Saturday - June 1st:
It's a God Thing Team arrived in Honduras Friday afternoon. We traveled to La Ceiba on Friday and spent the night. We found out Friday night, the container had been released from port and was on it's way to the Compound. On Saturday, the men went to unload our supplies so we could put some things in storage and get some boxes ready to take to the clinics. Later that morning, the remainder of the team went to the Compound to start getting our supplies ready. The eye team was able to get everything we need loaded on our inventory trailer which we later took it to Belaire where we will be having clinics next week. It has been a great work day and so much was accomplished. Tonight we are going to a youth rally at the church at Crusadas. We have been praising God for his goodness to us. He sees our needs and knows the perfect timing for everything. I have learned this week to sing praises to Him before the battle and then thank Him after the victory - whatever that may be. Es una cosa de Dios!
Monday –
June 3
The medical
and eye clinics went to Yellow Rock to minister to the people of that area
today. There were so many people waiting on us when we arrived. We quickly set
up our eye clinic in the school and began seeing patients. We were so blessed
by the sweet and precious spirit of the people in that area who came to see us.
Gloria worked the evangelism station by herself. She tried to talk to everyone
to see those who were saved and those who weren’t. With this information, she
could spend more time with those who were not saved and share the love of Jesus
with them. Gloria said she saw approximately 35 adults and 15 to 20 children.
She reported to the team during devotion that 5 adults got saved on our first
day. If they were Catholic, she said she shared with them that it isn’t about
religion, it is about why Jesus died for us. She reinforced with them that
there is only one God.
In the eye clinic, we saw a total of 52 patients today. We had several new people who have not worked in our clinic before, but they adapted and learned quickly and we had an amazing team today. Last year when we came to Yellow Rock in the cloud forest, we were concerned that we would never see all of the patients before we had to shut down. Bucket, our team leader, told us that we needed to shut down at 3:30 so we could make the slow and long trip back to Belaire and then to the hotel we are staying in. Some of us were worried that we would not be able to see everyone before the end of the day. Last year we noticed that it seemed that time stood still at times as we were seeing so many patients in such a short amount of time. The same thing happened today and we saw every single patient who came through our clinic. God is always ahead of us and had this planned in His time frame – not ours. It was one of those “5 loaves and 2 fish” experiences again where God took just so much time and multiplied far beyond what we could imagine. We are all excited to see what will happen tomorrow. I praise you God for you are awesome and take care of us always. Es una cosa de Dios.
Tuesday - June 4
Today both the eye and medical clinics were in Belaire at Evelyn and Jose's medical clinic. Our medical clinic worked out of Evelyn's medical clinic and the eye clinic was in the goat pen today. (by the way, I love the goat pen!). It was a wonderful and amazing day. We saw a total of only 48 patients today. As of this afternoon, the evangelism team had seen 5 people get saved. Today we were able to fit people who came in with glasses that improved their vision to 20/20 or very close. Things slowed down tremendously after lunch because the medical clinic had a patient who was a local priest transported in. He and several people had been severely attacked in the river close to us. Everything came to a halt as they tried feverishly to save the priest's life. It took a nurse practitioner, a doctor, another nurse and a vet to sew him up while the ambulance was on it's way. His wounds were extremely severe and Evelyn said he would never have survived this if our medical team wasn't here. Police were called to protect the clinic. As of this time the priest is still alive. Please pray that he will survive this horrible attack and those responsible will be found. All team members who were not working on the priest stopped to pray for him. He needs us to be his prayer warriors at this time. I will keep you informed. As always, it's a God thing - es una cosa de Dios!
Wednesday – June 5
Miracles All Around-
Today was a very special day for the It’s a God Thing team.
We were on the front page of national news for helping the priest recover from
his knife wounds yesterday. We received news today that he is doing well.
Both the medical and eye teams were
in Belaire again today. Our eye team saw a total of 75 patients. It was a busy
but amazing day. In the goat pen you get immediate results. God’s
timing is perfect. The eye team was blessed to come across a woman today who initially
had 20/200 vision which would be considered legally blind. Her vision was so
bad, she couldn’t even make out 2 fingers from standing 10 feet away. By the
end of her visit to the eye clinic, her vision was corrected to 20/20! We thank
God He used unworthy servants like us to change this woman’s life. This was one
of the many cases we experienced today.
