Hello to anyone still reading!
Well, I took a much-needed hiatus from blogging to settle in to school and try to adjust. It is never easy. I had my one day home to pack, and I have been at Shepherd for a little over a week. For the first few days, it was all I could do to keep from having an emotional breakdown in the middle of class or whatever public place I was in. This semester is academically and in terms of work, the easiest I have ever had. I have free time, and I feel like I'm wandering around as a lost person because of that free time. Last semester, I had 20 hours of credit and held three jobs. It is quite a shift for me. Thus, in addition to feeling the huge sense of loss from leaving Honduras, I also felt a strong loss of identity and self. Whether I mean to or not, I too often define myself and my value by what I do.
Last year, God made it very clear that I had filled my time unnecessarily, that I was trying to operate within doing my own "good" things instead of surrendering my precious time for His best purposes. Thus, I decided not to return to the Resident Assistant job or work for The Picket, Shepherd's newspaper, any longer. Just because I only had two required classes for this semester before student teaching, I am taking classes that are easier and interest me--Painting II, Sign Language I, and Women's Self-defense. I love all of my classes, but I am unaccustomed to having free time. I am not the kind of person who knows how to relax. I am always busy, always doing something. Thus, my loss of identity as a hard worker, as an RA, etc. was quite overwhelming. On my first day of class, I just told God that I felt lost, like an alien in my own country, etc., and I went for a run. During that run, the song "Dying Star" by Jason Upton came on my IPod.
I have gotten stuck on that song so many times in the past couple years, but once again, it spoke to me. I would highly recommend looking it up if you've never heard it because it is one of the most powerful, convicting songs I've ever heard. Some of the lyrics that stand out in this unusual, prophetic song are:
I was just hanging out with the Lord one day, and I said, Lord, I want to be a part of Your army. . . . I want to be a part of that generation that You raise up, and the Lord just sang this over me. He said:
You got your best men on your front side. You always show your best side. Evil's always on the other side. You say this is your strategy. Son, I hope you'll take it from Me. You look just like your enemy. You're full of pride. You're full of pride. Better trash our idols if we're gonna be in the army of the Lord. The greatest idol is you and me. We better get on the threshing floor. When will we learn that God's strategy is giving glory to the Lord? So we trash our idols cause we want to be in the army of the Lord.
Whatever You want, oh God. No battle was ever won in the entire Bible by anyone but our Lord. It's not good music that breaks the yoke. It's the anointing of Jesus that breaks the yoke and sets us free, oh God. All through the Bible, God used people who didn't have a clue, who didn't have all the answers. They didn't really know anything. They had no strategy. Their only strategy was looking up to heaven and saying, "My eyes are on you. My eyes are on You. My eyes are on You."
Star, how beautiful you shine. You shine more beautiful than Mine. You shine from sea to shining sea. Worldwide is your strategy. Shining star, I hope you see that if the whole wide world is staring straight at you, they can't see Me. They can't see Me. I want them to know Me, but they can't see Me. I want them to know Me. I want to show My glory, but they can't see Me. Rise, rise, rise. Live out your fantasy. Think that you're better than Me. Rise, rise, rise. Live out your man-made religiosity. Rise, rise, rise. Live out your strategies. Rise, rise, rise so the world can see. Rise, rise, rise so the world can see. So the world can see just another dying star.
Better trash our idols if we're going to be in the army of the Lord. The greatest idol is you and me. Better get on the threshing floor. When will we learn that God's strategy is giving glory to the Lord? So I trash my idols cause I want to be in the army of the Lord. In the army of the Lord. Raise up an army. Raise up an army. Raise up an army, oh God. There's no room for idolatry in the army of the Lord. There's no room for man-pleasing in the army of the Lord. Raise us up, oh God.
Break it off of us right now. Break it off of us right now. More of You and less of me. More of You and less of me. More of You and less of me.
God began to remind me as I was listening to this song and running that I am right in the middle of His purposes. He told me in Mexico that this was the year that He would be teaching me how to share with others, how to lose it all, how to be unselfish, and how to be a humble servant. He chooses the least of these, and I so desire only to the be the least of these in His kingdom. He has made it clear to me that if I want to be first in the kingdom of God, I have to be content on my knees, broken, crying out in helplessness to Him. My first desire and focus has to be on Him, and I have to be willing to lose all of myself. The lines that I bolded are the ones that stand out the most for me. That word "strategy" was highly convicting for me. I am a list maker. I make a new to-do list every couple of days, and before I returned to the US, I made a list of people that I could reach out to and ways that I could help or bless people. It seems so silly, I know. And as that word "strategy" came up, God reminded me of that list--essentially a list for how I could keep busy, a strategy--and He made it clear that I am supposed to feel lost. I am supposed to have free time. I am not supposed to have a strategy, even if it is a strategy for "good" things. The good things that stem from my own mind are the very thing that distract me from His best. My eyes are only meant to be on Him and not even on others for the purpose of serving them.
