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Building up the house 10/11/10




before and after

 

Today we worked on Miriam’s house. It’s not easy to build a window when someone is cooking on the other side of it or to handle power saws with small children running around but we managed it all! It was a great day of hard work in the hot sun. Miriam’s former church excommunicated her for receiving the gift of missionaries building a home for her free of charge, so she now attends Pastor Ben’s church “Mi reto� “My Challenge�. Miriam was chosen to receive the free home when missionaries visiting Mi Reto were told to pray and seek guidance as to who in Panajachel God wanted them to build a home for. Some received visions and others words and when they walked around Panajachel the guidance from the Lord led them to Miriam. When they asked her if they could build her a home she broke down and shared with them how God had told her two years earlier that missionaries would come and build a home for her free of charge. Her husband had struggled with their situation and turned away from the Lord during the hard time but I am happy to say he was sitting next to me at church last night! The work was put on hold due to storms so Miriam, her husband and her 3 sons have been sleeping in the same bed. For weeks they have been living in a cinderblock fort with open spaces for windows and a second floor with only 3 walls. They have a roof over their heads…mostly but they also have been exposed to the elements. So today we got to work.

 Angie, Sarah and I walked through back alleys and main roads to Pastor Ben’s house for sand to bring back to the work site to be made into concrete.  Most Guatemalan women wear a long, fitted skirt with a tight sash around the waist and a lace top so we were quite the spectacle in our loose T’s and pants struggling to push deceptively heavy wheelbarrows back thought town to the work site. As if we didn’t already stand out enough as gringos (anyone who is not Guatemalan) we drew laughter and some mockery but for the first time no one tried to sell us anything. The locals were actually interested in what we were doing. “Building a home for a woman at church.â€�  We shared. Maybe it’s wrong that I was a bit proud to be laughed at for the work I am doing in Jesus name, but I was so happy to finally be seen as sowing into the community rather than another tourist that I started to sing some praise songs when I had the breath.


When we were done with the sand Mac and I were asked to build a window frame for the kitchen. The little lot that is Miriam’s home was once a garbage heap. The space, still crowded with waste, is quite small and with the 7 of us building, the 5 that make up Miriam’s family and 2 church volunteers it had the “too many cooks in the kitchen� feel. I had a moment of frustration thinking “why am I working so hard when others are playing with the kids or cooking?� But who is to say playing with the little children wasn’t worth time? Or that learning to prepare and cook authentic tortillas on a wood burning stove in Guatemala isn’t a once in a lifetime blessing? By God’s grace I checked myself and rejoiced in the blessing my teammates and I were receiving: we were all smiling and living Jesus’ love in different ways!


It took a few hours for 2 people to assemble 4 pieces of wood in the shape of a square but at the end of it we had a window frame! Trust me it was sooooo much harder than it sounds. After an inventory of the tools when most of my teammates had left for lunch I notices the shovel and buckets caked with cement hadn’t been cleaned so I grabbed a rock and a bucket of water that I probably shouldn’t have been touching and started scrubbing the cement off. It was a hard, dirty day and all I wanted to do was work more and go the extra mile. But while I was walking home smiling about the joy God gave me today through serving, I thought: why was I pushing so hard to keep a good mood, to keep busy when it seemed like there was nothing to do? Was it for God or was it for my own pride? Was it because I wanted to please Him or because I don’t want people to think I’m lazy? I genuinely enjoy serving people and I do want to give all that glory to God but if my motivation isn’t right what’s the point? I wanted to tear my pride down not to build it up even more, to glorify Him not myself. I do think God was secondary in my motivation and I’m glad he pointed it out to me. What if no one had noticed my hard work would I have walked home frowning or thinking my day counted for nothing? It definitely wouldn’t have felt good so I am working to change my focus.


 Lesson learned for today:  “And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor and though I give my body to be burned, (by the sun in my case) but have not love it profits me nothing.â€� 1 Corinth. 13:3. I have a lot of love but I think today most of it was for myself. Pray for me that tomorrow my eyes will truly be set on Christ and not myself.



P.s. photos will be added soon. and It can take me a while to respond to comments so please bare with me!