Transformation 2017: Part 1/3

As I write this, my hands reek of white lithium grease - the only thing I could find in the house to get this filthy, asphalty-pitch roof patch stuff off my hands. As I schlorped it into a crack in the roof this weekend, apparently it glorpled down through said crack onto our pila.... where we wash our clothes. One crisis averted, another nearly created.

Roof asphalt hasn't been the only thing leaking through cracks around here. From what I have been able to measure, we have received about 4 feet of rain in the past month or so. Five of those storms have released 6 inches + of rain into our yard in a matter of a few hours - one dumped 10 inches overnight. We gauge our need for response on the sound of rain on the metal roof. The liquid soundtrack progresses from intermittent trickling to steady static to pounding waves to train in the living room to 747 landing in our bedroom. As the train approaches, we leap into action, jamming plastic bags under the front door with a spatula and setting up twisted-towel jetties to sop up and slow anything down that sneaks through.

Of course, during all of this, the girls sleep mildly on -- even during the night that taught us our defensive strategy. After the storm had passed on that cool June evening, Stacey stepped lightly out of bed to go feed Eliana... directly into three inches of standing water. The experience was identical in the girls room. Slipping around on hands and knees in our little indoor pool, we drug out suitcases from under the crib before sweeping out gallons of water and mopping it dry. All of this without once waking a baby. When we want the child to sleep - no power on heaven or earth seems to be able to knock her out... and now we know that the opposite is also true. In the end, some well-placed ditches seem to have the majority of the precipitation issues under control for now.

As we fight our own little skirmishes in water world at night, we have continued by day to stand beside our brothers and sisters of Honduras in their remarkable battles. Communities now find themselves far down the very same road that in the past they couldn't even agree needed traveling. Along that road, local leaders have gone from skittish, frightened bystanders to passionate, determined warriors that endure isolation, threats against life and livelihood, and seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

This week, we hope you'll check back in to read about a couple of these examples.

July Update

Well, we still have yet to get you the “comprehensive update of life around the house and HTH” soon.  Trust us everything is in full swing and very busy! For now we wanted to give another brief update which might explain why that promise has yet to be fulfilled.  I was just working on some reimbursements for our international health care since we have returned to Honduras and wow, did we have a lot of “e-claims.”  Each of us has one and several of us have multiples. 

We believe that we have been fighting against a lot of spiritual attacks this year.  Satan continues to try to get us down and if he doesn’t get us in one area, he tries another. If doesn’t succeed in attacking our spiritual life he tries physical, if not physical then emotional, or relational etc. etc. we have felt stress and strain(in so many areas of our lives) like never before in the past 5 months.

Kaleb is finally on the upswing for a few weeks now after more than a month of continual illness after illness. Eliana continues to take meds for acid reflux as well as struggling with daytime sleep. Alida had a skin problem called folliculitis and needed a med. and cream to get it under control.  Stacey has dealt with sinus infections, stomach bugs, exhaustion, and other abnormal symptoms which we recently went to the doctor for who wisely found some ovarian cists. So we are pursuing options for healing for her.

Needless to say we need your prayers for our physical, mental, and spiritual health and stability. Thank you SO much to those of you who have kept in touch via email during these especially hard months. Your emails, thoughts and prayers go so far with us.

When we struggled through our return to Honduras with Alida 3 years ago, we quickly came to find out one of the reasons God had us return and that was to help root out deep oppression in our village Las Lomitas regarding our previous local pastor. This return with our second child has quickly revealed that we are here to be a part of rooting out deep oppression in the area of education in our village. Satan has tried to keep Las Lomitas tied down for decades intellectually. Last year(with the addition of a second teacher) and this year(raising expectations of the previous teacher) we are starting to break chains alongside community leaders who are fighting for better local education. Our presence and support alongside of those leaders has led to the previous teacher leaving and the search begun for another qualified teacher. This is an amazing story that we will have to tell in another post, all GOOD though.

Again, we come back to poverty not being a lack of material things. Poverty = broken relationship.  This happens holistically (spiritually, intellectually, physically, and social/emotionally).  The way for communities to develop and alleviate poverty is not to give away things or services; is it to restore broken relationships, root out and break chains of oppression, and walk together in unity toward bigger and better things God has planned for all of us. Please pray against Satan’s attempts to hold our family back from the ministry God has for us here and now.  Pray for sin and deep rooted problems to be brought out and chains of oppression to broken. For sin, ways of life or ways of thinking to be gone in the name of Jesus and for us and those we work with to have the minds of Christ.