I recently watched the movie, Inception, and I loved it. I like any movie that causes me to think, but it was especially appropriate for my current place in life. As was also the case last summer, God brought Romans 12 to my mind during my time of adjustment to the US. I may have included it in previous blogs, but it is so powerful and appropriate, I'll include it again because I believe that it is the plea of God to the US, and it is certainly God's direction for me:
So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life--your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life--and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for Him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. . . . Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it's important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him.
The idea behind Inception is essentially the questioning of reality as it is a movie that deals with dreams. Every time I return from Honduras, I am faced with that question of reality because the reality that I live when I am in Honduras is completely different from the reality of the United States. Every time I go to Honduras, I find that I come back even more mellow and even less likely to worry about things that the average person worries about in the United States. Seeing how people live with very little or must endure situations that they literally have no means of helping makes the majority of the gripes of the US so trivial. All they can do is give the problem to God, and because that has been my reality among them, I find that it is more often my first response when I first return although I still have my times of unnecessary worry.
The point that I make with all of these scattered thoughts is this: The world I see around me is not reality. In every moment, in every place that I am, I have the choice to view the world through the perspective of flawed humans to create a worldly reality, or I can choose to look through God's perfect perspective to see the reality of His Kingdom. In His reality, I can see Jesus in every single person. In His reality, the only strategy is His best--the loss of self, looking to Him, and unconsciously displaying His glory. In His reality, every situation--seemingly bad or not--is worked for His good. If I only have one year left here in the US, and realistically, if I only have one short life to live, I want to live every moment in His reality--no distractions, no veering into my own perspective, no wasting of time, no blind complacency.
I have been praying that God would grant me a humble heart, and during my time in Honduras, it became clear that for me that means learning to accept the grace of God and the nothingness of myself--for me, learning to have a humble heart means that I have to learn to stop running to Him with my "good" offerings of help and service. Having a humble heart for me (and all of us, really) means just what it says in Romans 12--embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for Him. Accepting help is very difficult for me because it means vulnerability. In Honduras, Roy and I spent the summer basically struggling over who could serve each other more. We are both very stubborn people, and neither of us really likes to accept help because we're so dedicated and accustomed to being the one serving. We're always trying to be more accommodating for the other person. I had to learn through our interactions that it brings Roy immense joy to serve and help me, just as it brings me immense joy to serve and help him. When I reject his loving help out of pride or fear of vulnerability, I hurt him because by rejecting his help, an extension of him, I am also rejecting him. It works the same way with God. When I reject God's help or when I simply get so busy trying to serve Him that I don't even notice what He is doing for me (and in spite of my ignoring Him), I reject Him, and this hurts Him. We are His children, and it brings Him great joy to lavish His love and His goodness onto us. We just have to have the sense and the humility to accept it.
I have also been praying for a long time that God would teach me how to witness and reach others with His love. And what He has been saying to me since I've been back in the US is that it is not my conscious work. If I want to reach others with His love, I have to learn how to accept His love, to truly be saturated with His love so that it can spill onto others (often without my knowledge). I have to learn to accept His every good gift and allow Him to have all of the glory. I have to learn to let Him heal me from the inside out. I have to accept His gift of nothingness, His gift of free time, and His gift of humility. And, as with every gift from God, after I accept it (and for me, learning to truly allow it to saturate my being is the most difficult), I have to offer it back up to Him as an offering.
When I keep all of this in mind, my life is the greatest adventure because it is not my life--it is His, and He can do whatever He wants with it. Even though I miss Honduras greatly, I am so excited to be back because this is obviously where He has me. I want Him to have His way.
