The Journey

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Why Is Jesus Sad?

From the Archives: Winter 2008

Written By Judith Martinez

As a nine year old child, I was reading my Bible and read Matthew 23: * “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, asa a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing” (Matthew 23:37). * I asked my mother, “Why is Jesus sad?” She told me to go outside where she had some hens and chicks.  There, she used these hens and chicks to explain the Gospel to me.  She told me to pray and Jesus would come and live in my heart.

Growing up in Tampico, Mexico, I went to church all my life.  When I was sixteen, God called me to serve Him.  I refused to hear Him because I was angry with Him.  My parents had separated and I couldn’t understand why God permitted that.  I decided to go to the university to study accounting.  While I was at the university, I could see my friends lost without Jesus.  Always I had my Bible with me and they asked me about God but still I refused the call.  I simply shared with them there was a better way.

When I finished the university I got a job.  Always people asked me why I was different.  Why didn’t I say bad words and why did I pray before I ate?  I could hear God’s voice asking me to go to the seminary.  I quit my job, obeyed God and went to Mexico City.  At the seminary, I heard about missionaries in other countries preaching the gospel and God tugged at my heart.  When I graduated, I stayed at the seminary as a teacher. 

Judith Martinez

One day I was up on a high mountain and God reminded me of Matthew 23.  I could see all of Mexico City spread out below me.  “I have called them to come to Me, but they don’t listen.” He placed in my heart a burden for these lost people.  When I heard the voice of God, I went down into Mexico City and began to make disciples.

My home church in Tampico asked me to come back, but God had made it clear I was to stay in Mexico City.  For 18 years I served Him there.  Four years in study and 14 years teaching in the seminary and making disciples.  During this time, I got my masters degree in Christian Education.  In one of my classes, the teacher asked me to do a project about Hispanic people in North Carolina.  She gave me some magazines to read.  These magazines told me how many Hispanic people lived in Boone, NC and didn’t know Jesus.  As I read, I felt God ask me to come to Boone.

Retired missionary friends had settled in Hickory, NC and invited me to visit them.  I came in December 2001.  They said to me during my visit that I needed to meet their daughter.  She was living in Boone, NC, so I came up to the beautiful mountains to meet her.  While here, she told me about the problems Hispanic people had, and again I heard God asking me to come to Boone.  I was only here on vacation and had to return to Mexico City.  I remained in Mexico City for four more years.  I was working at the church with families whose husbands were working in the USA.  The wives and children were coming to Jesus, but the husbands working in the USA didn’t know Jesus.

Again in June of 2005, my missionary friends asked me to come to Boone and help their daughter.  I was here for two months helping her and she told me about the Hispanic people.  The last week of my trip I met a family from Mt. Vernon Baptist Church and they also told me about the Hispanic people living in Bradford Park.  They said, “These people need to hear the gospel in their own language.” Once again, I had to return to Mexico since I was here on vacation.  Once again, God asked me to come to Boone.

One year later, I came to Boone and in July 2006 started a ministry among the Hispanic people.  For the past two years, I have watched God touch their hearts and they are coming to Jesus.  Little by little, they are responding to the Gospel.  Now some of them are sharing the gospel with their friends and family because God is changing their lives.  Each day God shows His faithfulness by protecting me and providing everything I need.

* Matthew 23:37 was not quoted in the original 2008 edition of this story.