Sunday - We are His Hands and Feet

Sunday morning we got up and went to Amed´s church. We had to load all of the humanitarian aide we were taking to the dump into the car. After church we went to the mall and had lunch and changed clothes then headed off to the city dump.
We met a lady at the school they have there and the other lady who works there as well. The lady from the school´s name was Dominga and that other lady´s name was Paula. Paula earned most of her money by digging through the trash looking for recyclables while her daughter Leslie went to the school.
We couldn´t go inside the dump because it is too dangerous (I think I heard that there were some kind of toxic fumes or something that killed 5 people recently, maybe it was just toxic material or maybe I heard that wrong). We prayed and then we left all of us carrying two bags full of sugar, beans, and rice. We also had bags with toothbrushes and soaps for families and toys to hand out to the children.
At each "house" we would go to the door hand the bag to the person and tell them this was a gift to show the love of God. The "houses" were wood with some tin for the sides, all probably one room, maybe two, but they were all really small. The doors might be tin or they might be just a cloth hanging down. Each family had at least 3 kids and one had 7. Amed said that some have 10 or 11. It was truly an unbelieveable sight.
The fathers were mostly druggies and alcoholics and the mothers were left to dig through the trash all day to raise money for their many children. The school is there for pre-schoolers and 1st grade students. After that they have to pay for school or the children are put to work.
After we gave to some of the houses, the boy and girls from the Buckner transitional homes showed up to hand out things with us. It has truly been a blessing to get to know these kids. These are the ones who have come from orphanages and are going to school. They have goals and dreams that I am so blessed to be able to spend this time with them.
There were two things that really specifically touched my heart from this trip. One was the little girl Leslie, whose mom was helping to lead us to the different homes. Halfway through she came up and held my hand. While every other child was fighting for toys to get as many as they could, she stood back clutching her Cinderella doll we had given her. At one point some other girl came up and started hugging on me and Leslie backed away and let me love an her a little bit before grabbing my hand once again and fearlessly leading me through the streets. She told me she loved school a lot, but unless they have money for her to go to school she won´t be able to much longer. She is 8. I was so surprised by how strong a spirit she had. I could just feel that she knew there was something so much bigger out there. She was beautiful.
The second thing that made my eyes start to well up with tears was a girl that I saw about my age. I saw her walking toward us in a nice evening dress with heels and her hair all fixed. She had a large coat on over her outfit. At first glance I thought "why is she dressed like that here" and then it dawned on me. She was going to work. I watched her walk past and at the tears welled up in my eyes I wanted to grab her and say that she is so much more than this. That she is worth more than what she has to sell herself for to make money to live off of and I wanted to tell her that she is beautiful human being. But, she hung her head, pulled her coat around her and quickly walked off up the hill and I just stood there and watched her walk away. I wished I would have at least reached out to hug her.



I felt like I have had a chance to see just a glimpse of the people Christ reached out to on earth. These people were dirty, some of the men were still high or drunk and sat on the sides of the streets watching us or yelling at us. One man stood like a statue in the very middle of the street like he´d stopped right in the middle of taking another step and didn´t even flinch when our huge group walked by. (At this point Sergio, a boy from the transitional home studying medicine, laughed and made me laugh a little bit, too. I think you have to when you´re in these surroundings sometimes) These people were dirty and the children ran around fighting for toys and even food if one of them had some. There were flies everywhere and it was the dump, so it didn´t smell amazing either. Between the rows of houses was walking room for maybe 3 people side by side, if they touched their shoulders together. These are the people Christ reached out to and loved. These are the people that you have to look inside and you have to pray and seek the heart of Christ. Christ gives us strength, He makes us fearless, and He gives us the ability to love them no matter if they are sober or not, clean or not, or even speak our language.

I am very thankful for this experience and what it has brought to my eyes. Amed told us today that he estimates 40,000 people are living at the dump. I looked up the population for Moore real fast and in 2006 there were about 50,000 people (I don´t know if children are counted, so these are just estimates). Moore is growing fast and it has been a couple years, but really when you put it in perspective... This is a little less than the city I live in and all these people are living in poverty. It makes you think, doesn´t it. Next year Amed wants to spend a week worth of afternoons setting up where people can come get food and medicial and spiritual help.

We are God´s hands and feet and this is exactly what He´s called us to do.

Guatemala Week 3

This has been a very interesting week. On Sunday we met our next church group we would be working with. They were a group of 6 girls and 3 boys from Little Rock Christian Academy in Little Rock, Arkansas. That afternoon we went to the Baby´s home and just spent time playing with them and loving on them.

For the next two days we spent mornings at Remar playing with girls and boys, most of the girls were who we worked with last week. We just gave out candy and toys and had fun. In the afternoons we went to San Gabriel which is a home consisting just of boys. The first day it rained, so we just did crafts and things inside, but the second day we played soccer and some basketball as well. On the second day, Marion took the initiative to hand out bibles to some of the boys because they didn´t have any. It is so amazing to be able to share the word of God with them.

