Today we finished painting the school – and boy did it look great! We managed to get almost as much paint on the walls as the floor. We were amazed at the creativity of the Rio Azulians to be able to stretch 5 gallons of paint. We were asked to put one coat on but some of our team members snuck a second one in when the principal wasn’t looking. Luckily we did because he came around later and inspected our work – he only asked us to fix two spots.
We made three visits today. The first visit was with Juana who is sponsored by kids at Friends. She was so excited to get the blanket that the kids made for her – we have photos and video which we will share asap.
The second visit was with a young girl who has bravely battled encephalitis since birth. This was a challenging visit for our team. The family lost their mother four months ago due to childbirth complications. So Dad now has seven children, including a new baby. The family is deeply grieving their loss and asked for our communities prayers.
Finally, we visited a young man (20 years) named Jeremy who lost his leg while performing his job as a carpenter 15 months ago. It was inspiring to see his strength and outlook on life. He described his experience of ‘phantom leg’ pains but was keen to assure us he is doing well and living life. He took time to play us a song on his guitar. We had a very delicious snack with them. Jeremy’s father was very appreciative of our visit. He was joyful and welcoming and wanted to make us a meal.
Our day ended at the FH office in Nebaj where we took part in a service. As the head of the team, I was asked to give a brief message. Have I ever given any other kind? We presented the team with the Rio Azul t-shirts and they seemed to really like them, despite the fact that they were more Canadian sized than Guatemalan.
That’s it for now – (ps – Jim wanted to make sure everyone at home knew he finally won a card game tonight).
Water: anything that God uses in and through us to make the world better. How are you bringing water to your world today?