Anyway, I recently met with my advisor and found out some news that initially had me in one of those phases of unnecessary worry. Last year, the state of West Virginia changed the standards for Spanish education and required that before I graduate, I have to pass an oral Spanish proficiency interview and receive a score of Advanced Low. I took it last year when I first had returned from Honduras. Although I practiced with my advisor and he felt sure I would receive the score I needed, when I was actually interviewed by telephone by the tester, I was two levels short of what I needed. Initially, I was quite crushed, but I later realized that once again, God has a purpose for everything. This "failure" was essentially the only reason that I applied for the scholarship to the language school in Mexico. If I would've gotten the score I needed, I never would have felt it necessary to go to language school at all, and I would have missed out on an amazing, God-granted experience. Well, they once again changed the standard, and thus, instead of having to get that score before I graduate which gives me more time to re-take it, I have to receive that score before I will be permitted to even apply to student teach--September 22 is the deadline. I looked at the website to schedule my interview, and I found out that if I still don't receive the score I need, I can't re-take it for 90 days--missing the deadline to apply to student teach and essentially keeping me from graduating on time. After three years of intense work and good grades and fulfilled requirements, one 20-minute conversation in Spanish on the telephone with a total stranger determines whether or not I graduate on time. This is absolutely hilarious to me since I don't even plan to teach Spanish in West Virginia, and I don't even need my teaching certification for the direction and place my life is going. From the world's reality, that is incredibly stressful and seems wildly unfair. (I hate standardizing testing anyway.) But even as I was feeling the weight of that paralyzing stress yesterday morning, God quietly asked me, "In whose hands are you? In whose hands is this test?" His. The answer has to be His. Thus, whether or not I get the score that I need, whether or not I graduate on time, whether or not I ever receive my fancy academic piece of paper, I am in His hands. Why should I ever worry? I only want His glory anyway. But, it is something to pray about if you wouldn't mind.
Thanks for reading!
Until next time,
Sarah
Saturday, August 21, 2010
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Running. . .
Hello All,
After a tearful goodbye with Roy at the airport and a long journey, I arrived back at my house in the early morning hours today. I've slept about two hours today, started packing to move back to Shepherd, and already started going through some things to sell, donate, or give away. While leaving Tegus was very difficult, and Roy was rather overwhelmed by my ready crying in the middle of the airport, I have already hit the ground running. If this is my very last year to live in the US, I want to make the most of it, and I have numerous preparations to complete.
I feel as if now more so than ever my center of existence has shifted to Honduras. As Papí Alvin said when introducing me to a Honduran pastor, I will be leaving for a short time and will be returning permanently. And Mama Cheryl echoed this sentiment by saying that it is almost as if I am taking a mission trip to the US because my heart still resides in Honduras. I fully agree. I am not as heartbroken to be back in the US as I was last summer. I already miss my Honduran family greatly, but I want to seize my time here. When I returned last summer, the scripture that God gave me was Ephesians 4:
In light of all this, here's what I want you to do. . . . I want you to get out and walk--better yet, run!--on the road God called you to travel. I don't want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don't want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline--not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences.
The United States is obviously the road that God has for me to travel at this time, and I want to run whole-heartedly and steadily here in the direction that He leads.
Meanwhile, I am very clearly avoiding the inevitable packing that needs to take place so that I can head back to Shepherd tomorrow morning. When I get settled, I'll scour my journal to make sure that I didn't leave out any particularly readable Honduras stories to share.
With love,
Sarah
After a tearful goodbye with Roy at the airport and a long journey, I arrived back at my house in the early morning hours today. I've slept about two hours today, started packing to move back to Shepherd, and already started going through some things to sell, donate, or give away. While leaving Tegus was very difficult, and Roy was rather overwhelmed by my ready crying in the middle of the airport, I have already hit the ground running. If this is my very last year to live in the US, I want to make the most of it, and I have numerous preparations to complete.
I feel as if now more so than ever my center of existence has shifted to Honduras. As Papí Alvin said when introducing me to a Honduran pastor, I will be leaving for a short time and will be returning permanently. And Mama Cheryl echoed this sentiment by saying that it is almost as if I am taking a mission trip to the US because my heart still resides in Honduras. I fully agree. I am not as heartbroken to be back in the US as I was last summer. I already miss my Honduran family greatly, but I want to seize my time here. When I returned last summer, the scripture that God gave me was Ephesians 4:
In light of all this, here's what I want you to do. . . . I want you to get out and walk--better yet, run!--on the road God called you to travel. I don't want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don't want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline--not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences.
The United States is obviously the road that God has for me to travel at this time, and I want to run whole-heartedly and steadily here in the direction that He leads.
Meanwhile, I am very clearly avoiding the inevitable packing that needs to take place so that I can head back to Shepherd tomorrow morning. When I get settled, I'll scour my journal to make sure that I didn't leave out any particularly readable Honduras stories to share.
With love,
Sarah
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Update
Hello All,
Just a quick update--
Life in Tegus is going very well although the reality of my impending departure is very pressing and painful. I have been working as directed by Alvin with a team that is here from Canada. It is such a blessing to share my country with others. Yesterday, we went to Casitas Kennedy, the orphanage, and the two feeding centers. I hadn't been there at all this summer, and it was a blessing to return.
