We arrived in Guatemala City on Saturday, September 8th. The bus ride from Guatemala City to Santa Cruz del Quiche was about 3 hours of pure glory. About 60 of us were crammed into a garishly decorated old school bus as we rode the through the sharp twists and turns the countryside of Central America. The weather was cool and the scenery was enough to knock the wind out of a person. I was lucky enough to get a window seat and recklessly stuck my head out of the bus half of the time, soaking in as much of the new air as I could. I loved seeing the people going about their daily lives, while the scenery lay quite and unchanging in all it's glory around them.
I've seen a lot in the short week i've spent in Santa Cruz del Quiche. I've seen children, their frail bodies overwhelmed with sickness and disease. I've seen families, who travel for hours to get their sick loved one to the hospital, only to sleep on the surrounding streets waiting to find out if their loved one will ever come out the hospital doors again. I've seen women with their families, and fathers making a living by selling old used tires. I've seen pastors and missionaries giving their lives and possessions joyfully to bring glory to God. They walk through broken streets where concrete curbs are freckled with trash and various metal poles that occasionally jut out. Cars, buses and motorcycles fly by pedestrians, literally inches from hitting them. Huge chunks of meat hang from cleavers in the market stores while flies make it their goal to wander around every inch of the dangling slab. Dogs seem to be on every street, their sickly bodies competing to look like something of a dinosaur. It's a strange new world. My first reaction is- How can I change this? How can I fix them? But I can't. I literally can't do anything. Even writing this makes my heart beat faster with frustration towards my powerlessness. It's not fair– that I should be gifted with so much. Comfort, warmth, finances, friendship, food, and love… In just walking down one street, the stories that these people hold inside are horrifying and heart-wrenching. There is nothing I can do to heal any of it, BUT I know someone who can. JESUS CHRIST.
This week my squad did an amazing thing of sharing their stories with each other, opening up in a way that Americans seem to rarely do. We are the ones that have it all together, we are the ones that help others, and fix things, and make dreams come true. But everyone in this squad has a story. One of hurt and of brokenness. We thought we were coming to make a change, but God wanted to remind us first that we're in the same boat as those we hope to bring change to. We hurt just like people in third world countries, maybe we just hide it better behind good jobs, lots of cars, and white picket fences. But isn't that type of brokenness, the "american-brokenness" potentially much more dangerous?
We fool ourselves into thinking we have it all together while the sickness of brokenness silently sneaks into our lives, destroying aspects of us we don't even realize until it's too late.
We snuggle behind the comfortability and try to hide the hurt from the world. If we can only work harder, be more beautiful, have more money… have the perfect spouse, then things will be okay. These people face problems head on. Here there is no hiding the brokenness. It's written deep in the eyes of a Mayan Grandmother who has seen the loss of her children and grandchildren. It is burning in the eyes of a hard working Quiche father who can't seem to make ends meet. It is carved into the heart of an orphan child who has been shunned and unloved all her life. It's simple, and it's hard. The ONLY thing, worth living for, worth dying for, is the Lord Jesus Christ. Only through Him will anything be decent or good or beautiful.
I don't want the American dream…
I don't want the American dream…
This is the white picket fence I want.
This is the dream I choose.
