Getting Our Hands Dirty

Today we went to visit a small community of people living just outside Catacamas. To get an idea of what this village looks like and how the people live, there are about 270 people living in 60 houses. It's pretty cramped. The community surrounds a two and half acre lot that is devoted only to community-use. There is one church in the whole village, a Church of Christ, and it sits right on the corner of this lot. Pretty cool.

The community leaders have a great deal planned for this lot: tilapia pond, a well, a garden, and two brick ovens. Honestly, I think this space has the potential to greatly affect the lives of the people in this community. With our group of about 60 people, we were able to get a lot accomplished today. The garden was started, the latrine was painted, as well as had screens put in and electrical work done. One of the biggest tasks of the day was putting up a chain-link fence around the perimeter. (An agricultural school nearby is ready to donate and plant fruit trees on the property, on the condition that there is a fence in place first.)

We are half-way through with the fencing today and will head back out to complete it as well as the garden and other projects on the grounds. I'm not going to lie, the work isn't easy and I'm going to go ahead and just put it out there that someone nearly ten years younger than me had to teach me how to swing a pick-axe. (Hello, sore muscles!) Clearly we are not a team of professionals. HA. But the work is incredibly rewarding...not only did we make a lot of progress, but we got to work alongside members of the community, digging trenches and wiring chain-link. Very cool experience.

The creatives among us worked super hard all day prepping for VBS. I heard they have some AMAZING things planned for tomorrow. It's going to be awesome. I think we are expecting about 85 children but Honduras is full of surprises so who knows how many extra will show up (an awesome problem to have!) Oh and about Honduran surprises? We had a downpour at about 5:00 this afternoon at the work site as we were wrapping up. It had been such a hot day, no one complained. :)

It's been an awesome first day and I think there is going to be some great work done tomorrow, too.

We love and miss you all, so I'm going to ask you guys a favor. One of the best things you guys can do for us at home is to pray. Here are a couple of things we would love for you to pray for: 1) A well for the people of this village. The community has worked so hard for so long and several things have fallen through in their journey to bringing a well to their village. Please pray that God will make some things happen for them, as He is awesome and faithful to do. 2) Pray for our efforts here in Catacamas. Along with all the labor we are doing, we want to show Christ to these people. Pray that we will be able to show these people God's love in everything we do.

I know some people have asked about us streaming our devos live online for you guys to watch, so we will start that up Monday night when we get back to Tegucigalpa. I'll give you directions later for how you can watch it! 

Love you guys. Have a goodnight. :)

Kathryn