From the very first moment that I stepped out of the van at Casitas, I was drawn to a precious little boy. His name was Roy--the only other Roy I've ever met here in Honduras besides my friend, Roy. He is five-years-old and so very precious. He clung to me the entire time we were there, and Papi Alvin picked on him saying that he was in love with me. He showered me with kisses and stayed in my arms for the majority of my time there. When we left, he asked me when I'd be coming back, and I once again had to come to terms with the idea that I possibly would never see him again. He blew me kisses and chased after the van. I do believe that my time with him blessed me more than it blessed him.
Today was church. I'm not really sure what all there is to say about church except to ask for your prayers. I know that God is in control and that He is at work, but there is a lot going on that could use the prayer support of other believers.
There's not too much else to share at this point. I am just soaking the last little bit of it in. I leave on Wednesday. I don't know that I'm ready, but it is inevitable. I will arrive in Pittsburgh around 11, be home technically on Thursday, and have only Thursday to pack for school. I move back to Shepherd on Friday, have job training on Saturday, work on Sunday night, and classes start Monday. Goodbye summer. I am almost thankful that I have no break between--it means that life goes on no matter where I am. I am the same person in Honduras, Mexico, and the US. God is the same God in Honduras, Mexico, the US, and wherever. Thus, I trust Him to lead me and guide me there just as He has here this summer.
Until next time,
Sarah
Just a quick update--
Life in Tegus is going very well although the reality of my impending departure is very pressing and painful. I have been working as directed by Alvin with a team that is here from Canada. It is such a blessing to share my country with others. Yesterday, we went to Casitas Kennedy, the orphanage, and the two feeding centers. I hadn't been there at all this summer, and it was a blessing to return.
From the very first moment that I stepped out of the van at Casitas, I was drawn to a precious little boy. His name was Roy--the only other Roy I've ever met here in Honduras besides my friend, Roy. He is five-years-old and so very precious. He clung to me the entire time we were there, and Papi Alvin picked on him saying that he was in love with me. He showered me with kisses and stayed in my arms for the majority of my time there. When we left, he asked me when I'd be coming back, and I once again had to come to terms with the idea that I possibly would never see him again. He blew me kisses and chased after the van. I do believe that my time with him blessed me more than it blessed him.
Today was church. I'm not really sure what all there is to say about church except to ask for your prayers. I know that God is in control and that He is at work, but there is a lot going on that could use the prayer support of other believers.
There's not too much else to share at this point. I am just soaking the last little bit of it in. I leave on Wednesday. I don't know that I'm ready, but it is inevitable. I will arrive in Pittsburgh around 11, be home technically on Thursday, and have only Thursday to pack for school. I move back to Shepherd on Friday, have job training on Saturday, work on Sunday night, and classes start Monday. Goodbye summer. I am almost thankful that I have no break between--it means that life goes on no matter where I am. I am the same person in Honduras, Mexico, and the US. God is the same God in Honduras, Mexico, the US, and wherever. Thus, I trust Him to lead me and guide me there just as He has here this summer.
Until next time,
Sarah
Monday, August 2, 2010
Quiero Cambiar
Hello All,
This may very well be the last post that I make from Honduras as I´m leaving La Esperanza today, and I may not take the time to go to the internet when I´m in Tegus. I will, however, give you the final update on how it all wrapped up whenever I get back to the States. And, I think I am going to continue blogging this school year for anyone who would like to read. There are going to be lots of preparations (both physical and spiritual) for moving to Honduras, and perhaps, some of those adventures will be worth reading. At any rate, I am very thankful for all of you who read and share in the adventure with me.
It has been a long week. We went to Chiligatoro on Friday to say goodbye to our students, take pictures, and watch La India Bonita which is essentially a school beauty pageant celebrated their indigenous identity. It was very interesting. Our children gave us lots of hugs and asked us when we´d be returning. I will miss my students very much.
Friday night was pretty crazy. I spent a lot of the evening with Jorge just visiting. He is such a fantastic kid, and I am so grateful to have his friendship. He has been a bit of a comfort for me as I feel that he understands me fairly well, and we have a lot in common. Friday night was the big party for the Arabe soccer team, and it essentially consisted of two giant DJ set ups right outside of our house in the street with tons of drunk people mingling and dancing. Pretty unbelievable. It was also pouring down the rain the entire time. There is all kinds of dramatic things I could share, but the long story short version is that one of the soccer players got in a fight with a drunk guy trying to rescue a volunteer who was being harrassed, and he got hit in the back of the head with something, cutting his head open a bit. It wasn´t too terrible although it did seem to me that it needed stitches. The man works at the hospital, though, and he didn´t want to go due to fear of needles or something. Thus, some other soccer players, volunteers, and I all did our best to doctor him up. It was amusing, and I greatly appreciated my mother´s willingness to go into Nurse Kimmie mode at 3 AM by telephone, talking me through how to make a butterfly out of hot pink duct tape. Never a dull moment in Honduras. We stayed with him and monitored him until 5 in the morning, and I did not sleep at all.
