Thursday, March 13, 2008

Got up at 4:30 a.m. to ride the bus to San Pedro to pick up the group; a five-hour bus ride. Everyone arrived safely. However, one of the young ladies from LA did not get her luggage. Who knows how long it will be before she gets it.

The bus trip home was another story. We stopped just a few miles from the airport and got pizza for everyone at the Pizza Hut. As we got back on the bus, we could tell our bus driver was tired. When it became dark, he slowed down to about 25 mph when he should have been doing 55 or 60. Pastor Ricardo Escobar talked to him and kept him awake. We had to stop in La Ceiba for food supplies and glasses. Pastor Escobar talked the driver into letting him drive the bus. That would NEVER happen in a million years in the US! So, we were able to make better time.

It took us nine hours to get back, instead of five.

The bus driver shared his concern with Pastor Escobar that the highway between La Ceiba and Tocoa is notorious for “banditos” and was not too thrilled about driving it at night. We knew we were on God’s errand and that His army would protect us.

Got to bed after 11 pm.

---

Friday, March 14, 2008

Spent the morning in our orientation session. We have a great group of youth and staff, mainly from Sacramento Academy and the Fredricksburg Church in Texas. The young pastor, Wil Klinke, was with us on a mission project in Jamaica six years ago.

We went to the church construction site this morning and had a ceremonial “cornerstone” block-laying.

We sent the construction crew to the job site in the afternoon. The rest of our group worked on VBS programming as well as kitchen detail. The group from Union College (International Relief and Rescue) are an outstanding team. The first major “Medical Brigade” will be on Sunday here in Tocoa.

The evangelistic meetings began tonight. The meetings were supposed to start at 6:45, but typical to this region, they began at 7:30. There were about 200 adults and 175 children at the VBS program.

---

Sabbath, March 15, 2008

We split up our group and went to 5 different churches here in Tocoa. They have five congregations, but no official church building yet. This small church that we are building will serve the area of Tocoa well.

After church, we had lunch and then headed off to the neighborhood surrounding the church to meet some of the poor residents. Many of our youth brought toys, stuffed animals, Beanie Babies, and clothes to give away. We saw some VERY poor homes. The young people were affected by this experience.

One of our main challenges is transportation. We eat our breakfast meal in the hotel. But the lunch and evening meals are served at the home of the head elder near the church site. It is about two miles away, so you can imagine trying to shuttle everyone there. We have been using a local bus, but it will not be available to us after Monday.

Pastor Ricardo Escobar is a dynamic speaker. This evening there were at least 350 people in the main auditorium and the VBS program was unreal! They counted 340 children. They have had to go into a total revision of their program, so that it will be easier to manage with so many. But, they have accepted the challenge well and have learned that flexibility is the middle name of mission projects.

---

Sunday, March 16, 2008

This was the first full day of work for the construction crew. It has taken them a while to find their niche. The local block layers that we have hired are working well. They managed to complete three rows of block around the perimeter and also added the fourth row, which is the “U block” or “Bond Beam.”

It is hot and humid, so we have to keep pumping water and fluids into the workers. No heat stroke yet.

The Medical Brigade got slammed with patients today. They had about 700 waiting for them when they arrived at 8:30 a.m. They handled it extremely well. They learned a few things about life in Honduras and other Central American countries. These folk come from the woodwork when free medical services are offered. The physicians saw 300+ and the eye clinic saw at least 200.

The evangelistic meetings had a baptism tonight, of six people. They anticipate more than 100 by the weekend.

The children’s program went much smoother tonight. By streamlining the program, they were able to maintain much better crowd control. The local folk also suggested limiting the ages to these meetings. We were getting 13- and 14-year-olds. So they have made it clear to the children that these meetings are for children 10 and under. All others should be in the adult meetings.

Judy came down sick on Friday night. She has a horrible cough and was up most of the night. But, being the trooper that she is, she was still heading up the eye clinic. Unfortunately, since the new auto refractor was repaired, they did not recalibrate the settings, so they are getting a lot of false readings and have had to resort to the old method of trying on dozens of glasses for each patient. Very frustrating and time consuming.