Dr. Kelly Page is serving the Lord
this week as a dentist. Before she started her work this morning, she presented
the plan of salvation through a puppet show. It was adorable and the kids seemed
to really love it. Her main job was extracting teeth. Today Dr. Page had two
teenage patients who wanted all four front teeth pulled. Because Dr. Page has
such a big heart, she refused to pull them and paid to have the children sent
to a dentist in LaCeiba. Dr. Page worked in a confined space with absolutely no
lights or air circulation. It is also what we call…a bathroom, and it is being
used…
The medical team saw 135 patients
throughout the day which was incredible. They experienced everything from
extracting bullets in the neck to cutting off fingers. They also came across a
man who’s thumb had been completely chopped off by his brother. They were
fighting over a cellphone. They also
took time out of their day to evangelize, which is giving the greatest
medicine, JESUS!
First thing this morning, the group of boys who always help the team, accepted the Lord as their Savior. What a blessing to see the impact of people ministering in the same town for several years. Gloria, the evangelistic expert also shared the Word with the town police. Several people came to know the Lord today. We are grateful we are able to help people physically, but more thankful the Lord allows us to have enough and share the gospel with others.
Thursday- June 6
Enough
Today was yet another incredible day for the It’s a God
Thing team! The Lord sent a bunch of unequipped people to serve for Him, yet he
gave us enough to accomplish tasks He had set before us.
The eyeglass
clinic did have enough today. We were able to help 96 people, which came to a
total of 271 people for the week! That
is above and beyond the number of people we have EVER seen in one day. The Lord
used three school teachers, a welder, and an air force financial manager to
help these people be able to see better. Although the team had no one who
specializes in optometry, God gave us enough. We had enough people to run the
clinic and enough of God’s grace to be privileged to be a tool for the Lord.
In the medical clinic things become stressful at times. Yet again, God gave His servants enough courage and strength to serve the people of Honduras. First thing in the morning a little girl, carried by her grandmother, arrived at the clinic. Many of our team members thought she was dead. Come to find out, she is handicapped and cannot control her muscles and she is also blind. This little 11 year old had a plethora of lice which had made her anemic. Had she not arrived at the clinic, she would have died that very night. It was a God thing… that God gave this family enough strength to make it to the clinic, and that God gave His servants enough supplies and courage to help this poor little girl.
The
veterinarian team dewormed and vaccinated and gave mineral and vitamin
injections and some antibiotics on sick animals. The team had a tremendous
amount of help every day. David said the amazing thing was that so many of the
people were willing to help him with everything he did and expected nothing in
return. A significant amount of the
animal pharmaceuticals did not make it to our destination due to shipping
issues. Even without those extra meds,
the supplies were enough to accomplish what God had planned.
Evangelism had
enough today as well. Gloria shared God’s word and His love with those who came
through our clinics. Many of us spent some time this week working with her in
evangelism. Gloria has enough passion for sharing His word and love for the
people of Honduras. She also had enough Bibles to share!
Today was a
totally amazing day for all of us in ways we can’t explain. We have seen
miracles all week to let us know that God was present through all
circumstances. He knew what we needed long before we arrived and provided
enough of everything in every clinic. We praise Him and thank Him every day –
all through the day. Es una cosa de Dios!
Saturday June 8
Today, the team split up and went in different directions. Most of the team went to Sambo Creek to zip line for a few hours but came back to Cruzadas to get the inventory ready to go to Roatan. Some team members took food and supplies to a young girl named Kenia. She had a brain tumor 2 years ago and was seen at the dump at that time by some of the team members. She didn't have any hair on one side of her head because of the surgery to remove the tumor which made her very self conscience. Several team members decided to buy her a wig. She was so happy to receive such a special gift. She was so excited to see the team members again today and was so appreciative of all the things the team has done for her and her family.
Many of the team went to the hospital to see the priest who was attacked on Tuesday. He is doing great and was released from the hospital this evening. The doctor at the hospital told the team that he was very impressed with how well the team did the sutures especially under such challenging conditions. The family of the priest was at the hospital and thanked the team for all they did to save his life. His mother was in tears while thanking the medical team for what that did for her son. The priest told the team that he truly appreciated all that the medical team did for him and he called them his "good Samaritans". As always, es una cosa de Dios...It's a God thing!
