Honduras (parte uno)

I came back from Honduras a week ago with my team from Imago Dei church and have avoided blogging about it because I don't know how to convey the experience without sounding cliched and trite.  I had an amazing time serving on the outskirts of La Esperanza in an area known as the invasion.  It's dirt road with houses and shacks bordering each side and our team was able to finish one house and start another one in the week that we were there.  In this post I will talk about the actual building of the house and then in a separate post I will talk about the people that I encountered.

It was amazing to see how little most of the people in the invasion actually live in and even the concrete block houses that we were building seemed primitive compared to American standards but the families were grateful for the added protection from the wind and the rain plus doors and windows that can be locked.  We spent our days mixing concrete, digging trenches, carrying rocks and doing our best even with rain most days at some point.   The house we built was for a family of fourteen and they had been on a list for a couple of years to get a house built.

Luckily, not much skill was required and we had some local guys leading the effort.  It was tiring but also very rewarding to be a part of what God was doing on that street in Honduras and I know that it was a visible demonstration of God's love for that family.   We wrote bible verses on paper as prayers for the family that was embedded into the cement and one in particular stood out as it was also written across the wall where the team was staying...

Jeremiah 29:11
For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

The city name La Esperenza in Spanish means "hope".   The invasion sits on the outskirts of hope and it's easy to believe that hope will stay on the fringes with the lack of money, jobs, fathers and even lack of dreams for the people living in this poverty stricken area when a huge worry is where your next meal will come from.   Just as the houses are being built on each side of this dirt road, I have to believe that God is building hope in those that live in them and it was exciting to be a small part in the big plans as God continues to move hope from the outskirts to the center of those who put their trust in Him.