Divine prompting turned Israel Rodríguez’s heart toward the pastorate

By Elket Rodríguez

Based on his family background, Israel Rodríguez Segura seemed destined for the pastorate. Not necessarily so, but a decision he made as a rebellious teenager turned his life back toward God and made a long and faithful ministry possible.

Rodríguez is pastor of Primera Iglesia Bautista—First Baptist Church—in Piedras Negras, Mexico, and a regional stalwart in Fellowship Southwest’s ministry to refugees along the U.S.-Mexico border. He’s also a pastor’s son and the oldest brother among six siblings in which all the boys grew up to be pastors and all the girls grew up to marry pastors. 

Their parents raised all those sisters and brothers in a strict home, Rodríguez recalled. “I couldn't go to bed without reading five chapters of the Bible or get up in the mornings without praying,” he said. "We had to sit on the front bench of the church, be quiet and listen."

Rodríguez laid all that Bible reading and worship aside and turned against God at age 13, when his father, Carlos Rodríguez, died. The church where his father had been pastor informed his mother, Eliazer Segura, she and her children had to leave the parsonage. At that moment, the pastor’s oldest son was done with church. 

"After my father died, I entered a time of spiritual rebellion," he said. “I left my house and went to Veracruz. I wanted to do whatever I wanted, and I didn't want to be subjected to reading the Bible or praying. I didn’t like the imposition."

For four years, Rodríguez angrily resisted God. Then a brawl broke out at a party, and he fled. On the way to his apartment, he sensed God reminding him of his mother and his siblings, as well as his father's teachings. He opened the Bible "looking for something that would give meaning" to his life. 

That's when he was confronted by Romans 5:8: “But God demonstrates his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” 

“I read the verse about 20 times, bent my knees and gave my life to Christ," he reported.

From that moment, Rodríguez sought to follow the path he believed Jesus prepared for him. He began serving at Primera Iglesia Bautista of Jaltipan, Veracruz. That’s where he met Rebecca Jiménez —the daughter of pastors—and they soon married. When the pastor of the Jaltipan church died, the church chose Rodríguez to succeed him.

Later, the couple moved to Mexico City to study at the Seminario Teológico Bautista Mexicano—the Mexican Baptist Theological Seminary—and to continue preparing for ministry. He majored in church growth, and she earned a degree in music ministry.

In May 1985, Rodríguez became pastor of Primera Iglesia Bautista in Piedras Negras, which only had 18 members rambling around aging downtown facilities. By the time the COVID-19 pandemic struck last spring, the church gathered almost 900 members to worship on a newer campus near the Mexican side of the Eagle Pass International Bridge.

But worship is only one aspect of the church’s robust ministry. “We have 220 small groups or cells that meet weekly in their homes,” Rodríguez explained. "Our motto is: ‘Every believer a servant; every house a temple.’”

While shepherding the flock in Piedras Negras, the Rodríguezes rescued six children, plus Carlos José, their biological son. 

Their large family demonstrates God blessed them with children who needed love and understanding, Rodríguez stressed. Carlos José’s siblings include two unruly relatives the Rodríguezes mentored, a child rescued from an orphanage, a newborn girl given to them by her mother, a child rescued from a bus terminal, and a boy whose mother tried to kill him.  

All their children now are adults. Most of them are professionals and attend Primera Iglesia Bautista in Piedras Negras.

With the help of his church, Rodríguez began ministering to immigrants after he preached a sermon series about loving neighbors, based on Matthew 25. At the end of the service, several women approached him and asked, “Pastor, the message was nice, but what are we going to do now?" 

That conversation prompted the church to begin feeding refugees clustered in the border city. When immigrant caravans trailed through Mexico in 2018, a trickle of refugees grew into a flood, and Primera Iglesia Bautista scaled up its ministry. It sheltered immigrants from Central America in its older downtown buildings and welcomed immigrants from the Caribbean and South America to its suburban campus.

Fellowship Southwest soon began supporting the church’s feeding and shelter program for the refugees, thanks to a grant from the Prichard Family Foundation. 

 The flow of immigrants has shifted within Mexico, and Piedras Negras no longer receives as many refugees as it did a couple of years ago. But  Primera Iglesia Bautista still shelters 35 refugees and assists 15 immigrant families with food and rent assistance.

And Rodríguez still has a heart for his two flocks—local members and immigrants from far away.

If you want to support Fellowship Southwest’s immigrant ministry all along the U.S.-Mexico border, click here.

Elket Rodríguez, an attorney and minister, is CBF’s immigrant and refugee specialist. He lives on the U.S.-Mexico border, in Harlingen, Texas, and works with CBF Advocacy, CBF Global Missions and Fellowship Southwest. He and Israel Rodríguez are not related.