In November 1985, my husband, 11-month-old daughter, Hannah, and I left Goshen, Ind., for San Antonio, Texas, to begin our Mennonite Voluntary Service term with Mennonite Mission Network.
Bryan and I were unit coordinators half-time, and then each of us was placed as a volunteer in two different community organizations for the other half of our time.
My placement was with San Antonio Urban Ministries, an umbrella organization for other nonprofit service organizations, where I did general office work, including accidentally erasing two days of data from the computer’s hard drive in my first month there (fortunately, they were forgiving). Bryan volunteered with Inner City Development, a community center in the west side of the city.
Our experience during almost two years of MVS encompassed much more than our placements. It included relocation to a vibrant and ethnically diverse city. It introduced us to the gifts and challenges of involvement in a small urban congregation.
It taught us to live in community. It gave us opportunities for spiritual reflection and growth. It opened doors for us to stay eight years after our term finished.
It was exciting to experience San Antonio and learn its history, neighborhoods and cultures, as well as the resources that a large city offers. We loved it and developed our own traditions that wove in the Mexican-American culture that characterizes San Antonio.
The people of the congregation that we attended, San Antonio Mennonite Church, became our family. In the small and diverse congregation, we learned about conflict and discernment, about variety and flexibility in worship, and about the depth of relationship that can be nourished in the church.
I was given many opportunities to participate and lead in the congregation. I gradually realized that I was most “at home” participating in the whole range of tasks within the church.
In MVS, we lived in community with people whom we ourselves did not choose. In that setting we learned about the real joy and challenges that arise in community life.
We took turns with our household chores, ate together, played together, and hosted together (in one six-month period, we hosted nearly 100 people in the unit house). Our daughter was nourished with love and attention and patience.
We also learned to work through the ups and downs that come with living together. I am grateful for the people we came to know and for what we learned as we lived with them.
Finally, the MVS framework provided resources for spiritual growth and learning.
During our first year, each MVSer received a devotional book, Disciplines of the Inner Life. That book was foundational then and continues to be a resource as I continue the journey of faith and discipleship.
Our life in San Antonio—in the unit and the church—were undergirded and surrounded by the recognition of the presence of God at work. For that, I am grateful.
In substantive ways, our adult identities were rooted and formed in that place we were sent to serve and where we received gift upon gift.
When we left San Antonio, it was so that I could attend Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart (Ind.) to prepare for pastoring, building on church leadership skills I learned in the San Antonio congregation.