Monday and Tuesday – June 10 and 11
Monday and today we have been in a remote village called Oak Ridge Bight off of the island of Roatan. While we were there, the team helped over 150 local residents with eye glasses as part of our eye clinic set up at a local church and feeding kitchen. We also had an evangelism team that passed out Bibles and prayed with all of the patients as they left. We joined up with a team from Florence, AL who is helping us with the eye clinic and also a construction project at the church and feeding kitchen. Funds were raised to build this church in the impoverished Oak Ridge bight around 2005. The funds came from the Florence, AL church where the team is from. On the second floor of the church is a fellowship hall with a kitchen which is called Rebecca’s Table. This was named after a young woman from the Florence team’s church who passed away in an automobile accident in 2003. Her family worked to raise the money for the construction of the church through the help of the Florence congregation. The feeding kitchen, Rebecca’s Table, is used to feed over 100 children in the area on Monday, Wednesday and Friday every week. For many of these children this may be the only meal they have all day. Our team had the opportunity to serve the local children during the meals this week. It has been a blessing to the team to be able to serve the needs of the people in this village.
Wednesday and Thursday – June 12 and June 13, 2013
Faith vs gratitude
The team saw a number of precious people come through our
clinic the last 2 days. We were able to help most of them with either readers,
prescription glasses or both. There were only 3 that we could not help with
prescription glasses because the Retinomax would not read their eyes because of
cataracts and/or pterygium. These conditions are caused by excessive exposure
to the sun. We gave out all our sunglasses to those who came through the clinic
and encouraged them to wear the sunglasses. We saw a total of 233 people this
week with a total of 504 for both weeks. We were so excited to be able to
minister to all these people. We know we are only touching a few lives, but
knowing we have hopefully made those few lives a little better with improved
vision is worth it. When 2 older gentlemen went to the evangelism station after
going through the clinic, they looked down at the Bible they were given and got
so excited because they could finally read it when they could barely even see
it before! We had another young man come to one of our interpreters on
Wednesday night. He had a small piece of metal in his eye that was very painful.
The interpreter came to me to ask if we could do anything. I told her we should
ask the doctor who is with us if something could be done. Steve tried to remove
the metal but couldn’t so he tried to wash his eye. Then Steve told him to get
to a local doctor as soon as possible. The metal was removed and the young man
came by to see us today. He was so appreciative of what our doctor did to try
to help him.
Our evangelism team prayed with so many people this week.
There were a number of children who prayed to receive Christ as their Lord and
Savior this week. Some of the evangelism team had never worked in evangelism
before but were blessed and excited beyond words about how many came to know
the Lord. There were approximately 19 adults and children who prayed to receive
Christ this week. They even did a little skit about Daniel and the Lion’s den
with the children. They said they lost count of the number of people who
rededicated their lives this week. When they shared with the team about what
was going on in evangelism, they couldn’t help but cry for joy about what God has
done.
I shared with Bucket, our team leader, about the fact that I
was very concerned that Guf and Mary weren’t going to be able to come on this
trip. They oversee the eye clinic every year. Mary has had some health problems
so they decided to stay home. Guf asked me last year to be in charge of the eye
clinic from now on. I didn’t want to at first but I prayed and felt God leading
me in that direction so I said yes. I shared with Brother Chris, the pastor of
our church back home, that I wasn’t really worried about taking over because I
knew that Guf and Mary would have my back the whole time. God had other plans.
I shared that I realized that for the last 4 years, I have put my faith and
trust in Guf and Mary for these trips instead of God. I didn’t realize it then,
but He made me realize this now. Emilie, one of the team members who went with
us last year and this year, shared a devotion with me from Pastor Rick Warren.
In it he told the story about King Jehoshaphat who was leading the Israelite
army into battle against the Ammonites, Moabites and Edomite armies. King
Jehoshaphat decided to put a choir before the infantry. They would march ahead
of the army and sing praises to God for what He was going to do for them. This
is found in 2 Chronicles 20:21-23. “Give thanks to the Lord, for his steadfast
love endures forever. And when they began to sing and praise, the Lord set an
ambush against the men of the Ammon, Moab and Mount Seir, who had come against
Judah, so that they were routed. For the men of Ammon and Moab rose against the
inhabitants of Mount Seir, devoting them to destruction and when they had made
an end of the inhabitants of Seir, they all helped to destroy one another”. God
confused the enemy of His people and they turned on each other and destroyed
themselves while the Israelites watched and were still singing praises to God.
