Churischan

After we returned home from Copan last week our first goal was to make a visit to the village of Churischan.  David called our contact there and made plans to visit him the next morning.  Our contact, Rigoberto, and his wife are the only evangelicals in the village that we know of.  If you'll remember a few posts back our Ag workers met him walking down the road one day and offered him a ride home.  During that time in the vehicle they found out that he was a believer and had accepted Christ through a relative that lives in Zacapa.  They put us in touch with him and we've made a few visits to his house to get to know his family.

The next morning we all loaded up and headed up the mountain to their home in Churischan.  It's about 50 minutes one direction and 30 minutes the other.  The road conditions on the shorter route are not as good so we took the longer route there and the shorter route home.

My boys before we left the house that morning.  Taking them with us is HARD WORK, but I hope we are setting a pattern for them that being on mission with their parents is just a natural, normal part of their lives.  I want them to grow up feeling involved in what we do and eventually using their gifts and talents to help us. I pray that they will embrace the life they have and will one day look back on it with fond, happy memories.  I also thank God regularly for giving us sweet little Ben so that Cruz has a "partner in crime" to share this adventure with.

I had taken the above photo before we left and loaded it onto my computer to post on facebook.  While doing so I forgot to take my memory card out of the computer and put it back into my camera.  I didn't realize it until we got to the village and wanted to take a picture.  You can imagine my frustration at that moment!  So, I had to use David's phone which doesn't take very good photos. 

Here's a photo of the boys before we began our hike down the mountain.  The trail is right behind them.  Cruz was putting his hand up to block the sun and Ben was just doing what his brother does (always!)

My guys headed down the mountain.  The trail was much drier this time around.  Rainy season seems to have passed for the year.  With the exception of maybe a few random spotty showers we shouldn't get any rain again until May.  It's about to get dry and dusty again around these parts!

Ben constantly looked back at me and said, "be careful, mama!".  He was very concerned about me and it made my heart smile.

We had a good visit.  It was the first time for me to meet the wife and kids.  She seemed really pleased that I came to see her.  We spent most of our time talking with Rigoberto.  He is really interested in the Ag work.  We picked a day to return with our Ag team and share with him more of the details of the program.  

On Monday David returned there with our Ag team.  They presented the program and we feel sure we will be able to start an Institute with them.  We would like to begin a training session held in their village (instead of them having to travel over to Honduras).  It would be a small class of about 6-8 and would be led by Noe and David.    Noe would teach the agriculture classes and David would do Bible story training.   We would have liked to begin that training in the near future but it is coffee harvesting time and most of the men there are away working.  It will definitely be after the first of the year before we can start, but it's something we now have permission to do.

Rigoberto, his wife Maria, and four of their eleven kids.

Here's one of the sons shelling beans on their patio. 

Here's a picture of their food cooking on the "oven".   Maria served them some pumpkin like the one we were given last month in another village.  She quartered it up and boiled it in this pot.  Towards the end she added about 2 cups of sugar to the water and put a plastic black bag over the top for a lid.  David said it was very tasty, but sweet.  He forgot to take a picture of the finished product.  I'm just thankful he took pictures at all, HA.  Aren't you glad you don't have to cook like this everyday???  I am!

So in the meantime we'll just continue to make regular encouragement visits to them to further build relationships and trust.  Would you join us in praying for Rigoberto and Maria?  They are young Christians who need to be discipled, and we would love to have the opportunity to do that with them.  Pray also for the hundreds of others who live in this large village that we would have an opportunity to share Christ with them.