Norris Family News

Agua Viva

As part of the last outreach of the summer in August, we had the blessed opportunity to visit Agua Viva, a men's drug and alcohol rehab center. It is a self-imposed prison. The doors and gates are locked to keep the men in. Together they face the detox demons as each man must go cold turkey when they arrive. We wondered if this was the kind of place into which we should be bringing our family, even our little children. But we had been told that we wouldn't want to miss it...

One thing that has become very clear this summer is the fact that we humans are all the same. We all have the same basic heart issues. The Scripture declares; “For all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God.” All of us at the core know that we are accountable to God and that we do not measure up to His righteous standard. All of us at the core know that we exist for a purpose. The Scripture declares that Man was created in the image of God and describes how we were made for relationship with Him. We are all aware of these facts to various degrees at various times. Sometimes we feel guilt, sometimes we feel empty, and sometimes we yearn for purpose and lasting achievement.

The Agua Viva men's drug and alcohol rehab facility;
looking at the outside of the handball court

As human beings we all share these things, but we address them very differently depending on our society and our station in life. All humans respond to these fundamental truths. Some, regardless of society or station, attempt to escape from them with extreme measures such as drugs, alcohol, or other addictive behavior. But most strive to mask them or quench them with “quality of life.”

If someone in an affluent society feels the pang of the human heart condition, he can go buy something, or use the leisure affluence affords to travel, or enjoy nature, or pursue some creative expression, or even do something “socially responsible” to assuage the ache. Not that there is anything wrong with any of those pursuits. Truly, God created an amazing world and gave us unfathomable capacity to study, create, enjoy, and empathize. But most people cover over their ache with quality of life to such a successful degree that they believe they have no need for God. We have it all together, we have noble pursuits, we have hobbies, and we surround ourselves with beautiful things. After all, these things are all there is to life...right?

But where we are working in Mexico there is a greater concentration of people who do not have the quality of life icing to paste over their heart yearnings. Instead their hearts lie bare, exposed raw to the harshness of human need; both physical and spiritual, like an aching tooth. When we share the life-giving, conscience-cleansing, purpose-giving, Good News of Jesus Christ, these people are more apt to listen. Indeed, they are hungry. After all, these things are all there is to life...and life eternal.

Walking into Agua Viva was like plunging into a river of liquid joy, becoming immersed in peace. It was like taking a drink of the Water of Life. We had imagined those men to be tough, bitter, scary, and hopeless. Indeed, some certainly looked scary with all their tattoos and other marks of street life. Who we met instead were men who were once genuinely lost; who were the dregs of society, cast out by family and the law because of their choices. They had been running away, like all of us do, chasing after all kinds of things to fill their souls. But in God's mercy, they were not dulled and spoiled by quality of life. Instead they were beaten and kicked almost to death by their life choices, and from the depth of their lostness, they discovered the maginitude of their Father's love. They were lost, and now they have been found!

The men were working on this rock sculpture
at the bottom of a pit when we came in.
It is a portion of 1 Corinthians 1:28 which says
"and the base things of the world and
the despised God has chosen."

Some in our scientifically enlightened culture might try to explain the peace in these men and their resulting changed lives as applied group psychology or as a result of being removed from a culture of danger and death and placed into a culture of nurture and support. But the men would tell you otherwise. They have come to know the Resurrected Lord and have been transformed by Him. They have come to know intimately that He is the Living God who cares for them and can be trusted for everything in life. Agua Viva receives no outside financial support. So the men must not only learn to trust God for their own salvation, but also for their daily food, water, and other necessities of life. Just as He is able to provide for their meals, He is able to transform the hardened heart of sin. Indeed, these things are all there is to life.

-- Thaine