For the next two days we spent the mornings at a daycare playing with the children whose parents were at work. These kids were so cute and on the last day they performed and danced for us. They even got us up off the benches and had us dance with them as well. It was really fun to be a part of. Then in the afternoons we went to Eliza Martines which is also a boys home and played with them. I was with the group of special boys and they were so sweet. The thing is, we kept hearing talk of a Quinceñera at Manchen (an all girls home in Antigua) on Friday. Since we had already been to one quinceñera we definitely wanted to go to another one. On the last day we were there, the boys shared their testimonies upstairs and we had 6 boys decide to accept Christ. It was truly amazing and it is such an amazing blessing that God allowed us to be a part of this.

This is one of the cutest little boys at the daycare. He was an amazing dancer. The boys colored his face completely with face paint crayons. It was really funny.

This is Wes from Little Rock and two of the special boys from Eliza Martines. They were always making us laugh.

On Friday we met the team in Antigua and went to the Jade factory. We got to learn about how they make Jade and where it is found and other cool facts about it. Then we went to go to the Quinceñera. This quinceñera was huge. It was for 11 girls that were turning 15 at Manchen. They invited the boys from Eliza Martinez and the boys from San Gabriel. The sad thing is, we showed up when the party was already over. So, we just wished the girls Happy Birthday (they were all wearing beautiful pink dresses) and talked with the kids for a little while. Then we went to the market to shop. That evening we said good-bye to the team and headed off to bed.

This is one of the older boys from San Gabriel. He was in Marion and my group. He got one of the bibles. The rose I´m holding was just for the picture, but some girl gave it to him.

The funniest thing was that one of the Manchen girls wanted to make this boy jealous so she got one of our boys, Preston, to lock arms with her and walk by the boy she had a crush on. This boy didn´t even notice, but it was cute.

This morning we got up and headed off to Antigua again. We spent the morning learning how coffee is made. It is really a very interesting process come to find out. I had to buy a few pounds to take home as well because the coffee here is delicious. Guatemala is 3rd in the world for the best quality coffee. After that we went to a park to have a picnic and this park was amazing because it had the ruins of an old church/convent in it. The building had fallen during an earthquake a long time ago, Berta said like 1800´s or something. Then we went to the market one more time. After that we walked through this amazing hotel that used to be a monastary. It was beautiful and I wish we would have gotten to stay there. When we got back to the Buckner house this evening, we had the huge task of dividing up all the humanitarian aide to give to the different orphanages. It was hard at first, but then we got a system going and it didn´t take long at all. Now, we are all showering and getting ready for our last week here.

This is one of the many pictures I took at the park. The weather was perfect.

This next week is going to be very eventful. Tomorrow we are going to church, then we head off to the dump to hand out humanitarian aide and play with the kids. That´s right, people actually live in the dump and make money from digging through trash and recycling what they can. So, we´re taking toothbrushes and soaps and things to them and some toys for the kids. We estimated about 40 families with about 4 or 5 kids per family, but we´ll get to see tomorrow.

Monday is going to be very crazy, but we get to go on a shoe trip! We´re leaving at 4 in the morning for a 3 hour bus ride to one city. We´ll stop for a while then drive another 2 hours to another city and spend some time, and then drive the 5 hours back to Guatemala City. It will be a lot of time in the car, but it will be worth it.

Tuesday we are going to a place called Zone 18, which is apparently a pretty bad part of town. We´re going to be giving school supplies and things to a church and toys to the kids. Then on Wednesday we´re going to spend time with kids at the children´s hospital and hand out games and stuffed animals and candy. Thursday is cleaning day and the afternoon will be spend with the 4 homes in Guatemala City, the two transitional homes, the mom´s home and the baby´s home. Then Friday is just resting and we get to stay at the Vista Real. (They have a sauna and a pool and a work out room!).

So, we will be doing a lot this next week, but I´m really looking forward to it. God is doing some amazing things here in the people and in myself. I cannot wait to be back home and share this with everyone.

Love,
Kirby



And just for fun:

This is Morgan and our bus driver Hugo pimping it out...lol.

Set the World on Fire - Nicole Britt

I wanna feed the hungry children

And reach across the farthest land

And tell the broken there is healing

And mercy in the Father`s hands.

I, I am small but

You, You are big enough

I, I am weak but

You, You are strong enough to

Take my dreams

Come and give them wings

Lord with You

There`s nothing I can not do

Nothing I cannot do

My hands my feet

My everything

My life, my love

Lord, use me

Perspective

So, last night I was on facebook and Melissa messaged me about how DG is doing the same rush skit as us. Normally, I would be worried about it, but I´m not. I mean really in the perspective of life and everything else in the world what is so bad about a duplicate rush skit?
This is what I don´t want to be drug back into when I come home. I don´t want to worry about petty little things. It´s not worth my time or my effort. So, what if they´re doing the same one. We work hard at ours and give it our best, but other than that, there is nothing else we can do. So why should I even worry about it.
I don´t want to go back home and worry about everything like I always do. I am so blessed to have the things that I have. It is not worth stressing myself out over things that one day won´t mean hardly anything. God is taking care of it all.

The End of Week 2

The Interns at Porta de Angel, a really nice steak house.