There is power in expectation. This is faith (praising God before the battle)
instead of only thanking Him (gratitude) after the battle is over. I began to
praise God then that He was in control of the next 2 weeks and I was only a vessel
that He would use to accomplish His task (like the rope holders in Damascus
when they helped Paul escape). My fears went away and I was at peace. I am not
saying that everything went perfectly smooth – I had to get Jim and Clarke to
help me fix a couple of mistakes I made with the inventory program. But I learned from that and I will be better
prepared for next year if God sends me back to Honduras. Faith vs gratitude.
Where do you spend your time?
Friday – June 14, 2013
Children are a blessing from God
We didn’t have clinics today so we drove back to La Ceiba to the hotel there and then went to Cruzadas to take the eye glass supplies to the bodega. Later we went to Casa Cielo Children’s Home. We had a cook out there with several other teams and Papa and Mama Jones and their children at the orphanage that they run. This is an amazing couple who have such a tremendous love for these children who have no home and no hope for being a part of any family. With Papa and Mama Jones, they are a family and you can see it on their faces. Last year I became a sponsor of one of the children at the home. Her name is Breysi and she is 8 years old. Papa and Mama have a school that they also run which allows children in the community to attend as well. I had the opportunity to spend time playing with Breysi and the other children. We were at the house they are currently building for them and the children to live in which is much bigger than the very small house they live in now. It was very sad to say goodbye to Breysi and the other children. I want to see them again before I leave but we won’t have a chance. If you would like more info about the orphanage, you can go to www.casaderoc.org. This is truly an amazing ministry and it was a blessing to spend time with them. This is another one of those life changing moments when you leave a part of your heart behind.
I want to add one more praise report about the eye ministry this week. Pat told me that she saw an older gentleman walking down the road as they were delivering washcloths and soap to young teenage girls. She shared that the gentleman she saw was one of our patients in the clinic. He was looking around and pointing at everything and smiling. She went up to him and he indicated to her that he could actually see. She took a picture of him and he just kept smiling from ear to ear. Pat stated that this trip has allowed her to see God at work in ways she never experienced before. We praise Him every day that He allowed us to come here and serve Him with the people of Honduras. Es una cosa de Dios! It's a God thing!
Saturday - June 15
Today we went to the church at Cruzadas where there was a youth rally. We had a great time singing and praising God. Kayla, one of our team members, shared a message about hope with the youth. At one point the youth began singing praise and worship songs again and most went up front and began praise dancing in the front and then all around the church. Then some of them came to us and began pulling us up to the front to praise dance too. I thought about David in 2 Samuel 6 when he went dancing through the streets singing praises to God.
2 Samuel 6:14 And David danced before the Lord with all his might; and David was girded with a linen ephod.
We can praise God in the quiet, privacy of our homes, in church raising our hands to Him or praise dancing in front of the church! (ok, Brother Chris, I want to see you doing that next Sunday!! - just kidding!) However we choose to praise Him doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is that we praise Him with all our hearts - praise Him for his majesty, His greatness and especially for loving us when we don't deserve it.
1. | The LORD is my strength and song, and He has become my salvation; This is my God, and I will praise Him; my father's God, and I will extol Him ... Exodus 15:2. |
2. | Who is like You among the gods, O LORD? Who is like You, majestic in holiness, awesome in praises, working wonders? ... Exodus 15:11. |
3. | He is your praise and He is your God, who has done these great and awesome things for you which your eyes have seen ... Deut 10:21. |
4. | Hear, O kings; give ear, O rulers! I will sing to the LORD, I will sing, I will sing praise to the LORD, the God of Israel ... Judges 5:3. |
5. | I call upon the LORD, who is worthy to be praised, and I am saved from my enemies ... 2 Sam 22:4. |
6. | Therefore I will give thanks to You, O LORD, among the nations, and I will sing praises to Your name ... 2 Sam 22:50. |
7. | Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; speak of all His wonders ... 1Chron 16:9. |
8. | For great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised; 1 Chron 16:25. |
