Who is most blessed? My thoughts on my mission trip to Honduras, February, 2014.

This was my second mission trip to Honduras.  My sister, brother and I had made the trip together in 2012 as a way to honor our parents who had made several mission trips including one to Honduras in the 1980’s.  Both trips were sponsored by our church, the Grace Place, and lead by Hearts to Honduras.  My daughter went with me on my second trip which was a special blessing.  Our focus this trip was to complete a kindergarten building in the village above Santa Rita where a team from our church had built a church building last year.  We have established a “sister church” relationship with that church and plan to go back to the same village on future trips.  In addition to completing the building, our plan was to also continue to build relationships with the people in Pastor Paula’s church and the village.

Upon arriving in Honduras, the thing that most Americans notice first is the poverty.  As soon as the Heart to Honduras bus leaves the airport parking lot at San Pedro Sula, a silence comes over the occupants of the bus especially the ones who have never been to Honduras.  The cameras come out of the backpacks because what is seen rolling past the windows is so different from what we see in the U.S. surrounding a major, international airport.   There are men on horseback trotting down the side of a four-lane highway.  There are huge carts of sticks being pulled by bicycles.  And there are shacks, lots and lots of shacks.  It is hard for our mind to believe what our eyes see.  People really live in these shacks.

As we travel into the interior of Honduras to our destination of Santa Rita, the terrain gets more rugged and the signs of poverty more profound.  There are banana trees and coffee fields.  There is corn planted everywhere.  We try to imagine how a person would plow a field of corn that goes straight up a mountain until we remember they do it by hand not by tractor.  We see children carrying bundles of sticks.  We see children carrying machetes as long as their arm.  We meet the people of the village and visit their homes.  As we get to know them, we are amazed by their contentment and faith in God.  We realize they don’t know they are poor.

Pastor Paula, of our sister church in Santa Rita, takes us to visit members of her church so we can pray with them.  As we enter their fenced in yard, we are greeted warmly.  They drag out plastic chairs for us, their visitors.  Their sense of hospitality puts us to shame.  They are not embarrassed of the trash on the ground or the outdoor kitchen with its mud oven.  We are invited to go into their homes to look around the two room dwelling.  They have so much less than we do but they are not ashamed of their home like some of us are.  They are thankful for what they do have and don’t seem concerned about what they don’t have.  Many people in our congregation will not invite a Bible study group into their home for fear that their house

won’t measure up to other houses.

While in Santa Rita, our associate pastor and trip leader asked us what impressed us most about our visit to Honduras.  Many people talked about the people and the poverty.  Pastor Owen told us how torn he was with the idea of bringing 25 people to Honduras on a work camp at a cost of $1,000 per person.  What could $25,000 accomplish in a community like Santa Rita?  Are our personal relationships with these people worth $25,000 when $25,000 in cash could potentially build a new water tank system for the entire community?  None of us knew the correct answer.

As I was coming through U.S. Customs on my return to the United States, the customs officer asked me if I was a part of a mission team.  I told him I was and realized my Heart to Honduras t-shirt had given me away.  He thanked me for what I had done in Honduras.  I told him I believed we got more of a blessing from the trip than the people of Honduras had received.  Again, he thanked me for what I had done “down there” and said, “Welcome, home.”

Many Americans come home from third world countries with a feeling of guilt.  It is the guilt of having excess.  I have more clothes than I can possibly ever wear and, yet, I want new ones.  I have boxes of shoes for every occasion.  I have multiple bedrooms; pure, clean, running, hot and cold water; an indoor, electric kitchen and three cars, two of which are in garages.  I know God has blessed our country, my family and me personally.  I don’t feel guilty about that.  I use what God has blessed me with to serve Him and others.  What I do question is whether or not we should share our hunger for more stuff with people who are so content with so little.

One of our translators while in Santa Rita was a 21-year old young man named Isaac.  A native Honduran, Isaac was fluent in English and worked as a translator for several groups.  He was making a good living by Honduran standards but he desired more.  His brother had gone to the United States and was living in Florida illegally.  He was urging Isaac to join him.  Isaac desired all the good things that he thought would be waiting for him in Florida but was fearful of the dangerous and expensive trip by train and bus through Mexico to Texas.  We tried to encourage Isaac to stay in Honduras and use his abilities to advance his own country.  We explained to him that the life of an illegal in the United States may not be what he thinks it will be.  Yet, he was not persuaded.  The desire to have the same stuff as the “rich” American mission workers was too strong.  I have no doubt that by now Isaac is in the United States illegally and for that I feel just a bit guilty.