I was utterly exhausted, and through some of the circumstances here, I have come to once again realize what a work in progress I am. God showed me before I came to Honduras that He would be teaching me how to share with others, how to lose it all for others, and He has indeed been teaching me that. It is quite difficult at times and leaves me drained and tearful, longing only for His grace. He has definitely been teaching me to want something better--just Him and His will. At any rate, while I absolutely love all of the people here, and there is a very special place in my heart for La Esperanza and Chiligatoro, I am ready to go back to Tegus. But there is a part of me that I believe will always been attached to La Esperanza, and I don´t know what God has in store with that--it is merely something that I am offering up to Him. Perhaps, He only led me here so that I would pray for the town and people here. Perhaps, He has other purposes in mind. At any rate, it was not an accident, and I only want to be obedient in any case.
Yesterday, I went to Jorge´s game (he made a penalty kick goal!) and got rather sunburnt. I am going to have a gorgeous flip-flop tan--likely my only proof that I actually got some sun. Then I mainly spent the rest of the afternoon with the family while the volunteers went to a tourist area with some of the soccer boys. I enjoyed the time with Dercia, the kids, and Jorge. Jorge and I visited for a long time while he was doing homework. He is such an amazing kid, a very diligent student, and such a ridiculous perfectionist! I am going to miss him very much, but I look forward to when we can visit when he goes to university in Tegus to study medicine, and I live in Tegus.
Last night was also very blessed as God was so present in some of the things that happened. As I believe I may have mentioned before, we volunteers like to visit with the neighborhood boys--all of whom are cousins of the family we live with. They are rough around the edges in many cases. A lot of them drink, and sometimes, talking to them can be quite interesting, but they have become quite precious to me. I have a tendency of adopting brothers, especially guys that have rough lives or that go through difficulties, and my dad calls these guys my ´´lost boys.´´ These guys have definitely become some of my lost boys. Although I´m not very close to any of them, they have all become to important to me. Last night, they were drinking while we were visiting with them, and one guy who was drunk--Alexander--who I have rarely talked to before, started talking to me. These guys know that I am different. Jorge and Henry, one of the soccer players here, both have told me that it was very apparent to them that I am different. It´s not just that I don´t drink. They can see that I have sincere motivations of kindness with them. Jorge said that he has never met someone like me who tries so hard to operate out of love for other people rather than selfish intentions. Jorge told me that he will always remember my face and my smile because he has never met someone who always has a smile as I generally do. This is most definitely a God thing. He is my strength and my joy. He is the one that has made me who I am. Thus, He receives all the glory. At any rate, Alexander looked right at me and started talking to me directly telling me that he wanted to change.
Last week, we came across Alexander not only drunk but high on cocaine as well. These guys lead rough lives. A lot of them have grown up without mothers or fathers. A lot of them have grown up in homes plagued with alcoholism. Many of them have had children of their own since they were teenagers. They constantly are around drinking and adultery, and just from the way that they interact with me, I can tell that they must be lonely in their lives. There is never any stability, never any sincerity. It is normal for everyone to be unfaithful. It is normal to never be able to trust even your wife or closest friends. It is normal only to rely on diversion and substitutes and the obligation of family to get you through life. It is a tragic existence to me and one that has touched my heart with compassion and sorrow while I´ve been here.
Alexander kept saying, ´´Quiero cambiar. Quiero cambiar.´´ ´´I want to change. I want to change.´´ And as he looked me in the eyes, my heart just broke for him. His mom died this past year of cancer, and when she was on her death bed, he promised her that he would stop drinking. He held her hand and promised, and four days later, he was drinking again. He feels such guilt over that, and he wants better for his life. He told me that when he hears the songs trickling from the churches, he begins to cry every time. And I know that this is the Spirit of God working in his heart, sending him an invitation to have a real relationship with Him. Alexander kept saying, ´´I want something real, Sarah. I have my God, but I want to change.´´ The other guys were really giving him a hard time, saying, ´´If you want to change, just do it. Just stop drinking. Stop smoking. No one can change you but you.´´ But I kept looking at him straight in the eyes even as my own were full of tears, and I kept saying, ´´I understand. I understand you, Alexander.´´He kept talking about how he needed someone to take him by the hand, to take him to church, to take him to hear the word of God because he can´t do it himself. He feels shame around God and fears being judged in church. The others kept telling him that he shouldn´t need anyone else to help him change. But I just looked him in the eyes and again told him that I understand. And I do. We humans can only change by inviting God to change us. It is His work in our hearts; we cannot earn our salvation or will ourselves to truly change.
