November 15, 2007 - Kenny

Thursday, November 15, 2007

What a full day.   Buffet breakfast as usually.  The food in El Salvador is outstanding.  Marco has done a great job making sure we were well fed and safely fed.

The morning stared as usual with a stop at the market.  As Marco was talking to a vendor to buy our bananas, oranges, and pineapple for the day, Faye’s curiosity got the best of her.  Faye opened her window and asked the lady in plain southern English, “What is that?”  Needless to say there was a communication barrier.  The lady put the “produce” in a bag and handed it to Faye.  Faye has such a generous heart that she couldn’t say no to the lady.  So we ended up with a bag of produce for $1.00.  Then Marti thought that the cost was $2.00 so she had Faye hand the lady another dollar.  The lady started to fill another bag, but Faye said, “No mas, gracias” – coached by Bill – and we pulled away.  We had to ask Marco what our “produce” was.  Faye had bought 4 or 5 yucca roots.  When we arrived at the job site Faye found Transito and gave the yucca to her.  She was very happy.

Meat and Vegetable Vendor
Sonsonate



Transito and friends

 Transito and her family have been very special to us.  She has 4 boys and 2 girls.  She has been in Puente Azul for 13 years.  She left the mountains because of the war.  Her sons that we see often are Napo and Elijah.  She is very friendly and we all have come to love her and her family. 

On the job site, there were more columns being built and more chain link fence being built.  Everybody has experienced a variety of tasks and seems to have settled into an area they enjoy.  Even though we have been together for 7 days now, we are doing great and growing closer every minute.

Dale, Scott, and Darryl.  Our friends that are not members of FCC Wilmington.  It has been great to get to know each of them, especially after Marco has talked so much about them.  Dale is a DOC minister in Indiana.  For me personally, it was great to meet Darryl.  Not only has Marco spoken highly of him but he was with our church’s travel to Moss Point, Louisiana that Vicki participated in.  All 3 of these guys have years of mission trip experience.  Hopefully our church can follow in their footsteps.

This afternoon Pastor Luis had a “community devotional”.  There were about 50 people present including us.  Pastor Luis has 7 families in his church.  There are 30 children from those 7 families.  Songs were sung in Spanish by his members and in English by our group.  A gentleman from the community, Antonio Monje, who appeared to be elderly and almost blind sang a song.  He told us he did not sing well, but felt the need/calling to sing a song.  Though I didn’t understand the words, I could tell that he was well respected in the community. 

Lance gave a short sermon, with Marco translating, from Luke.  It was the story of the lepers (10) and Jesus walked by and said you are healed.  Now go to the priest as required by law to be cleansed.  Only 1 came back to say thank you and he was a Samaritan (I hope I got that right, Lance!?).  Anyway, the message was that even though we have differences within the community, we should strive to work things out with our neighbors.  Eddie East appeared at the devotional.  I’m not sure the kids knew exactly what was going on, but I have an idea that this service will be talked about by Eddie back at FCC.

At the end of the devotional  (which lasted about an hour) we, the group, presented Pastor Luis with a bike so that he could better serve not only his church, but the community.  Our church, FCC Wilmington, gave him a framed photo from our 100^th anniversary showing our church family.

If you did not feel the Holy Spirit this afternoon, then there is no hope.  I’m sure we, the group, felt a wide range of emotions.  I know personally I felt close to the community but also sadness that our time is coming to a close.
I am going to close with a quote from Great is Thy Faithfulness.  I don’t think anybody in the group will ever hear this song without thinking of Puente Azul.  This has become our “theme song”.

“All I have needed thy hand hath provided…”

As we head back to our comfortable lives in a few days, I hope we can remember this and live by it.  Hopefully, we will do away with some of the excesses we have in our life and use the extra to help somebody out, whether it is a neighbor in need, a mission in the U.S. or another mission to Puente Azul, El Salvador. ---Kenny Morris, Jr.