Saturday, January 6th, 2007
Well, we made it to Palenque, in the state of Chiapas, Mexico. This trip took forever..
. we’ve been on three separate buses for about a total of 30 hours. I don’t get car sick, and I felt car sick. And I’ve got a full blown cold (ears plugged, nose plugged, sore throat… all the good stuff.)
But guess what? I’m supposed to be here. I’ve been called by God to be on the World Race 2007. It’s been confirmed a zillion times, by our pastors, by our supporters, by God’s voice Himself! Yet, I’ve been feeding into the lies that I should go home… because I miss my dog, my parents, my siblings, my frineds, because (when I’m sick) I miss my couch and blankie, because life was easier when I had it all at my fingertips, and I miss life as it was, because I’m stressed and completely out of my comfort zone (it’s pretty overwhelming to get dropped off in the center of Reynosa, and told “Go”… go where, how, huh?) But God has been faithful through this journey, showing up in pretty cool ways, stretching each of us beyond what we thought we could handle.
We left Reynosa at 9:45pm by bus on Jan. 4th, a 17 hour bus ride to VeraCruz, taking a ride down the coast (absolutely beautiful in the morning… mountains jumping up from the ocean… and somehow you find yourself in the middle of it all). Then around 5pm on the 5th we popped on a bus for Villa Hermosa. When we got there, we got tickets for a 2:40 am bus ride to Palenque, us and the rest of team B, and one of the team A teams. But our bus didn’t arrive until 5am. There was a little bit of choas, but all of the team members made it onto the bus, and we headed to Palenque (I was fast asleep for that ride, since I didn’t sleep in the terminals). When we got to the bus station, some hopped out immediately and get into taxis to make sure they got the the Mayan ruins fastest. Our team decided to stick together… there had been many opportunities for our team to separate to get there faster, but we opted for team unity. Ultimately we came in last for the challenge, but our team didn’t suffer in the process. I’d put some pictures on, but internet here takes forever to download that stuff! (We’ll try to burn disks and ship them home and have some one at home post a bunch of pictures for us.)
Anyway, sitting on top of the highest temple at these ruins was breathtaking but still was a weird feeling. Knowing that these temples were used for human sacrifice, offerings for their gods (Apocolipto-like stuff), it was as if I could feel a demonic presence in this place, a stronghold that Palenque has never been able to be released from since 600 AD. And that’s mostlikely why Chiapas on a whole is the only hostlie state in Mexico. There are still many Mayan descendants who live in this area, who don’t speak spanish, but separate dialects.
And yet we’re living at a Bible College about 5 minutes down the road from the ruins (for this week anyway). Eleazar and his wife Marta moved here 4 years ago to raise up trained pastors in Palenque, to release it from it’s past, and bring this past to Jesus as an offering.
Tonight we we’re prayed over, to be healed of our sicknesses. God can heal, He is the Great Physician, and I trust that totally! He’s already healed my hamstring tendonitis (I didn’t even notice at first). But when we were praying, one of the girls came over to us and put her hand right on top of our joined hands. At that moment I felt God say, this is your eternal family, these are your brothers and sisters, bonded forever in eternity. Maybe travelling for more than 30 hours does it, but I think it’s really God.
