Maids

Today has been an easy and relaxing day for me. While a maid in the States is only for the rich, here in Honduras it is much different. For a while I fought having a maid as I was thinking like an American. Here if you have even a 2 bedroom house and can afford it, you have a maid. They are much cheaper here and can save you a lot of work. Honduras is a very dirty country. You have to clean your house top to bottom every day. Just cleaning the floors consists of sweeping, mopping with water and cleaner, mopping with water, and then dry dusting after that for a shine. Then there is the dusting, dishes that must be done several times a day or the one sink that you have for them will be to full to use. Needless to say, before we had a maid I spent all day cleaning the house and had not time for anything else.

Here in Honduras a maid costs about $125.00 a month. For that $125.00 a month you get someone who comes Monday through Friday and cleans your house, cooks lunch, helps you with your Spanish, and does whatever else you would like for her to do.

We do not only get a maid for the help around the house. We also make sure that they are saved and faithful to a good Baptist church. Rosa attends Iglesia Bautista Peniel (Face of God Baptist Church) and was recommended to us by the Pastor who is a great friend of ours. She has been without a job for a while. Her husband got a loan from his employers for about $250.00. Rosa was taking this money to the central market to buy things to sell in her neighborhood. While in the market she was assulted and robbed by four women. They took everything from her, even most her clothes. They even took her cellphone. She was left a long way from home with no money to buy anything and not even any money to get home. She had to beg for money to buy something to wear and for a taxi fare so she could get home.

Rosa now had no money and a debt to pay back. We hired her for 130 Lempira a day ($7.00 US) and she has done a wonderful job. She has done such a good job that we decided to raise her wage to 150 Lempira ($8.00 US), which is a very good rate for a maid. Before she started working for us she went to a job fair and filled out 30 applications. She told us if one of them call she would let us know and help us to find a replacement. Praise the Lord the only ones that called have been obligatory work on Sunday and she told them no.

She has been helping me to clean up and organize things. I have gotten rid of a lot of things. I told her that I feel funny giving things that are not perfect away and so I throw them in a seperate "trash" pile and she goes through them and takes what she wants. She has told me how she is going to give some of it to her niece's family who is poor and the rest she is going to sell to make money.

In these past few days she has helped me so much and we have talked a lot. I feel as if she is my sister instead of my employee. I am so thankful that God brought her into our lives.

Today I made her cry. She was getting ready to go and as we had a few people from the states donate cell phones for us, we gave her one of them. It wasn't as fancy as the one that was stolen, but she was so excited. It is such a blessing to give things to people.

It is a blessing when God uses you to be a blessing to others. One of the things that I was "throwing out" was old clothes pins as we got new ones when we got here. Most of the clothes pins were still in good condition, but because we needed them when we got back; and our only ones were still being used by the family that rented our house and furniture for the year we were gone, we had to buy more. Rosa was so excited to receive the old ones as she had just broken her last one the day before. Oh, the little things we take for granted.

Praise the Lord for how He has blessed America.

Home Bible Studies

Last night we all went to Rueben and Xiomara's house for a home Bible Study. (Sorry that the only pictures I can find of them at this time are of their baptism) We gave them both a ride from Tegucigalpa as well as some other church members who work in Teguc as well. We had to take two trucks as we had quite a few people travelling with us. We were a little concerned when we got to the house and the other truck with Rueben and Xiomara was not there. Thankfully we were able to call their cell phone and find out that they had stopped by the church to pick up more chairs.

Being that this was the first home Bible Study, we weren't sure how many people would show up. We were so pleased when we had 20 people attend. Bro. Armando preached and it was a great service. We are planning on having our service at Bro. Armando's house next week and Bro. Rueben will be preaching (his first time ever). Jason gives them a pretty detailed outline to study and then they preach it. These Bible Study times gives these men opportunity to have a little bit of leadership in the way their church is going. They asked if we could start them and we told them that we would help them for a couple of months and then they would have to run it themselves. Praise the Lord for men that are making huge strides forward for God.

Please pray for our family. We have been sick more often than healed. This morning I woke up with body aches, a fever, and nausea. I feel different than when I had the colon infection so I think that this time it is just the flu. We have another group coming in on the 31st of this month and staying for two weeks. Please pray that we would be all healed by then.

Jason left to take the Jacobos to San Pedro. They fly out tomorrow at 7:40 am. Once they get through customs then Jason will take off to drive back to Teguc. I loved having them here. They were here three weeks and while they may have gotten tired of us we greatly enjoyed our time with them. The kids are enjoying not having a baby around all the time. Tonight they played with their train tracks, Lego's, play dough, and all of the other things that were put up when Isabelle was here. Isabelle's problem was that she loved to play with whatever the boys were playing with much to their frustration. :-)

Please pray for the Jacobo family as they return back to the states and deputation as they are looking at going to language school the first of May. Please pray with them that they will reach that goal.

