Wait, how I am done 2 months of the world race already? We’re down to single digit months left on the race… what!?
Honduras is a sad place to leave, I feel like I’m gonna be saying this every month, but I hope it’s not this hard to leave every month. This ministry (which I talked about in my last post at http://mikebergey.theworldrace.org/?filename=no-gates-a-ministry-that-gets-it) has everything I love including working with the homeless and inner city kids, mostly teenagers. It is really making me want to coach in the inner city with the kids nobody wants to work with more and more and also start a ministry there. I’m not sure what that would look like, but maybe something like Tony has here. It’s something I’m very passionate about, but not something I’m gonna think about till my time on the race is over. I don’t wanna miss the blessings the Lord has for me today which is so easy to do, heck you've probably done that already today… so let’s live in the moment, because it could be the last moment you got… We live in a society where you need to have everything together now, and everything prepared and ready for the future. well I'm trying my best to live what the Lord wants me to live today, whatever that may look like, and he will make sure the rest falls into place… (just some free words of advice mixed in with my monthly recap, so live by it!)
We had an opportunity to work with a ministry called “The Heart of Christ” for a week here in Honduras too. It was about an hour outside the city we are staying at, and it was with a couple who is completely awesome. Gracie and Lee have such amazing hearts, and Gracie alone is like the machine gun preacher of Honduras. She is has worked with the police force to bring justice to crimes of violence, sexual abuse, and rape in Honduras and has help the police force make substantial strides in their cases where justice prevailed. Through this she has found young girls who have been victims of rape and have become pregnant. Her ministry basically takes in the kids no one wants. The 12 year old who was raped by her grandfather so now she has a child, the CP kids who cannot talk, walk, or do anything for themselves, a little boy who weighed 36 lbs, then got the tumor removed from his side and weighed 18 lbs (that’s right he had a tumor the size of his little body on the right side of his stomach, same size even to the lb), and Gracie takes them all in and loves on them, provides resources and a better life. We were able to take care of the kids and help build dorms for future missionaries to come help, and also future rooms for more girls and their kids. There are currently 3 girls and their children living there (they come and go sometimes), as well as a few orphaned kids and 2 girls with CP. It was great getting to help build and hang out with the kids there, getting up at 5:30 so we can get to work by six and having to pray for rain to fill up the barrels because that was our source of clean water to shower and wash clothes. Although some of us guys skipped that step by just taking our soap, striping to our boxers, and running to the top of the roof during the rain storm… there’s nothing like showering in the good old outdoors. Gracie and Lee’s was a great week, it was tough work, but probably the most peaceful and relaxing time on the race so far. I’m glad we had an opportunity to work with that ministry and continue to build relationships with people who have such a passion for the Kingdom of God.
At the trash dump colony my team has been having an amazing time building relationships with the people down there. It’s weird looking at a box spring and an old billboard sign and knowing that’s the walls to someone’s house, but it was awesome to see how normal and fun these people are as well, the problem is, no one ever treats them as normal. No one wants to go near them, no one wants to talk to them, and no one wants to help them. It’s really sad and I am glad we got that as our ministry for the month. It was really cool the last day we were there we were able to bring food, music and the girls on my team did a spa day for the women down in the dump. We brought stuff to clean their hair, cut some hair, dye their hair, paint their nails, and make them feel valuable and beautiful. The girls loved it! All the guys loved getting their hair dyed as well and some even go their hair cut. We had music and some dancing going on down there and we just hung out for our final day. It was great to see how many people came out and stayed out just to hang with us Americans. We even got the opportunity to pray down there, and a lot of them joined in with us as we did. It was a really cool memory and it’s great to know that even though our physical presence isn’t down there anymore, the presence of the Lord is there to stay and cannot be removed!
Back at Zion’s Gate we are having a blast too. We had an opportunity to get the grill going which we built for Tony. It was great (even though we struggled to light the coals, the burgers weren’t staying together, there was smoke everywhere, and we ran outta burgers pretty quickly), we had chicken, burgers, corn, and potatoes followed by a birthday party of ice cream, brownies and s’mores! I love how we got great cooks and creative minds on our squad!! There were a few unfinished projects that will be there for the next world race group, but from what that place looked like when we got there to how it was when we left… it was a world of difference.
I’m really gonna miss the boys at Zions Gate. I really grew attached to some of the older guys and loved to hang out with them. It defiantly solidified my passion for working with teens, especially the ones who are underprivileged. These kids in the picture I posted definitely left an impact on my life and I am already missing them like crazy.
The way to Nicaragua was a fun one…. a 5 hour bus ride down ended up taking all day and all night, literally. 2 and a half hrs in when we were crossing the boarder, we were officially checked out and left Honduras, but our bus couldn’t get us into Nicaragua. It literally broke down. So we had to wait until a bus got down to the boarder to change it out, and that left us to move the bags from the top of one school bus, to the other. So me and a few teammates had to find a way to climb to the top of the bus, untie the ropes, then pass them over and tie them onto the top of the other roof. I might be alone on this, but I felt like it was a fun experience and it was awesome how patient the whole squad was with the travel troubles we had.
Now sitting here in Granada, Nicaragua, we are at our squad debrief. Basically it’s a place where our budget is a little bigger for a few days, our stay is a littler nicer (sweet hostel instead of our tents), and where we have very little scheduled throughout the day. We just kick back and relax and enjoy a few days off before we kick back into ministry. It is great and a fun time just to hang out with everyone and recoup. This is also the first country where it feels like Central America should feel like. Honduras and Guatemala had their hot points, but never like this… welcome to the life of living in sweat, now this is more like I expected!
God has been so good throughout this trip and I am so pumped to just continue to grow closer to him. I am still hanging on the these two saying I’ve been going over ever since month one in Guatemala… “ If you want to increase your level intimacy with the Lord you have to increase your level of pursuit for him”, and “If you want to experience more of the presence of the Lord, YOU CAN…. the only thing standing in the way.. is YOU!"… Keeping these fresh in my mind continues to challenge me because I know God has soo much more for my life but I need to seek him for it. He is always there, He never leaves, it’s not hard to find him because He’s standing there with arms wide open… It’s just a work of the enemy that other things are always, and I mean always jumping in front of the Fathers arms, we just have to fight to have that time with him!
Thanks for reading and be sure to stay in touch! Check out pictures on facebook at https://www.facebook.com/mike.bergey.5 and instagram at http://instagram.com/babybergfo_won
Sorry when the blogs get long like this… just wanna keep ya informed!
Love ya all!
