The feeling of return from the mission
There is a strong sense of relief I get coming back to my family, back to normal life, back to my reality. But it’s not their reality. The people we served in Guatemala don’t get to sit on their sofa, don’t get to grab food from the fridge and heat it up, don’t get to shower in the evening with hot water. They don’t even have running water. Most of them have nothing.
There is some guilt mixed in. It’s like guilt but it’s not. I don’t think there’s a word in the English language to describe this feeling. It’s knowing they have it bad and I have it good but I have an obligation here. It’s a mix.
My prayer is that over time we can create a perpetual mission of local serving and sacrifice, to a point where we can show up and a local team is ready to put us straight to work. Where the local churches and Christians come together daily to serve the forgotten and unwanted in their own backyard. This is my sincere prayer.
A troubling realization (warning)
This one is gripping and extremely unsavory, so reader beware. If talk about young teen pregnancy is not something you want to hear about, feel free to skip over this one.
At the basurero (city landfill), there are people living off of about $5 a week for the family. This lifestyle affords these people no hygiene, no medical care, and no education. At age 12-14, the boys leave to go find work, and girls get pregnant. Two years ago I took this as a cultural norm, a sort of duty to your future – the boys become men and the girls become women.
But a nasty reality hit me when I realized that girls getting pregnant at that age means they probably started before that, maybe well before that. Likely not by their choice. And there are no fathers around, just moms and kids.
Despite despair, hope thrives
In addition to the basurero, we also visited the same elderly care facility from two years prior, and an orphanage which was more a refuge for women and children.
Despite, or in spite of their situation, many of these people have strong faith in God to provide. Salvation in Christ isn’t limited to the educated and affluent, or to the cultured and well-traveled. Christ’s love is available to all – and we all need it.
One pastor prayed with us in such a powerful way that it was clear her life was surrendered to her calling, to the mission of God, for these people. It truly is a sacrifice.
And many of the people have clear hope in Christ’s salvation, as though they’re packing their things already for the next life, eternal life.
It was amazing to see the smiles on kids’ faces as we played activities with them, and the light in young girls’ eyes when we looked at them as a person, and not an object.
The embraces were tremendous and more real than anything in our comfortable lives. This experience is as much theirs as it is mine. And it’s an experience I cannot recommend enough.
Clickbait: I swam in a volcanic spring
Guatemala is home to 37 known volcanoes, a few of which are regularly active and several of which don’t erupt but have some thermal and seismic activity underneath. And this can lead to some amazingly fresh water being pushed up from deep underground. One of these such water channels was contained to fill a swimming pool with crystal clear, fresh water. Here’s a video of a massive volcanic rock sitting at the bottom of the pool:
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