Ranting

Nothing much has been happening to me since I have been home with a colon infection. I am doing better, but ate some meat for dinner. I am supposed to only be having soft foods, but since no one else living here at this time is also on this "diet" I made a roast for dinner. How can you make a roast and not have a little piece? I am thankful that I am starting to feel better though.

Is anyone else, like me, getting frustrated with forwards. I get at least three a day. I should be thankful as some people I know get more than that. I usually try to be nice to the person who sent it and at least skim it. I think that if it was so important to you that I see it you would delete the fourteen other headers and retype the subject line so it would look like you actually cared who read it.

I got a forward the other day that stated that the words "In God We Trust" was not on the new $1.00 coin. I was able to email the sender of that email back and tell them that that was not true. The words are on the rim of the coin. My mom showed me one before we left the states. It was really neat looking.

Anyway.....Thank you for letting me get on my soap box for a while. I hope to have more newsy news the next time I write, but I will have to be allowed out of the house first.

Blessings and Sickness

Jason has received a huge opportunity to preach. One of the men in our church works for the president as an electrician. He talked to the Captian of the President's Guards and they have invited Jason to come and speak to the President's Guards on Thursday the 2nd of August and every Thursday thereafter. What a great opportunity this will be. They wanted him to come so badly that they have given him a gas voucher for 4 gallons "to make sure he gets there in time"

Please pray for me. I have spent today very near the bathroom. I went into the ER tonight and am being treated for a colon infection. I am not allowed to eat until Monday and then only soup that day. Pray for my family as I am not a happy sick person.

Back from San Pedro

We made it back from San Pedro Sula yesterday at around 5 PM. We had a great trip, but our way home was a little harried. We left at a good time and as we drove out of San Pedro Sula I was stopped by the police. This is normal as they do random stops. As a very white woman driving a huge truck (our F-250 is twice as big as most Honduran trucks) with Washington State plates I attract a lot of attention. We didn't have any problem with the truck papers (that was a blessing), but I was not carrying Audrey's Passport of Birth Certificate with me. While we are here on a residency visa and so are the kids, they do not have cards until they are teenagers. They stopped us for almost 45 minutes trying to figure out what to do with us. They were going to make us wait while they called Migration or (worst case scenerio) one of our trucks would have had to stay with Audrey in San Pedro Sula while the other truck with one of us would have had to drive to Tegucigalpa, get her birth Certificate out of the safe, and drive back to San Pedro Sula to show them. Thankfully they just let us go.

I was stopped twice on the way home, but everything worked out fine and we were able to make it home with only a slight delay.

We spent the rest of the night trying to get Snuggles back from a family in the church. There was an accident on the roads and we had to go all the way around. On top of that Sunggles got hurt while he was at Teresa's house. We had to take him to the doctor. His leg was all swollen up and so the doctor gave him some Anti-inflamatories and an anti-biotic. He is doing better today. He is running around and having a great time. The saying "It's only a dog" does not apply when is is the first dog we have ever paid for.

Busy Days

I have so much to say and so little time to say it. We are leaving for three days to go to San Pedro Sula. This is the other major city in Honduras and we are taking the Jacobo family there to see it.

Jason took his tests on Friday and they determined that he had Dengue and lifted off his restrictions. Ever since that time we have been running. Praise the Lord for his healing.

Saturday, Xiomara and I started the first lesson in our Discipleship course. It went well and we are excited on the growth in the family. After lunch we went with Adelaida and Armando to their house for lunch. We had a great time, but Adelaida had to go into the hospital with pre-term labor the next morning so please pray for her that she make these last few weeks. She is due on the 24th of August. I told her it would be to much for her to cook for all of us, but she is stuborn (not at all like her friend Cassy) and did it anyway. We are glad that everything turned out good.

Sunday I took over the Sunday School class again. Praise the Lord for the 18 kids that came. We were down a little, but it was a cold (about 75 Degrees) and raining so the adult attendance was also down.

Please pray for our ministry that God would bless it and that it would grow.

Jason's sickness

I was going to try and write last night, but there is just to much to do. It seems like when it rains it pours. Jason has been sick off and on since last Thursday. He seemed to be getting worse and yesterday I finally suggested that if he felt that badly, he needed to go to the doctor.

He went to the Emergency room yesterday and they kept him for a while. They finally concluded that he either has Malaria or Classic Dengue. Both are very similar in the symptoms, but Classic Dengue is not a illness that stays with you. While Malaria is a illness that can reappear at any time. Both illness come and go for a week or more, but Malaria is usually every 24 hours you get sick and the next 24 hours you are well.

Jason is still sick this morning so that is a good sign. He will have to go in Friday morning for some more tests. Please keep him in your prayers. This is especially hard on him as we have visitors that are here and he wants to be able to show them around Honduras.