets she sells to make her living (MSC missionaries raise their own support). “It’s hard work and it takes a long time, but in the end something beautiful is created.
“When I got saved,” Rose says, “I wanted to tell anybody about the Lord,” Rose says. “How He is real in my life. God opened my eyes and gave me a burden for the Navajo people.”
Rose is familiar with the difficulty and desperation of reservation life. She lost her mother to complications during the birth of her baby sister. Rose was only 13. Following her mother’s death, her father’s alcoholism became more than Rose could take. On February 4, 1964, she and a younger sister set out on foot, with only the clothes they were wearing, to go live with an aunt.
They weren’t sure exactly where their aunt lived and with no telephone, they had no way of letting her know they were coming. On the way, the girls were caught in a blizzard. Rose’s sister died from exposure, but Rose made it through and during her recovery gave her life to Christ.
“Two missionaries came to visit me in the hospital,” Rose says. “They said I needed to accept Christ. I wasn’t sure exactly what that meant, but I knew God protected me during the storm. I remembered seeing the words to Acts 16:31 when I was unconscious. So I prayed, ‘Lord, I will open my heart to you. My relatives have traditional Navajo beliefs, but I will follow you no matter what. I believe and I will trust you.’”
Many years later, Rose is still on the reservation, pointing her people toward Christ. At Tinian Baptist Church, she leads a weekly class for Navajo women and teenage girls. One of the many ways she shares Christ is by teaching them to speak and read their native language. “I want them to read their own Bible in Navajo,” she says.
She also teaches them about their customs. But most of all she teaches them about her faith in Jesus Christ. The Navajo often believe they will have to leave behind their cultural identity to follow Christ.
“I love to explain to young people that our culture and traditions are two different things,” Rose says. “You may have to give up some of the traditional practices to become a Christian, but you will always be Navajo. God created us as a tribe with a unique language, arts, food and clothing, and He doesn’t ask us to give that up.”
Jami Becher is editorial assistant of On Mission.