Another blog post from Bruce, in Honduras....
this was written a day ago and was delayed in sending due to an electrical storm. As you read this, he is most likely winging his ways across the sky heading home!
This afternoon we completed the
church addition project!! We have successfully added 800 square feet of space
which will enhance this church’s ability to minister to a larger community than
has been previously possible.
Other than the Sunday messages of Christian Encouragement, this church’s efforts
also include Bible studies, purity classes, housing a family in need and the
very successful neighborhood feeding center program.
Each day of work has included a one
hour period of time when parents bring their preschool and elementary age
children for a meal and a lesson. During this time of day, we've had to be extra
careful of jobsite hazards but it has also been a time of our interaction with
these extremely poor people of the community.
It has taken some effort on my
part to mentally accept that the well kept kids, young people and adults we
have encountered at this church actually live in the shacks and simple little
houses right next door.
The typical home in this barrio
looks to be about 2-300 square feet with no running water, an outhouse, camping
style cooking and an outside concrete sink and washboard (a “pila”) for
cleaning laundry. Yet it is very common to see the people looking well groomed
and dressed in clean stylish clothing. I challenge any of us gringos to pull
this off as well.
Our trusty group of teenage helpers
seem like their counterparts back home hanging out together, joking and teasing
each other. Some differences are also apparent. They don’t grumble about hard
physical work and they aren’t distracted by technology or vehicles. In fact
some of them are quite good musicians in the church praise band. It seems
incongruent to my North American mind that they have been born and raised right
here in this poor barrio. They are also a product of this feeding center which
connected them with this church at a young age and likely rescued them from being
recruited by the gangs.
I was introduced to a girl one day,
about 13, who came by the church with her aunt and uncle as volunteers to help
feed the kids that day. She looked a little shy and was dressed in a school
uniform of clean white blouse and navy blue pleated skirt (all school kids here
wear uniforms). When I conversed with her in my pathetic Spanish, she startled
me by responding in clear and perfect English. I went on to learn that someone
in the U.S. has sponsored this bright young lady for the last seven years at an
English speaking school and she has been doing very well there. I could clearly see reason for the pride that
her Aunt and Uncle have for her.
Nelson is a gravel voiced middle
aged member of this church who lives about 2-blocks down the hill and works as
a self employed welder/fabricator. He makes steel roof trusses, doors, security
bars for windows and property entrance gates. He speaks some English because of
time he has spent in Panama working at a US military base. He saved our bacon a
couple times by loaning us his paint sprayer and extension ladder.
Nelson exudes enthusiasm for life
and seems to really savor the time he spends helping his church and discussing
life with us. His opinion on his country’s leadership: “It’s no good. They can't be trusted”. Spoken as a man with first hand experience. He is part of a
multi-family group that have pooled their resources to hire a 4th
grade teacher for their 4 3- 4th grade kids. Each family chips in $5
dollars a month. Why? Because the school couldn't afford to hire the teacher.
I overheard Mateo asking a 12-year
old girl what her plans were for her future. She replied that at one time she
wanted to be a doctor but now she wasn't sure. Mateo suggested becoming a
teacher to which she immediately replied “No,they don't get paid !”
I have always found it interesting to just
open the pages of a World Atlas to any country and examine the character of
that country summarized on those pages. The type of government, geography,
weather, religion and natural resources are all listed there. If you look up
Honduras, for example, you would see that coffee, fruit and sugar cane are
natural resources which are exported from Honduras.
Read on a little further and
discover that at least 850,000 Hondurans have left this country of 8 million
for Spain, Guatemala Canada, the U.S., etc. in search of employment. That is
10% of the total population and 800,000 of these people come to the U.S., many
arrive illegally.
I have had the pleasure of meeting
two such men on our job here. Both of them have made the dangerous 2,600 mile
journey on foot and on top of freight trains through Guatemala and Mexico to
sneak across the border into the U.S. (read the book Enrique’s Journey if you
would like to know more about this trip).
One
of them worked 6-years in Virginia as a cabinet installer and then chose to
return home to his family. The other worked 17-months in Maryland doing
landscaping work and after a near fatal car accident, he was sent home by
immigration.
This trip to Honduras has enabled me
to see the world in a more realistic way than my life in idealistic America has
allowed me to see. This refined perspective has spoken loud and clear to my
conscience that the most valuable natural resource that any nation has is it’s
people.
The first priority of any nation
should be an investing in it’s people. Investments that release their potential
& skills and provides the freedom to use those skills which, in return,
will benefit the nation. Unfortunately,
Honduras looks to be a prime example of a government that ignorantly dismisses
the value of it’s people in favor of individual greed and corporate corruption.
This may sound like an oxymoron but “Thank
God for Christ!” because the model that Jesus Christ gave us for healthy
relationships turns this self-focused approach totally on it’s head. Jesus
directs us to love one another to the point of loving our enemies, to give
unselfishly and to trust faithfully. This is the kind of power that can
ultimately diffuse what is happening here in Honduras and this is what the
Christian church is promoting here.
I have no trouble justifying the
time and funds given through this 3-week mission trip to enable this life
changing effort to go forward.
Thank-you for the part that you have
played in this also.
Bruce
in closing, a few more pictures...