I asked Alexander to walk with me for a bit, just to get him away from the others, so that I could talk to him. One of the first things he said to me was, ´´Why haven´t we talked before, Sarah? This is the first time I´ve ever really talked to you. Why haven´t you told me how I could change before? Why haven´t we talked about God before?´´ I can´t explain the level of conviction that stirred in my heart. I will openly admit that I don´t know how to witness. I feel as if I have been through so many religious brainwashings that I don´t always know how to operate with a kingdom mindset of sharing His word with others as individuals rather than a quota to meet. I try to operate in love and show love diligently, but I am still learning how to be His voice. Please pray that He would lead me in learning how to witness.
I told Alexander that God was with us in that moment, that only God could work in his heart and change his life. I told him that the reason that God sent His Son, Jesus, was precisely because we cannot change ourselves. He listened intently, and I prayed for him. I told him that he could pray as well, simply telling God that he wanted God to change him. But, he refused. ´´Sarah, I´m drunk. I can´t come to God drunk. It´s not right.´´ And all I could tell him was that God loved him right where he was, that he didn´t need to change to come to God, that he could talk to God while in any condition in any moment. He said he knew that God loved him, and he told me a story about how he was almost hit by a car a couple days ago, and how he knows that God rescued him. He said he knows that God is with him because even though he is drinking or making bad decisions, he feels as if God has spared him numerous times when he should have died. He told me of his fear or death, and I explained that accepting Jesus and having a relationship with God means that we are rescued from death. We talked for a long while, and it was obvious to me that God is working on his heart. At the end of the conversation, he told me that he had faith that God was going to touch his heart to change him, and then, in the same sentence, he promised me that he would stop drinking. All I could tell him was that it was God´s work, that all he needed to do was received God´s grace. I gave him my e-mail and phone number so that he can contact me if he needs to, and I will continue to keep him in my prayers. I ask that you do the same.
Please also keep Nelson, Alexander´s brother in your prayers--he is 23 and has a daughter he is raising by himself. He works as a mortician, and he is so plagued by death and fear that he can never sleep at night. He is also the one whose head was cracked. Please also pray for Henry--he is also 23, and he was raised by his father. His mother has been in the US since he was 8-years-old. He is a precious person, but he struggles with the need for control and seems to operate out of force and fear, and all I can see in him is that he desperately wants something real. Please pray for Carlos, a policeman in San Pedro Sula who has become my friend. He does cocaine and marijuana. Please pray for Jorge--he is so important to me, and he is walking in a direction away from the vices of many of his peers which blesses me greatly. But he has also been through some difficulty. A result of an affair, he has been raised by his mother and aunts, and I believe that there is still a part of him that longs for the reality of a compassionate, ever-present Father.
It is very difficult for me to leave La Esperanza-so much more than I ever expected. I feel such an intense love and compassion for the people here, especially my lost boys, that I feel that leaving them is going to cause me to be very broken. But I am so grateful for all that God has shown me here at Calvary. I am greatful for all of the ways that I have died to self and all of the realizations of how much more of me needs to die. What I want more than anything is to be a pure vessel that can carry and overflow the love and message of Jesus to everyone around me. I want His will and His glory in all things.
And thus, it is off to Tegus. I have no idea what else God has in store for my last little bit of time here. I am already so overwhelmed by how much God has changed me just in the past few weeks here in La Esperanza. He is so loving and gracious with me, and I so desire to spread His love to others, including you. I hope that you feel His presence today wherever you are, and I pray that you would allow Him to delve deep into the recesses of your heart, that you would meet Him right where you are (no matter what your condition) and let Him love and purify you. His best is always better than ours even when it means the pain of dying to self.
Until next time,
Sarah
This may very well be the last post that I make from Honduras as I´m leaving La Esperanza today, and I may not take the time to go to the internet when I´m in Tegus. I will, however, give you the final update on how it all wrapped up whenever I get back to the States. And, I think I am going to continue blogging this school year for anyone who would like to read. There are going to be lots of preparations (both physical and spiritual) for moving to Honduras, and perhaps, some of those adventures will be worth reading. At any rate, I am very thankful for all of you who read and share in the adventure with me.
It has been a long week. We went to Chiligatoro on Friday to say goodbye to our students, take pictures, and watch La India Bonita which is essentially a school beauty pageant celebrated their indigenous identity. It was very interesting. Our children gave us lots of hugs and asked us when we´d be returning. I will miss my students very much.
