City Livin'

Hey Ya'll it's Skyler and Maddie comin' at ya live from Guatemala City.

Today we started our day venturing into the city to visit another ministry called Only a Child. Here we learned about George's mission of getting children off the street, into school, and eventually a job. We were able to visit with the boys, get to know them, and encourage them. We also got to see how the boxes there are made. Being able to visit with the boys there was a great experience because we were able to see how encouraged they are by us being there and taking an interest in them.

After Only a Child we went and parked outside of the dump.  Basically the dump is a massive landfill where all the trash goes and then people go down there and look for things.  People want to find recyclables that they can then sell, or maybe even food to feed their family.  As you can probably imagine this is not the safest of things to do because they are going through garbage which can cause diseases.  In this area their is a lot of drug and alcohol abuse, so the money that they may make from selling recyclables often goes to their addictions and not their family.  Visiting the dump really puts the way of life in Guatemala, Guatemalla City specifically, into perspective for all of us.  Living here is not the safest or easiest,but its their normal day-to-day life.

Today we met all the Guatemalan missionaries!!! We got to enjoy lunch with them to get to know them before going out on our house visits. For house viisits today we had three groups, all being able to experience different things.  Guatemalan houses are not your typical American houses.  The houses we saw today have a tin roof, cement floor, and curtains as doors.

The group Skyler was in went to visit a woman named Laura.  Seeing how grateful this woman was to see and visit with us was incredible. We hadn't even shared anything about ourselves or about the Bible yet and she spent a good 15 minutes talking about how happy she was to see us. We were able to pray with her and encourage her to continue praying about the things that troubled her.  After encouraging and visiting with her we went down the road a little bit to visit with a man named Jorge. Jorge was also very grateful to see us.  He talked with us about how he wanted to be able to go and spread the Gospel, but was having trouble walking to be able to do so. We shared some Bible verses of encouragement with him and we were able to pray with him.

The group Maddie was in went on a visit to one of the Guatemalan Missionairie's homes, Oscar. We were able to meet with his mother, one of his sisters, and his nephew. His mother was so greatful for us to be there and to share the Word of God with her. We then went across the street to visit Oscar's sister and she shared a medical miracle with us which she shared how greatful to God for this she was. It was such a great opportunity to be able to expericence the life of one of the Guatemalan Missionaries!

The group Mil was in went close to the city dump. The first house was a family of five, but the one son was not there. The mother told many stories about how through prayer she was healed, and how women come to her to ask for a blessing of a baby even though they were considered infertile. Towards the end of the visit, the very outgoing father decided he wanted the family to play for us. He brought out a guitar, accordian, and a bass stringed instrument which the daughter, mother, and he played. The second house had three boys and a single mom who was gone most of the day because she had to work long hours to keep the boys in school. We conversed about their interests such as art which they were very good at. Most importantly, we finished with a prayer reminding them of their Heavenly Father.

We all had such a wonderful day here in Guatemala City and can't wait for what is to come in the next few days.

Love and miss you all!

Hasta La Vista Baby!!!