This week was not near as eventful as last week, but God still came to work. We had a devotion every morning with this man who worked for Buckner named Eric. (Marion translated for us). They have all been really good. It´s nice to have since we haven´t been going to church. We will be going on Sunday though, and I´m really looking forward to that.

In the mornings we painted the entire inside of the baby home and helped paint a brown trim as well. It´s pretty much done, but all the rooms don´t have a brown trim which is ok. We´ll probably finish it later.

Here is one of the beautiful little girls at the home. She goes in the morning while her mom is at school. She´s just learning to walk which is so fun.

In the afternoons we would go to Remar and work with a group of girls in VBS. These girls were so much harder to work with than the ones in Huehue, but they still loved us being there. Some of the older girls kept asking Lindsey and me to sing songs in English to them that they know in Spanish. I´ve picked up spanish words to some songs.

Myself and some of the girls at Remar.

Yesterday we went shopping in Antigua. It was such a beautiful city. I loved it so much. I only ended up spending like $70 on a lot of stuff, but I still paid too much for some of it. We got to go up on this hill that has a giant cross overlooking the city and it was one of the most amazing sights I´ve seen so far. It helped that the sounds of children laughing and play from a school could be heard as well.

From the hill with the cross overlooking Antigua, Guatemala.

I love it here. The group of interns has been bonding so quickly and we´ve become such a tight group that is always having fun. I don´t even want to think about leaving them. I´ve been having nightmares about having to come home early. I want to take full advantage of my next two weeks. I love it here. I love the city, I love the culture, I love the people, but most of all I love the children. Maybe I´ll want to come home at the end of the month, but I don´t want to now.
The most important thing to me is that I don´t want to go back to life how it was before. God has shown me so much and has already moved so strongly in my life that I know I can´t go back to my old life. I want things to change dramatically. I want my prioities to be different. I´m praying for change. I´ll definitely get it. I´m sure I´ll be glad to be home, but today I´m not necessarily looking forward to it.
I think the happiest you can ever be is when you are in completely in God´s will and doing His work. I´m pretty much there and I don´t want to leave. I am so blessed for this opportunity.

My heart is here.

The volcanoes in the sunset from the Vista Real Hotel.

Love,

Kirby

Remar

We met up with the church group today from Northpark Baptist and helped them paint a the baby house. They´re nice, but they are so much more organized than we were last week. They even had name tags and snacks for all of the kids! We didn´t even think of that.
When we first got to HueHue I think everyone was thinking of how that would be our hardest week and then the other weeks would be better, but even today we are missing it. We miss the kids and we miss the translators and just being there. It was so fun.
We went to the orphanage called Remar in Guatemala City today. It was really different from HueHue. The new translator, Berta, was telling us that there were about 400 kids in this orphanage. That is huge! They have a highschool and a cafeteria and all kinds of stuff, and it was actually pretty nice. But, I think today is when it really hit me how many children are in orphanages and how big a need this ministry is in our world. 400 kids in one, and there are so many. It just kills me to meet these amazing kids and to think that there was someone who didn´t want them or didn´t treat them in a way they deserved.
One girl in HueHue that was like 3 or 4 (her names was Suzanna and she looked like Dora) was always cleaning everything because her mom made her. Like scrubing not just picking up stuff. One of the babies in the baby home was found in a trash bag and they saved her.
These kids are so amazing and they deserve all the hope in the world. I am so blessed to be part of this ministry this month. It is truly an awesome experience to sacrifice the comforts of home and of drinking the water from the tap, and hot showers, and everyday food, just to be able to show these kids that someone loves them. These kids are amazing and I am blessed to meet every single one of them.

Love,
Kirby

Back to Guatemala City

This has been an amazing week in Huehuetenango. I have tried so many different types of food and met so many amazing kids. We worked at the orphanage Fundacion Salvacion and ran a week long VBS by ourselves. I think we did really well, except we all got really attatched to the kids because we spent so much time with them. I think this will be our best week this month though. Our translators, Manuel and Alesandro were amazing.

We also got to see Mayan ruins and go out on a lake, Atitlan, that could be over 10,000 feet deep. No one knows. It´s volcanic and the government won´t allow explorations, so it´s always changing because of the volcanoes surrounding it.

The kids were amazing and we loved getting to play with them all the time, even when we were tired from picking up kids all day. The older girls made me feel so good, because when we played futbol they´d pass the ball to me even when they knew I wasn´t good at it.

On the last day, the kids put on this big performance for us where they danced and lipsynced and one baby even held a spoon in his mouth for a cute little trick...lol. The best part was when we all pitched in to help buy this boy a new wheelchair. He loved it. Now he can actually wheel himself around in this one if he wants to because it has those hand grips on the wheels. It was hard saying good-bye, but I´m already preparing myself for all the other children that will need to be loved just as much in the next few weeks.

We have church groups coming in from now on, so it won´t be just us leading VBS so it will be a lot less stressful on us. We start at a new place tomorrow. With new kids and new people to work with.

I am so blessed to be here and get to experience everything that I have. This is only the first week and I feel like I´ve learned so much. Thank you so much for your prayers and I´m continuing to pray for you.

Love,
Kirby