In our last meeting with pastors they decided it we needed to have a campaign/crusade in El Banano to support the church and the pastor there. We’re not sure the entire history of the church but it used to be pretty strong, the pastor had some moral failures, and the church has been struggling every since. We have a new gentleman, Elias, who is the new pastor. He is a former drug addict who was baptized just last September and seems to have a real love for Jesus and for people. The pastors want to help him and encourage him. They also wanted to have the campaign before we left for Guatemala. So, they picked the two nights before we left for language school. Because we want them to take the reins we agreed to whatever they decided.
On Friday morning, March 28th, the short-term team that is here wanted to pass out beans and rice to needy families we decided it pass them out in the same community we were starting the campaign that night. What we didn’t realize is that the houses are not very close together, the roads are such that the bus can’t take the team to the house, and mucho much (a little spanlish thrown in just for fun) walking will be required to get it all passed out. To make it worse for the past four days we have had clouds and cool (for Honduras) weather. The day we are passing out the food the sun is bright and it is very hot. The team worked so hard passing out the food. The only time any of them stopped was when they passed out (yes one did), they thought they were going to throw up (yes one did feel this way but never did), or their bodies just would not go anymore (believe a couple fell into this category). We were impressed and thankful for how hard they worked to make sure everybody got some food.
Friday evening we pick up Saul and head to the church for the campaign – or so we thought. When we get to the village the campaign is not going to be at the church. Nope. The campaign is going to be at the main intersection of the two dirt roads in the village. Some of the pastors along with some helpers have rigged up lights on banana trees, put together a small stage with a podium and lights, and brought a nice sound system from the church in La Sabana. The sound system is blaring music and it’s good stuff. We got the name of the artist and are actively looking for the cd. Maybe we can even understand the words after language school.
They have plastic chairs set up in the middle of the intersection. Yep, right in the middle of the intersection. Next thing we know they are bringing more chairs and setting them up. Understand it’s suppose to start at 6:30 and it’s now 6:20 and we only have about 12 people there. They proceed to setup about 60 – 70 chairs making sure they leave room on both sides of the rows and between the front row and the stage so the cars can get past them while the campaign is going on. And yes, during the service we had cars drive through and on man ride his bike drinking his whiskey pass between the first row of seats and the stage. Man, this is GREAT! This is what it’s about.
Ok, back to the story. At 6:40 they have all the pastors, leaders, and myself gather in circle and begin to pray for the service. We’re thinking it’s 10 minutes past the time to start and we still only have the same 12 people here. We are feeling bad for the pastors because they have put so much work into this. We pray for maybe 10 minutes and when we look up there are now about 40 people here. Amazing, but it gets better.
Tonight our kids from Faith Home (Hogar de Fe) are responsible for the music. The only problem is it’s 7:00 and they are still not here and we haven’t started the service. Once again, the only people that seem too concerned are us Norte Americanos. About 7:10 a big yellow school bus pulls up and about 60 people from our local churches get off the bus including our kids with their instruments. After a brief sound check we start the service about 50 minutes late. We end up with about 150 people at the service. All the seats are full and people are standing everywhere and many are sitting on or in the back of the few pickup trucks parked on the side of the road. It this great or what? (Well, except for the massive number of bug bites we got)
What was so exciting about the bus is that we didn’t know anything about it. The pastors felt free enough to take the initiative to arrange for the bus and any expenses associated with it without feeling they had to consult us.
They made Brad preach on this night. He tried to get out of it because we want people to see the pastors as the leaders – not Brad the “missionary.” But, they insisted, so we felt obligated support them in what they worked hard to plan.
After the message the pastors and a few others went to each person individually that was not a member of one of our churches and talked with them about where they stood with Jesus Christ.
After it was over we had to take everything down, move it down the street to a gentleman’s house, and lock it up to prevent theft. Which means the next day they will have to set everything up again. We got home about 10:30. Took care of some details that needed attention before our leaving and then went to bed – very excited about what had just happened.
The next morning Saul said he needed to talk with us. The pastors had talked the night before and decided it would be best if we didn’t come the campaign the second night because we had to get up at 4:00 am the next day to leave for Guatemala. They were worried we would not get enough rest. It’s nice to be working with people who care so much about each other. So, we took their recommendation, stayed home and packed for Guatemala.
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