Beauty[Full]
How is it possible that a place so beautiful can be filled with so much brokenness? How can something leave you awestruck in its wonder and yet break your heart with its tragedy? Zone 18, Guatemala City does this to me everyday. Being the poorest section of Guatemala City, Zone 18 is filled with poverty, abuse, rape, high gang influences, and more. It is a place where fifty percent of girls have been sexually abused by a family or gang member by the age of 15 and the average male joins a gang by the age 13. For the past two months (and the month to come) I have been blessed beyond measure to get to know this place and the beautiful souls that make it up.
Brokenness.
It’s there. Some days you can sense it all around you. You can feel it in the glances from people on the street. When looking at a place that you think is a dump, and then realize it’s somebody’s home. When looking at the underdeveloped bodies of the precious children you see everyday. When they come running towards you, you wrap them into your arms wondering how often they eat and where those suspicious “accidental” cuts and bruises come from.
After a few weeks you begin to see and hear about some of the pain these kids face every day. You can hear it in the everyday conversations at school. “Dangerous, scary, boom boom. Gunshots.” he said to me. Choking and hitting he motioned. Words you never thought you’d hear when talking to a kid about Christmas. You feel their pain as you sit hugging your student as she tells you, through tears, how her mom got up and left one day and hasn’t been seen since. You see a beautiful, young, eleven year old walking with the maturity of an adult, carrying the responsibility of basically taking care of her 4 sisters and 2 brothers, one of whom is only a little over 1 year old.
Beauty.
It’s there. Everyday you can sense it all around you. It’s in the breathtaking clouds and green mountainsides that make up every inch of Guatemala’s scenery. As each person and kid, who has close to nothing, freely gives up anything and everything just so that you might feel welcomed and loved. As the kids run to you as fast as they can, leaping up into your arms, unable to contain their excitement to see you. When you wrap them up in your arms, and they just stay there letting you hold them and rub their back.
After a few hours you begin to see and understand the love and compassion that fills up their hearts. You see it as a dad brings out a couch to the soccer field so his son, with a broken leg, can sit and watch even if he can’t play. When kids who are known as mean and called “crazy” let down their guards and show how gentle and loving they really are. Day after day they patiently sit with you speaking Spanish as slow as possible until you’re able to comprehend. When your students write you notes saying how much they love you and how thankful they are for you in their lives. The day you sit there and watch your 6th graders proudly walk across a stage receiving their diploma from elementary school, sitting there and feeling so honored to be apart of this big achievement in their lives, for only a few will actually continue on to middle school.
It’s crazy what one hug or one smile can do for these kids. It’s important to remember that while we’re here, whether teaching or helping with a soccer camp, we are truly here to show them God’s love and to bring glory to his name. Will the kid’s remember all of the English that we taught them? Hopefully, but probably not all of it. What they will remember, though, is how we treated them, how we acted, and the impression we left. For God’s spirit truly lives inside these people and inside these kids. They have hardships and face them everyday, but still carry themselves with faith and hope. It breaks my heart that some people look at this zone and don’t even give it a second chance. You mention the zone’s name and they shake their heads. They walk by and only see the brokenness, the hopelessness, and the pain. They’re just scratching the surface, making assumptions, and missing opportunities to get to know the people’s joyful and humble hearts. I have learned so much from each person here and will never forget the lessons they taught me, thanking God for every day that I get to spend apart of their lives.
