Right now it’s a Wednesday night in Guatemala (though I’m not sure when I’ll have wifi to actually post it). I’m sitting in Room 5 of the Adventures in Missions base here, my team’s room. The base is simple & beautiful. Mountains surround us, the volcanoes Acatenango & Agua are always visible, we have a pony named Princessa, our backyard is a corn field, hammocks hanging on support beams color the hall. The AIM staff here are wonderful & kind & ignited with the Holy Spirit. They pour into us constantly & love us so well.
Our first three days here were simple. We rode a chicken bus from the airport to the base & ate Wendy’s for dinner to really immerse ourselves in this new culture. To elaborate, a chicken bus is a school bus driven down from America, stripped of everything inside, painted all sorts of cool colors, new seats put in, and then driven as public transportation between towns & Wendy’s is anything but authentic. We met the base elders, Tanya and Kevin, who pour into us & make this place run alongside the other AIM Guatemala staff. They taught us about culture here & how to love the new people around us well. Outside of orientation, we got to explore the towns around us. We danced in the rain, ate street food, celebrated Guatemalan Independence Day for days straight, played soccer with kids who ruined any bit of confidence I had left from my high school soccer career, sang & danced & made art & had rap battles & hammocked & started to fall in love with Guatemala.
On Monday, each of the 8 teams received ministry assignments. My team and I have two different ministries we’re working with. Once a week we spend the day at Salea, a school in Chimaltenango. Our hosts are a couple, Alex and Ashley, who built the school from the ground up with little to nothing other than a whole lot of faith that a school for English was what the Lord was calling them to create. Guatemalans from ages 6 to 42 come to learn English and get to learn about Jesus through the love Alex and Ashley pour out. We help to teach, love and befriend the students, and help with any random projects we can like painting murals, helping with graduation, and participating in the school talent show.
On other days, we drive into the mountains to a small village called Corrales. With the guidance of our hosts, a couple named Leo and Mindi, we teach English in two different schools where the kids have hardly even heard English. I teach 9 first graders and the students are the kindest anyone could hope for. They love to show that they’re learning and getting to instill confidence in them and pour love out to them is one of the most amazing privileges I’ve ever received. You can look out from the mountains and see that you’re even with the clouds in Corrales. It’s remote and poor but full of love and rich in culture. When we aren’t teaching there, we get to visit the homes of the people who live in the village. Most of them are made of concrete and bamboo and have little to nothing in them. One family we became friends with invited us in immediately and we talked, played, ate, sang, danced, and prayed for hours. We left with the 6 little girls calling us their new sisters.
? The Lord is so evidently moving and working already and it has only been one week. We get to speak life into these villages and these people. Praying Ezekiel 4 over and over, being invited into the Lord raising an army here.
At any moment, you can find a racer singing or dancing down the halls and in the kitchen with the cooks and laughing while washing clothes in the back and someone is always throwing a ball in the front yard. At any moment you can find a racer painting this place with life.
I never want to get used to this. I hope the simple life here always refreshes me and never gets old. I hope the amazement of the new things the Lord has already done in one week never wears off. I hope my eyes never go blind to the constant color and life around me that is so easy to see as normal. I never want to be too comfortable with where I am that I become stagnant. I hope I never grow weary of hearing and seeing these stories.
Growth is hard but growth is so good.
One week conquered and only eleven left to soak in. I hope I never get used to this.
– L
