How Honduras stole my heart
I got to tell about the first couple weeks in Honduras in my last blog. The last two weeks we were there were really incredible. My team was assigned to go to the public hospital in Tegucigalpa to pray over the pediatric ICU and over patients that were waiting for treatment. After spending our entire month of Guatemala in the hospital, we weren’t exactly stoked. But, we were in for such an incredible treat from God. Alejandro (the awesome pastor who took us every morning to the hospital) told us that black magic is pretty prevalent in the hospital. Some doctors and nurses just want to turn beds so they make promises with the devil to see their wish come true. Because of this, other doctors and nurses have said they have seen and heard things at night that aren’t normal and it scares them. The side of the hospital with the pediatric ICU seems to be worse than anywhere else in the hospital. Because we couldn’t go into the ICU we would spend a lot of time praying over the walls. It seems like a silly thing to do at first. But, we saw God work through it. Four of the children that were in the ICU the first week we were there were out and well the next week. Parents came to Christ in their time of need, and he pulled through for them. These children were in comas and on the edge of death. It was really cool to see. When praying for random patients we usually went to whoever we felt called to, which was a really good lesson in listening to God and following where he leads us. One of the last days we were at the hospital we prayed for a man named Jose. Jose’s wife had just given birth to Siamese twins and we stood with him as they were taking his baby boys into surgery, hoping to at least save one. As we prayed for Jose he told us he wanted to give his life to Christ. So right there in the middle of the hospital he did. It was an awesome time and thankfully Darcie had a Spanish bible that she was able to give him because he didn’t have one. A couple days later we were on our off day in Valle de Angeles and we saw a newspaper with Jose and his Siamese twins on the front cover. In the article they talked about Jose’s sons- Jacob and Esau. Esau wasn’t able to be saved but Jacob was and Jose’s faith in The Lord was evident in his comments- he said he trusted God and that he knew The Lord was with him.
We also got to bless Tony and his family by painting their house (probably we will be professional painters by the end of the race). Which was so fun and a good time filler before we went to my favorite time of the day- ministry at the yellow house. The yellow house is an abandoned house down the road from Zion’s Gate and it used to be a place where some bad things happened, but as far as I can tell not too much mischief is going on now, maybe a little smoking here and there. At the yellow house we just got to hang out with the neighborhood kids and teenagers. We would joke around and play soccer on a small patio. The little kids would tease us and we would play soccer with them on a smaller patio. It was just such a good time to relax and show people the love of God just through spending time with them. Some of the guys put of chicken fence on the side of the patio that lead down the mountainside so the ball wouldn’t fly down it. Our friend Arturo straight up climbed a really big tree and used a machete to chop down a pretty big branch to make the fence. Our other friend Natalie was young but she was so sweet and so welcoming to us. There was Christian and Olzo (the called him pareza which means lazy, but I don’t know why because he never seemed that lazy to me) and Carlos. Alejandro and Kevin. Angel which was a little bit of a chunk and was the funniest little kid ever. He had a huge personality. Ariel and Arnold and Eduardo. We made good friendships with the people there and they quickly grabbed a part of my heart. And on the last day (which was not easy) I made a goal! All of the boys from Tony’s would come with us most days and so we not only got to hang out with our favorite boys from our home but our favorite people from outside the home too.
The last Sunday we were there we got to go to Henri’s soccer game and he plays on the same team as a lot of the boys from the yellow house. It was really fun to watch and the field was awesome (and in the middle of no where). Henri is one of my favorite friends from Honduras. He reminds me so much of my best guy friends from home (shout out to Zan, Will, and Daniel). Which if you know these three guys you can only imagine. Henri never ceased to make me laugh. There was also Rony and Ariel who are brothers. Both are just incredible and God has done some awesome things in their lives. Rony has so much knowledge from God. So many gifts. He is starting a seminary type of program which will be great for him because he has a way with teaching. I miss them so much!
Life in Honduras was just incredible. It may not seem like much, and I don’t think I am doing it justice. Living life and getting to just have tickle fights whenever and getting to be poured into and loving people that haven’t always had love and receiving their love and learning their ways, it was just seriously so awesome. It was a month full of laughter and learning together. I’d go back in a heartbeat.
