Broken and made new ft. Guatemala

Guatemala Recap 

Hey friends and fam, 

I realize I have been terrible at keeping you all updated. Life here in Guatemala has been beyond wild and my blogs to update will be coming in quickly. 

Now, where to start.

I came into this trip with an expectation. An expectation that I was determined on achieving and would be unsatisfied if I didn’t accomplish it. An expectation to make an incredible impact on the people I interact with and to use the knowledge I’ve obtained to bring others to Christ.

God has a habit of breaking expectations. I have been impacted. God has shown His love and mercy through every single person here. He has shown His Joy through the children we teach and spend countless hours playing with. He has shown His faithfulness through the families we have sat with and prayed over. He has shown His gentleness, His kindness, and His unending desire to know the heart of every living soul. God is already doing work in these places, I just have the blessing to step into what He’s already doing.

My team is made up of 5 individuals who have pushed me, encouraged me. And challenged me to become the best I can be. To watch them step out in boldness and follow the directions God has placed on their hearts has been incredible. We work in the mountains in a city called Chimachoy filled with house visits and Kids Club in the afternoon. I believe whole heartedly that I have learned more from these kids then they have learned from me. 

Another type of ministry we do is something called “Ask the Lord” or “ATL” for short. I think some of the craziest interactions with people and Christ have happened during these ministry opportunities. We as a group gather and pray asking God to direct us where He wants us that day. Sometimes people will see a color, a house, a family, anything. For example, last Tuesday I saw the image of yellow corn and 3 hours later I was shucking corn for two and a half hours. The entire guys team did ATL one day and I experienced something I’ll never forget. Luke saw the number three, Gabe saw the image of a bus and the itch to keep going, Jackson saw red flowers, Camden saw chickens, I saw yellow flowers and the image of a boy I’ve never seen before. Luke told me he saw a house with yellow flowers so Gabe and I followed him down a path that traversed up and down the mountain. No one was home so we decided to head back until we noticed that the path kept going and was littered with yellow flowers. These wild flowers were only on the path, nowhere else. So we ditched the idea of going back and continued on this path. This trail got more and more sketchy. After we passed a cow farm, It shot straight down this mountain and got more and more congested. We questioned if we should go back so we stopped and discussed what our next move should be. As we stood there we were flooded with the images we had seen before. It was Luke, Gabe, and me. That’s three. We followed the yellow flowers to our current spot. And Gabe mentioned that his gut was telling him we should keep going based off what he had seen before. So we kept going. 5 minutes later we heard chickens and followed them to this hidden village along the mountain unseen from the road of Corrales. The village was covered in bright red flowers and the people of the village greeted us with a warm smile. After we talked to them for a little bit we recognized our time and realized we needed to start to head back. Before we left we prayed for them, for their families, for their health, and for the Lord to show himself in radical ways in this community. As we prayed, I looked up and was completely awestruck at what I saw. The bathroom was about 30 feet away and at the bottom corner of that bathroom a child peeped his head around the corner. I recognized him. I’ve seen him before I just couldn’t figure out where. He was the boy I had seen at the beginning of the day. Our work there wasn’t finished. We brought them a bible, Weldon strummed some stellar worship music, and we continued to pray for them.

The Ministry has been all over the place. We spent two weeks in Peten and stayed a week in the jungle surrounding ourselves with people who don’t speak English or Spanish but their own tribal language. We woke up on the dirt floor of the school to open eyes peeping through the cracks of the walls. This community had never seen white people before. Even with all these barriers, we never ceased to laugh and enjoy the time we had with these GENUINE people.

Y’all, He is real and He is moving. Time and time again I stand speechless at the work he is not only doing in the hearts of these people but also in my very own heart. In Peten, our leader had us pick a psalm and write a paraphrase or a story on how it may affect our lives. I titled it “The Missing Piece” and will put it in my next blog. 

I have been broken and made new. 

Thank You.