SO to Katie, who instead of ever saying “Yes” to anything, responds with “Hondo P” (100%).
So, welcome to part four of this series- Honduras.
This month we painted the outside of the church, part of which was with handprints.
Ministry: Iglesias Zoe
Location: Urraco, Honduras
Currency: Limperas (24 Limperas= $1)
Language: Spanish
Overview:
This was the first month my team and I experienced living directly in the community, rather than at a base with guarded land. We lived in the church. Urraco is easily the hottest place we’d lived. Even the one fan we had could only blow hot air. We lived in the “downtown” of this town, which essentially meant we had a grocery store around the corner. Everything from chickens, to horses and donkeys, to pigs and cattle roamed around the town. (Fun fact: I’m terrified of horses, so that made walking around town super fun. Haha.) We ate all our meals at the small restaurant our pastors owned which was about a 5 minute walk from us.
Here is a video of where we lived this month:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=pHXmdGEp9Vo
Side note: Our hosts, Pastor Rony and Pastora Esther, gave up their home, the church, for us this month. They instead spent the month sleeping on the floor at their restaurant. I’ve never seen such generosity.
What type of ministry did you do in Honduras?
A HUGE part of our ministry this month was forming relationships with the people in this town and encouraging them. We were invited to countless homes for meals and we spent that time getting to know them and praying for them. We played soccer with the kids, painted our nails with our elderly neighbor, ate all our meals with the pastors and put on an event for the women. This month we also spoke at multiple schools (over 800 kids in total), cleaned the church, spent hours inviting individuals from the community to church, participated in a kids’ feeding program, attended three church services a week and participated in services by sharing our stories.
This was one of the schools we put on a program at. I can add “attempting to entertain 300 children at once” on my resume now. Haha.
How did you get to ministry?
This month we walked to ministry. Everything was within a mile or less of us, not to mention, a huge chunk of our ministry was at the church or immediately surrounding area.
What did a typical day look like?
9am-10:30am: Breakfast
10:30am-noon: Work on painting church/Misc projects and planning
Noon-2pm: Lunch
2pm: Clean church
3pm-4:30pm: Invite people from community to church
4:30pm: Get ready for church
5pm-7:30pm: Church
8pm-10pm: Dinner with a family from the church
Fun fact: We were here during Thanksgiving this year, so check out this fun video showing what we did! –> https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5LzAsCf3xB4
11 Lessons from Honduras:
1. First of all, this month I learned to be thankful for so many simple things I had taken for granted- the biggest of which was water.
2. Honduras was going through a time of some political unrest while we were here. This caused road closures and even some buildings to close in the Capitol city. (Thankfully, none of this reached Urraco.)
3. It is near impossible to get a job outside of the cities. Many people try to get visas to work in the US so that they can support their families from there.
4. This month I met quite a few people who had been deported and even a woman who’s husband was marching in the caravan to the US. These became more than issues to me; they became faces and names and desires for a better life.
5. One thing I’ve noticed in all the Central American countries that we’ve been to is that there appears to be no middle class. You are either well off and living at an almost comparable standard of the States or you’re struggling to afford food and water. It all depends on job availability.
6. Spiritual warfare is heavy here. Most people would not believe in the things I witnessed this month- and I wouldn’t have until I saw it.
7. Typical food here includes chicken soup and baliadas.
8. This is the first place my team and I had gone where the people we lived and worked with didn’t speak English- not even our hosts. I learned a ton of Spanish this month and even helped translate a few times.
9. Any time my team and I would want to leave on our off day, we’d have to take a bus an hour or two out to the nearest decent sized town. It had a small mall with a Wendy’s and AC. #Blessings
10. It is rude to not accept a gift- even if it’s a live duck you’re expected to cook and eat a week later.
11. This place is BEAUTIFUL. Moutains, lush green fields, an incredible city skyline, kind hearted and generous people- Honduras has it all. If I could visit any place again so far it would most likely be here.
This was our precious neighbor. I fell in love with her sweet self the first time we met. She cried when we said goodbye and so did I.
Current Fundraising Update:
Weve got less than $3,000 left to raise! We can do it, my friends. Thank you for your continued support! It means the world.
And finally, keep an eye out for the final part of this series- Malawi!
