Google Translate is My Azar

Well, y’all, we’re here, in Guatemala, and it is absolutely amazing here. Already a week has gone by, and it feels like things have changed drastically. The Adventures base here in Guatemala was so welcoming and it had hot showers which we already recognize for the luxury it truly is. We have also gotten to interact with the Guatemalan missionaries training at the base who thoroughly whooped us in a soccer game that left me sore and in need of a band-aid (shout out to our favorite Abigail for doctoring me up). We also got here just in time to celebrate Guatemalan Independence Day which apparently involves a lot of running while carrying a flaming torch that sometimes spits out flaming tar on the road. We were privileged enough to join the kids’ ministry that works with Adventures and run from the base to Paramos. In my sore state from soccer, I elected to ride up there with other injured compatriots and document the run as best I could while not getting splashed with water which is strongly a custom to afflict on those running and in cars.

Diving into each day is a blog post in and of itself because we’ve had people with amazing testimonies while on ATL (ask the Lord), finding people to pour life into and pray over, to even a group running into a possessed girl (seriously read other people’s blogs if you aren’t already). For myself, Abigail and I had the pleasure of running into a family running a small clothing shop on the outskirts of Paramos. Like most of my interactions here, I had to pull out Brother Google Translate but we found out that he was a kind Catholic man who didn’t pray to the saints and just wanted prayers for the life and health of his wife and daughter, and that their store can find enough success to support them. We also ran into a cute abuela in the colorful garb that women traditionally wear here. She said that while she was Catholic, she strongly did not want us to even pray the Lord’s prayer over her. Thankfully she has proved to be more the exception than the rule in praying over others.

In our ministry with OneWay Guatemala, we have found that we will be spending the next week training and serving in San Lorenzo before we ship out to Peten. When we arrived, we were just kinda let off the bus by a cow inhabited soccer field with not a person in sight. I started to panic and checked my phone, internally saying “this wasn’t in the email,” until our partners streamed out of a nearby building and welcomed us in. They gave us an orientation into who they were and how it is a team by Guatemalans for Guatemalans. When they first started serving the community, people would call them gringos, not realizing that many people on staff grew up nearby. When people learned that it was Guatemalan, they opened back up and since then OneWay has done a lot to provide local business, provide stoves, groceries, and even homes for many in San Lorenzo. Now, the founder Bilsan Ramirez wants to do the same where he grew up and I’m excited that my team and I will be a part of the founding group to get OneWay up and running in Peten.

In just our first day with them, I felt we already had a full day that was witness to what the Lord is doing here in Guatemala. In a house visit, we met a mother who was blessed enough to have a home provided by the ministry with enough space for her, her husband, and their four kids. In spite of schools having closed the previous two years, her three oldest were doing great in school and she was so proud of them that she shared their report cards. She makes the 50 minute round trip to her kids school three times a day for her kids, and when she’s home, she does her best to sell snacks while her husband works in a bean field for most of the day, making about $3.25 a day. She shared how the Lord provided in times when there was nothing and no hope, but He had sent people to generously provide for her family. In a town like San Lorenzo, help can definitely be hard to come by as the incline is so steep, many cars can’t even make it up the streets. After the home visit, we did our best with the children’s ministry: to serve lunch, do worship, and when we got rained in, to lead activities inside a little garage for the 60 kids that could attend. I truly don’t know what our ministry will look like this next week or even as everything gets started in Peten, but I can say that I am so excited for everything the Lord is doing here in Guatemala. I’m seeing missionaries trained, people’s needs provided for, and the Lord show himself in ways that are really making me reevaluate my own gratitude. Hopefully more to come, assuming I pick up no more new illnesses.