Friday night was pretty crazy. I spent a lot of the evening with Jorge just visiting. He is such a fantastic kid, and I am so grateful to have his friendship. He has been a bit of a comfort for me as I feel that he understands me fairly well, and we have a lot in common. Friday night was the big party for the Arabe soccer team, and it essentially consisted of two giant DJ set ups right outside of our house in the street with tons of drunk people mingling and dancing. Pretty unbelievable. It was also pouring down the rain the entire time. There is all kinds of dramatic things I could share, but the long story short version is that one of the soccer players got in a fight with a drunk guy trying to rescue a volunteer who was being harrassed, and he got hit in the back of the head with something, cutting his head open a bit. It wasn´t too terrible although it did seem to me that it needed stitches. The man works at the hospital, though, and he didn´t want to go due to fear of needles or something. Thus, some other soccer players, volunteers, and I all did our best to doctor him up. It was amusing, and I greatly appreciated my mother´s willingness to go into Nurse Kimmie mode at 3 AM by telephone, talking me through how to make a butterfly out of hot pink duct tape. Never a dull moment in Honduras. We stayed with him and monitored him until 5 in the morning, and I did not sleep at all.
I was utterly exhausted, and through some of the circumstances here, I have come to once again realize what a work in progress I am. God showed me before I came to Honduras that He would be teaching me how to share with others, how to lose it all for others, and He has indeed been teaching me that. It is quite difficult at times and leaves me drained and tearful, longing only for His grace. He has definitely been teaching me to want something better--just Him and His will. At any rate, while I absolutely love all of the people here, and there is a very special place in my heart for La Esperanza and Chiligatoro, I am ready to go back to Tegus. But there is a part of me that I believe will always been attached to La Esperanza, and I don´t know what God has in store with that--it is merely something that I am offering up to Him. Perhaps, He only led me here so that I would pray for the town and people here. Perhaps, He has other purposes in mind. At any rate, it was not an accident, and I only want to be obedient in any case.
Yesterday, I went to Jorge´s game (he made a penalty kick goal!) and got rather sunburnt. I am going to have a gorgeous flip-flop tan--likely my only proof that I actually got some sun. Then I mainly spent the rest of the afternoon with the family while the volunteers went to a tourist area with some of the soccer boys. I enjoyed the time with Dercia, the kids, and Jorge. Jorge and I visited for a long time while he was doing homework. He is such an amazing kid, a very diligent student, and such a ridiculous perfectionist! I am going to miss him very much, but I look forward to when we can visit when he goes to university in Tegus to study medicine, and I live in Tegus.
Last night was also very blessed as God was so present in some of the things that happened. As I believe I may have mentioned before, we volunteers like to visit with the neighborhood boys--all of whom are cousins of the family we live with. They are rough around the edges in many cases. A lot of them drink, and sometimes, talking to them can be quite interesting, but they have become quite precious to me. I have a tendency of adopting brothers, especially guys that have rough lives or that go through difficulties, and my dad calls these guys my ´´lost boys.´´ These guys have definitely become some of my lost boys. Although I´m not very close to any of them, they have all become to important to me. Last night, they were drinking while we were visiting with them, and one guy who was drunk--Alexander--who I have rarely talked to before, started talking to me. These guys know that I am different. Jorge and Henry, one of the soccer players here, both have told me that it was very apparent to them that I am different. It´s not just that I don´t drink. They can see that I have sincere motivations of kindness with them. Jorge said that he has never met someone like me who tries so hard to operate out of love for other people rather than selfish intentions. Jorge told me that he will always remember my face and my smile because he has never met someone who always has a smile as I generally do. This is most definitely a God thing. He is my strength and my joy. He is the one that has made me who I am. Thus, He receives all the glory. At any rate, Alexander looked right at me and started talking to me directly telling me that he wanted to change.
Last week, we came across Alexander not only drunk but high on cocaine as well. These guys lead rough lives. A lot of them have grown up without mothers or fathers. A lot of them have grown up in homes plagued with alcoholism. Many of them have had children of their own since they were teenagers. They constantly are around drinking and adultery, and just from the way that they interact with me, I can tell that they must be lonely in their lives. There is never any stability, never any sincerity. It is normal for everyone to be unfaithful. It is normal to never be able to trust even your wife or closest friends. It is normal only to rely on diversion and substitutes and the obligation of family to get you through life. It is a tragic existence to me and one that has touched my heart with compassion and sorrow while I´ve been here.
