This past Christmas, eight La Sierra University students and Jodi Cahill, La Sierra University Director of Homebase Missions and Dean of Nurture, went to the Navajo Indian Reservation in Monument Valley, Utah, to hold a Christmas Vacation Bible School and rebuild a home.

"We cleaned the ashes in a burned hogan (an Octagon shaped Navajo dwelling), tarred and shingled a roof and presented a Christmas program with stories,” says Emmanuel Nelson, junior psychology major. “This is what Christmas is all about. Helping in some way to give the joy of Jesus.”

“At the mini-church services we told the story of Jesus’ birth, helped the kids with coloring and sang songs,” says Kristin Blalock, freshman education major. “I would do this again to help kids that are not as fortunate as others.”

“Christmas went really well,” says Charlie Whitehorse, pastor of the Kayenta, Ariz., and Monument Valley, Utah, churches. “The young people responded well to the La Sierra University students, and the adults appreciated the students who came out in the summer. Some people have even started coming to church because of the time Manuel and Adam spent here last summer. They have been a blessing to our community.”

“It had just snowed when we got there and it was cold,” says Cahill, who adds that Homebase Missions meets people where they are and lets Christ change them. “We were so blessed to have Eloy and Lucy Felix donate 56 toys to the Navajo Indians for Christmas. We worked with Pastor Whitehorse in distributing them.”

The students had to break off the cement on the exterior of the hogan with rocks, sticks or anything else they could find. “We did not have many tools. The students had to roof a building, which they had never done before, and mix cement with their hands,” adds Cahill.

“This was better than receiving gifts, seeing the kids smiles,” says Manuel Arteada, sophomore business and pre-seminary major and Homebase Missions student director. Arteada coordinated this mission trip with Adam Hicks, sophomore religious studies, pre-seminary major. “Something about seeing young people working for God gets me excited. My last trip to Majuro changed my life, and I switched my major to pre-seminary. We want to send out more groups. We even had to bring an extra car because of all the gifts that were donated.”

“This is part of the experience at La Sierra University from our mission—To Seek, To Know, To Serve,” says Cahill.

“I recommend this. It is better than sitting at home. Kids are happy with the littlest things, like a hug,” says Melissa Elloway, sophomore education and liberal studies major.

“Presenting the Christmas story really helps the kids understand the meaning of Christmas,” says Whitehorse. “Many came to church for the first time.”

“We saw the need,” says Hicks. “It is weird how I feel alive when I am helping others. We organized this for a better Christmas to help out the reservation. Last summer I taught Sabbath school, helped build buildings and trenches and led out in an evangelistic series, ‘Best of Life,’ on the reservation.”

“If you go in loving people and be a part of their lives you will be blessed,” says Cahill. “We received more of a blessing. When God uses you, you get the biggest blessing.”