Waving Goodbye

Fernando and I waved through the gate at the bus. We were saying good bye to the rest of my team, who were headed to Guatemala City to fly back to the states. I on the other hand would board another bus to head back to Honduras for a couple of days before heading stateside. Graduation had come and gone. We had said our final good byes and hugs and kisses. It was time to move on. There were relationships that had been made that will last a lifetime. Ten weeks had flown by, but I can still remember the first day, passing through the city at 6 am just as the town was waking up. 

For every season there is a time and the season of Guatemala has come to an end, the next season is of rest and family and friends. I wish learning came to an end but it doesn't so I will be ready with an open heart and open ears as The Lord leads me into the next step. One step at a time. A lamp onto my feet. A light onto my path. 

Rainbows

A large rainbow crossed over the gray clouds and I smiled, it had been a perfect day, it was the first day I felt that I actually lived in Guatemala. 

After a morning of menial tasks such as laundry and cleaning, it felt normal to just pack a lunch and head down the road to the lake with the youth we had befriended over the last five weeks, to hang out and enjoy the sun. It was also the first time I didn't feel like a foreigner despite the language barrier. We usually have each event planned weeks ahead of time and involves only our group of six; this event didn't require a formal title or leader, there was no debriefing at the end, and no one seemed to watch the time. 

When the kids jump all over you and splash water in your face, you don't mind because they yell your name in their little Spanish accent and it's all worth it. Some how, beyond the odds, we've crossed over an invisible line into their world, it's a line some missionaries never step over. We've become family, despite our skin colors and languages, there is complete acceptance. I can't take them out of their world and its not what God wants me to do, but I can step into their world and even though they may still have go back to a rough home life, the rainbow in the sky is a promise to us that He goes with us. 

Maiblene

Tu eres princesa you are a princess. Maiblene's face lit up as the truth of that statement hit her. She was a princess of God. It was the second school of the first day, and the first time we had been to this school, when the spirit of God moving among the children's hearts and they encountered the fathers love. For so many of these kids here in Guatemala they are rarely told who they are and have no idea what God actually thinks of them. In this fatherless nation they are hungering to know a father. We poured ourselves into two full days of preparing a skit, lesson and songs to teach these kids that Dios es un Papa Amoroso. God is a loving father. We sweated in the summer heat and fell into bed each night exhausted, but it was do worth it to see this little girls face when she encountered the truth. There were many mistakes and lots of broken, mispronounced Spanish, but in the end the kids still loved us and God still poured out his spirit upon them. There is no junior Holy Spirit and the same spirit that lives in you lives in many of them now and they are forever changed by the Fathers love. Maiblene is one eight year old little girl who now knows she is special In the eyes of God. The truth has been spoken and his word will not return void.

Walking without Fear

As the Pastor showed us his scares, he recounted their stories, the persecution that he has gone through for the sake of Christ. Ixobel (ee-sho-bell) is a sub city in Poptun where our ministry focus will be for the next seven weeks. This place use to be controlled by violence and Christians were the target. You couldn't sit in the front room of your house with a group of people without someone throwing rocks at you. 

Pastor Mynor (our contact there) was very excited to have a prayer walk around the city to declare the goodness God has for that place that was once controlled by witchcraft and violence. Not long ago the local pastors would plan prayer walks in the middle of the night and walk quietly to avoid the persecution and physical danger. From their sacrifice and perseverance the violence has fallen. So last Thursday with loud speakers and a parade of believers we marched down the dirt roads in broad daylight declaring to the powers of darkness, who thought they owned Ixobel, that the King of Kings had arrived to reclaim his people. 

Immersion

We climbed into the already packed van and waved good-bye to the only link we had to the rest of world. We were on our way to Poptun for the first time in a public van full of strangers, we were packed in Guatemalan style and the heat didn't make it any more comfortable, but we pushed away our American mind set about how things should be and embraced our new culture. This was immersion week; we are spending the next seven days with a family we had never met and that don't speak the same language as we do. The three guys were dropped off at one house and us three girls continued on to Pastor Mynor's house to meet his wife, Sylvia and their two boys, Fernando and Danny. God is good, the other two girls who were with me spoke Spanish so I was able to get by with their help and my Spanglish.

Each morning after breakfast (beans, rice and eggs), we would walk down the dusty dirt road, the sun already hot on our backs at 7:30am, to the dirt floor church for our morning classes. Each afternoon we had LAMP (Language Acquisition Made Practical) where we worked with a Spanish (only) speaker and learned different phrases, then continued out into the community to practice what we had learned. It was strange to walk up to forty something people and say a couple lines in Spanish than move on, but it stretched me and that is part of the goal here at the internship, to stretch us and get us out of our comfort zone.

Poptun is the community we will be working in for the next eight weeks, to bring what help they need and try to encourage and unite the church for the work of the kingdom. There is much work to do here, but God has a plan and we are just a small part of making that happen.

Hope

It seemed like routine ministry (nothing with God is routine) go pray with people and see God move. Our team, six Americans, six natives, walked up to the house, Pastor called out the greeting and we were ushered into the living room. 

It had a dirt floor and a couch, there were sheets hung up on string to block off a corner for the bedroom and little else. We knew before going in that this young thirteen year old girl who went to the church we were with was having a hard time at home. Her parents were divorced and she loved with her mom and step dad who were not believers. 

We asked the mom for prayer needs and her story was translated to us that she had returned home last night to find her husband had attacked her daughter. She had grabbed the machete and would have killed him had he not ran away. The girl started to cry as the story was told and I went to her and wrapped my arms around her. We began to pray over the home and as I prayed for this girl my heart broke. God moved something inside me and I began to feel her pain, all I could whisper to her was "It's ok. Esta bien." 

I hugged her good bye and walked out of the house and didn't stop. I didn't look back. I didn't wait for my team. I walked down the dirt road and the tears flowed out of me. I didn't stop until I got to the church about five hundred feet away, and I got real with God. In the bible it says that we can approach his throne with confidence. I marched right up to that throne and pounded on his chest and cried and cried. All he said was "It's ok." 

While I can't understand everything, I learned that our only hope is Christ. If we don't let to and trust him to make justice, we will become angry and bitter. My God is a big God and a Good God. My hope is in him. 

Walking the Streets

The line was long, we were in the back, but here that doesn't matter to much when you are waiting for a taxi, because as soon as the right one rolls up to the side, the first person in gets it. I had been to San Pedro Sula downtown several times before, but this was the first time I had walked the streets. I was here with Miss Liza, the 3rd grade teacher I am an assistant to. She had wanted to take me to see the streets of SPS. SPS is known as one of, if not the first, most dangerous city in Central America, but I wasn't to worried because the lady I was with would scare anyone straight. For a woman in her fifties she still had fire and spirit. We walked most of the way around the downtown part of city, but at one point we wanted to grab a taxi, we saw one parked at the curb with its doors open, so we hopped in with the other passengers and took off. My western mindset had me smiling at how strange this experience was, yet how normal it felt. I love to see new cultures and different ways people live life, because it gives me a new view of God. These people represent another side of God. If you've ever been to another country and seen the big cities, they are very similar. People walk the uneven sidewalks, vendors sell various ítems, cars honk and traffic looks crazy, there is a very bad odor that fills your nostrils, but when you really look at it, when you stop seeing it through a forgieners eyes, when you stop comparing it to the place you come from, when you start to really see this is how people live, this is their life and it's a beautiful thing. That's when you can experience it for what it really is, how they really are. I leave Honduras for Guatemala in four days, and this may be the hardest move I've had to make. My heart is here, this is home.