Guest Blog by: Dr. Brenda Hagen, Lea Gardner & Paula Shriver
LEA…

Today we began our day at the Dump. This is my second year coming to Honduras. The Dump is a place where many families live and there are many children! Last year the first child that captured my heart immediately was a young boy named Oscar. We were able to reset his broken arm. I have prayed so many times over the past year for him. I have prayed for his mother, brother, and sister also. The living conditions here are not good. They don’t have electricity, or home cooked meals daily. I have hoped that I would see his precious face again. A face that left an impact on my heart and a love for the Honduran people. As soon as we pulled up into the Dump, I saw him running down the Hill with his brother. Tears filled my eyes to see that he was alright. I went up to him and hugged him. He said that he remembered me which completely made my day. Dean was able to recheck his arm and it had healed completely. Seeing so many faces today and having some remember us makes me realize even more why we do this. We are here to help these people but most importantly share Jesus! Please continue to pray for our group as we have so much left to do and accomplish.

PAULA…

This is my first time coming to Honduras. I had felt the calling to come for a while but always had a valid reason holding me back. Last year during the EBC Honduras report, I knew that the time was right and that I wanted to be on the 2016 EBC team. We are only a few days in and I am truly fascinated by this culture. The people of Honduras are so simple yet seem so happy with the little that they have. I love riding down the streets and watching the kids play “soccer.”  Their soccer goals are handmade using what they can find and they’re pretty creative!  My favorite was watching some kids run around tied together with rope and laughing hysterically.  It made me wish that the kids in the USA could be so easily entertained. 

Today at the dump, I helped out in the pharmacy. Although the people in Honduras seem happy and content, the need here is great. More so than I had imagined. When we arrived at the clinic this morning, there was already a line formed outside waiting on our medical team. Let me tell you, we worked non-stop!! Between 10:00am-4:00pm, our 5 doctors and medical team treated 176 patients! 556 prescriptions were filled! I was fortunate enough be able to slip out and take a peek at the EBC youth serving lunch to the local children. They typically receive 2 good home cooked meals a week and they come eager to eat! I walked around to the back of the building and happened to notice a small girl walk outside with her food. I was expecting to see her sit down and start eating but she was too excited to eat, she wants to read. She was one of 250 people given a new Bible today and she was so eager to read it! I wondered how many of us would have read that Bible first or how many of us would have satisfied our cravings. 

BRENDA…

Today was the first day of medical clinics. It was an amazing array of unloading trucks, setting up tables, truck opening, a maze of people hustling around and then suddenly…a clinic appeared. There was an intake station, waiting area, exam stations, lab and pharmacy. Just as quickly as it was set up, it was filled with Honduran men, women and children.

As a team we worked hard. We were hot, tired and thirsty, but our patients all left with medicine & treatment. It felt good… their smiles, hugs and appreciation. Today was about serving God, helping others and Amazing Grace! 

NATHAN…

While our medical team was hard at work in the clinic, out student team was hard at work outside.  They lugged hundreds of 5 gallon buckets full of concrete to pour a concrete roof for the church we began building last year!  The church is coming along great and we look forward to seeing it complete in the years to come!  While we poured concrete we also cut boards and prepped the wood for building the book shelves that will be installed later this week for the school libraries!

We also had a team of students go speak at a local high school.  Over 250 teenagers were there to hear the gospel presented through songs, testimonies, skits, games and a message.  The students handed out over 200 Bibles to the school too!  Though this is a public school, in Honduras the schools welcome the Gospel.  The teachers said they would use the Bibles to teach their students now that each child has one.  The principal also said, “when you speak today, please be sure to share the Gospel.”  Lol.  How often would that happen in Florence?  How awesome is it that we were able to speak the name of Jesus in a school!

Tonight our women’s ministry group led their second night of Bible study with another local church.  Nancy, Marci and five of our teen girls led this evening in God’s Word!

*The Tuareg Cross was passed this morning from Victoria Miller to Marci Gatewood.

Guest Blog by: Lauren Hill, Kaitlyn Kempson & Annie Kate Watson

Today we helped Ms.Nancy and Ms. Marci with Women’s Ministry. Women’s ministry is a loose term because there were also Children, some men and even a dog. When the service first began there was only a handful of women, but the music from the worship service drew more people in; by the time we started our lesson there were about 50 people. The people were very friendly and many came up and personally greeted us. We could tell they were excited to have visitors. 

Ms. Nancy and Ms. Marci spoke about God’s grace specifically in the life of Paul. They incorporated many object lessons to help the people better understand God’s grace. We helped with the object lessons, and at the end we all did a skit about the body of Christ. Afterwards we gave each woman a devotional book. 

It was a very different atmosphere, but very exciting. The people were very passionate, and we could definitely see their love for God. We expected the language barrier but as we got into the service, it became clear that we were all there for the same reason. You almost seemed to forget about it because you became so focused on praising God and spending time with others learning more about him. It is such an amazing experience to see the passion everyone had for God and the way they sang and responded to the lesson. We loved being able to participate in this ministry.

* the Tuareg cross was passed today from Kaitlyn to Victoria.

Today 44 people from Ebenezer & Florence boarded a plane and headed to Honduras.  We are 44 individuals, but we are serving as a team for the next ten days for the glory of God.  We will bring the Good News of Jesus to many people during our time in Honduras.  After a few airline delays and a long van ride, we made it safely to our hotel.  We are all settled in and ready to begin work tomorrow!

This team has a big task ahead of us.  We will be doing a variety of ministry projects.  Some of them include, medical clinics, construction of a church, building librarys at two schools, children’s ministry, speaking in local high schools and women’s Bible studies.  It may be a big task ahead of us, but we serve a great God!  We rely on Him for our strength!

As always, we know that as we serve the people of Honduras – it won’t be us being the blessing.  We will receive far more of a blessing for having been here this week.  Our mission teams always end up learning more from the people of Honduras than we teach.  We’re looking forward to what God does in the hearts of the people here in this beautiful country and in the hearts of our 44 team members.  

Check back every day as we have different team members write this daily blog to keep our family, friends and church updated on our work down here!  

**as we left today Sophie Watson passed the cross to Kaitlyn Kempson to bring on the trip.