**Sorry for the delay I thought I posted this a long time ago….
Anitgua, Guatemala is a beautiful city of history. There are ruins mingled into the architecture of the center city. The streets are cobblestone.Each day we walk along the streets of Anitgua to ministry. Each day I turn my ankles and trip but they are so beautiful too. I can see two volcanoes, Fuego and Agua, when I look out my window. The view everywhere is “muy bonito.”
There is a hill that over looks this beautiful city that has a cross, its called Cerra de la Cruz. Last Tuesday we woke up at 5am to ride the bus to a place where we could hike up to the cross. First I am not a morning person and I’ve been getting up with the chickens. Secondly, this hill was no joke. It was dirt and cobblestone road that was almost a 90 degree angle. I have not been working out and the elevation was high so needless to say I was sucking air. I’ll be honest I hated it! Some friends stayed with me and I kept praying to God “Help Me!” I remember thinking ok this has got to be a test geez this is so hard. I pushed through and made it. We got to the cross right at sunrise and the sun was peaking through the trees. It was beautiful and so quiet. The whole city below looked like it was empty. I couldnt see a car or anyone. We all sat and Luis told us about the city and how the Catholics are the main religion but they really aren’t Christian. The Mayans and Catholics have confused the representation of Jesus and God for the real thing. There are “Christians” that go to churches and pray to different statues of Jesus and really believe they are praying to God in that form. We all prayed over the city and the people with hope that they would know the real Jesus and Holy Spirit that is within us. Going down the hill was much easier. Ha we realized there was a much faster and easier way we could have gotten up to the top. The other side had nice steps. As I walked down I was grateful for that struggle because in it I got to practice thanking God and praying for his help.
Yesterday,Saturday, we had a day off so we all decided to go hike the Pacaya Volcano. It erupted a few weeks ago and is still erutping. Again we had to get up early, God is definietly working on this in me. Our friend Alex even showed up to hike with us. The ride was two hours in the curvy beautiful lush mountains. The views were gorgeous with a lake in valley between the mountains. We pulled into a small town and had to switch into a large pickup truck that looked like it held hay or animals. About 25 of us squeezed in and rode to a ranch. Then they had half of us get in another truck thaat looked like a cage. We rode over rough terrain and lava rocks surrounded us in a large praire. We had to drive through the cattle ranch and there was the volcano in the distance. We could see smoke coming out and all the old lava from previous eruptions. We finally parked and they handed everyone a walking stick. You know its hard when they hand you a walking stick. So we started hiking- we walked through large masses of cooled lava ash. The terrain was dried grass and thorns that scraped our legs and slippery ash and rocks. It was strenous. As I was hiking I kept thinking the hike to the Cross was just preparation for this. God, thanks for that preparation. I knew I could do it but it was very steep, windy,and the altitude made it hard to breathe. I had my friends Laren adn Sarah at my side the whole way! Sarah and I got winded and stoppped for a bit and we could see everyone was waiting so we asked the boy guiding us “Cuanto minutos mas?” How many more minutes and he said “Aqui!” We were here! Everyone was up there waiting because it was the top. We felt so silly but it made it worth it. The lava ran down the volcano about 100 feet below us. You could still feel the heat from that far away. It was so cool and surreal to be standing on the side of a volcano. I tried to sit and soak it in. I looked around at the vast land and valley we were in and praise God for making everything the eye could see. We all looked so small in the vastness of where we stood.
We rode down the mountain singing silly songs and holding on for dear life in the trucks. That was definitely one for the books. I’m just glad that I am trying to train my heart to thank God in these moments. Even if the road was hard and strenuous the breathtaking view was totally worth it.
Blessings from Antigua,
Jennie
