Hijos y Hijas de Dios,

The mission was so amazing! I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to work with. The village we worked in was absolutely gorgeous. I wish I had pictures to share, but my camera broke the day I got there. It was called “Mal Paso”, which basically means bad road. The roads were crazy- tons and tons of mud and huge rocks. The first morning when we got up, I naively wore sandals. My feet were basically two weights of mud. It was pretty hysterical; all the Hondurans usually gave us looks of pity, but I’m pretty sure we were their entertainment for the week. Supposedly there is some special way to walk in the mud here. I’m not even kidding. There would be a foot of really thick mud on the ground, and the Hondurans would walk into Church with spotless feet. That baffled us the entire week.

The generosity of the people was incredible. The woman at the house we were sleeping in would look through our things and wash our (muddy) clothes. We didn’t ask her to do this. She would fold them up discreetly, and never said a word about it. Everyday for lunch we were served chicken. Our leader, who is a Honduran, explained to me that they only eat meat in the Aldellas on Christmas and Easter, huge celebrations. Yet, everyday they were giving up their animals for us. The people were really such a joy to meet. Although we were there to serve them, I almost always felt like the one being served.

One girl specifically had a huge impact on me. Her name was Gloria. She was about 11, and her mother had died. She told me that she wanted to be a missionary like us when she grew up. She was often teased—I think it might have been because she was so poor. She asked me if I would move here and be her sister…yeah. She was so joyful and so in need of love. Throughout the mission, we were given these huge blocks of cheese to eat at almost every meal. The cheese here is really strong, and it was honestly really difficult to finish. We would sometimes jokingly complain to each other afterwards about how much we hated it. I was talking to Gloria and I was asking her about what she ate everyday. She said she eats beans and tortillas everyday; I asked her if she had cheese as well, and she said they didn’t have enough money for cheese. She also said they can’t afford to eat meat even on Christmas. I’m sure you can imagine how I felt after that! Every time we felt like we were going to gag on the cheese, we would say, “This ones for Gloria!”

For the mission, we had 3 programs everyday, one for children, one for teens, and one for adults. This mission taught me to have a deeper trust that God was using me and speaking through me in whatever way He wanted. When I gave talks, I never knew if the people understood what I was saying or if I was even saying things correctly. We often would visit houses and invite people to come to the programs and we would usually never see them again. This sometimes got to be discouraging, and I felt like screaming, “Am I even doing anything for you Lord!?” But that’s where that trust comes in—I had to trust that they heard and were given what they needed at that moment in their life. I will remember the people I met for the rest of my life. I’m so blessed to have met them and to have been able to share my love for Christ with them in whatever small way I was able to.

Love always,
Angie

"Let us not grow tired of doing good, for in due time we shall reap our harvest, if we do not give up."
Galatians 6:9