Alexander kept saying, ´´Quiero cambiar. Quiero cambiar.´´ ´´I want to change. I want to change.´´ And as he looked me in the eyes, my heart just broke for him. His mom died this past year of cancer, and when she was on her death bed, he promised her that he would stop drinking. He held her hand and promised, and four days later, he was drinking again. He feels such guilt over that, and he wants better for his life. He told me that when he hears the songs trickling from the churches, he begins to cry every time. And I know that this is the Spirit of God working in his heart, sending him an invitation to have a real relationship with Him. Alexander kept saying, ´´I want something real, Sarah. I have my God, but I want to change.´´ The other guys were really giving him a hard time, saying, ´´If you want to change, just do it. Just stop drinking. Stop smoking. No one can change you but you.´´ But I kept looking at him straight in the eyes even as my own were full of tears, and I kept saying, ´´I understand. I understand you, Alexander.´´He kept talking about how he needed someone to take him by the hand, to take him to church, to take him to hear the word of God because he can´t do it himself. He feels shame around God and fears being judged in church. The others kept telling him that he shouldn´t need anyone else to help him change. But I just looked him in the eyes and again told him that I understand. And I do. We humans can only change by inviting God to change us. It is His work in our hearts; we cannot earn our salvation or will ourselves to truly change.
I asked Alexander to walk with me for a bit, just to get him away from the others, so that I could talk to him. One of the first things he said to me was, ´´Why haven´t we talked before, Sarah? This is the first time I´ve ever really talked to you. Why haven´t you told me how I could change before? Why haven´t we talked about God before?´´ I can´t explain the level of conviction that stirred in my heart. I will openly admit that I don´t know how to witness. I feel as if I have been through so many religious brainwashings that I don´t always know how to operate with a kingdom mindset of sharing His word with others as individuals rather than a quota to meet. I try to operate in love and show love diligently, but I am still learning how to be His voice. Please pray that He would lead me in learning how to witness.
I told Alexander that God was with us in that moment, that only God could work in his heart and change his life. I told him that the reason that God sent His Son, Jesus, was precisely because we cannot change ourselves. He listened intently, and I prayed for him. I told him that he could pray as well, simply telling God that he wanted God to change him. But, he refused. ´´Sarah, I´m drunk. I can´t come to God drunk. It´s not right.´´ And all I could tell him was that God loved him right where he was, that he didn´t need to change to come to God, that he could talk to God while in any condition in any moment. He said he knew that God loved him, and he told me a story about how he was almost hit by a car a couple days ago, and how he knows that God rescued him. He said he knows that God is with him because even though he is drinking or making bad decisions, he feels as if God has spared him numerous times when he should have died. He told me of his fear or death, and I explained that accepting Jesus and having a relationship with God means that we are rescued from death. We talked for a long while, and it was obvious to me that God is working on his heart. At the end of the conversation, he told me that he had faith that God was going to touch his heart to change him, and then, in the same sentence, he promised me that he would stop drinking. All I could tell him was that it was God´s work, that all he needed to do was received God´s grace. I gave him my e-mail and phone number so that he can contact me if he needs to, and I will continue to keep him in my prayers. I ask that you do the same.
Please also keep Nelson, Alexander´s brother in your prayers--he is 23 and has a daughter he is raising by himself. He works as a mortician, and he is so plagued by death and fear that he can never sleep at night. He is also the one whose head was cracked. Please also pray for Henry--he is also 23, and he was raised by his father. His mother has been in the US since he was 8-years-old. He is a precious person, but he struggles with the need for control and seems to operate out of force and fear, and all I can see in him is that he desperately wants something real. Please pray for Carlos, a policeman in San Pedro Sula who has become my friend. He does cocaine and marijuana. Please pray for Jorge--he is so important to me, and he is walking in a direction away from the vices of many of his peers which blesses me greatly. But he has also been through some difficulty. A result of an affair, he has been raised by his mother and aunts, and I believe that there is still a part of him that longs for the reality of a compassionate, ever-present Father.
It is very difficult for me to leave La Esperanza-so much more than I ever expected. I feel such an intense love and compassion for the people here, especially my lost boys, that I feel that leaving them is going to cause me to be very broken. But I am so grateful for all that God has shown me here at Calvary. I am greatful for all of the ways that I have died to self and all of the realizations of how much more of me needs to die. What I want more than anything is to be a pure vessel that can carry and overflow the love and message of Jesus to everyone around me. I want His will and His glory in all things.
And thus, it is off to Tegus. I have no idea what else God has in store for my last little bit of time here. I am already so overwhelmed by how much God has changed me just in the past few weeks here in La Esperanza. He is so loving and gracious with me, and I so desire to spread His love to others, including you. I hope that you feel His presence today wherever you are, and I pray that you would allow Him to delve deep into the recesses of your heart, that you would meet Him right where you are (no matter what your condition) and let Him love and purify you. His best is always better than ours even when it means the pain of dying to self.
Until next time,
Sarah
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