Even as I sit here now writing this, I am thinking about what I learned yesterday, what I saw yesterday, the reality of my brothers and sisters, people I love, a reality I was not aware of.
My heart is broken!
I am embarrassed, I am ashamed of myself. Ashamed of what I have. Ashamed of the things I have complained about, ashamed of things I considered difficulties, when actually I live in luxury!
Yesterday I was with Marjorie in a community called La Islia. We have many people from this community who attend our church in town. If you have come here on a mission trip with Jim Pack in the last couple of years, I have probably taken you there to give out food, and prayers, and hope to the people who live there.
Many Saturday afternoons Marjorie and I are visiting families whose children come to church. Families we want to visit and encourage and talk to about the hope they can have in Jesus, and pray with them. Many have invited us into their small homes, I have sat on their bed because that is the only furniture in the one room of their house, they have shared a bag of chips they run to buy from the pulperia and a bottle of coke or a can of juice.
These are beautiful, lovely, people. Always happy to see us coming to visit. Happy to sit outside to visit with us.
The kids come and share their churros with us (chips or other fried things), they are giving and welcoming and children of God!
Yesterday as we were walking down the street on our way to visit a sweet lady, Delmi, we realized she was not at her house, but across the road in the small channel where water runs through, she was washing her clothes, and had just had her bath, and one of her teenage daughters was headed there with her towel, soap and shampoo. (when I say a small channel - it is about 8 inches across, and 8 inches deep)
I was shocked! Yes, I know there are people here in Honduras who do not have water in their homes, but I never imagined it was any of these people who I know. I saw their reality, and I was ashamed of myself. My heart broke! Not in a way that I feel sorry for them, but broken! Broken in pieces and I can only cry and pray and ask God what can I do?
There are only certain times that water runs to certain barrios in town and around Comayagua, and people adjust their lives to that schedule, or they keep their pila filled with water for washing dishes and other daily necessities. For the people with more money, they live in a home with a pump and a tank or even a cistern so that they don't run out of water even when the city is not sending water your way. I live in one of those apts. The only times I don't have water is when my pump is not working properly, or the days of no electricity.
But this community has no water in their homes!
I have learned to shower from water I have carried upstairs in buckets - but that is not every day, and still I am in my bathroom, in my own privacy.
I know how to flush toilets with a bucket - hence my nickname from Lance of Bucket Girl - still I have water in my house!
I cannot get it out of my mind today, or out of my heart! Some of the girls who come here for Bible study live there. Many of the kids who are in our class at church on Sunday nights live there. They are all beautiful, happy people.
Today I am feeling broken and ashamed!
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