Guatemala!

It’s been quite a while since I last updated you all on my life here! I now sit in the most beautiful home here in Durban, South Africa serving the community here, but let’s back track to two months ago before I talk about here!

Guatemala! The “land of eternal spring” as it is called. A land that is beautiful and rich in culture, and full of the most generous people. My team and I arrived there with such excitement and with comments of “this is really happening!” being heard throughout the background. We had trained so long for this moment to arrive! Now we were standing on the soil that we have been so eagerly praying for! We jumped on a chicken bus, which is one of Guatemala’s forms of transport, and headed to base! There was something so surreal about looking out the window, having this fresh wind blow within, and realizing that this is now my home for some time! What a blessing and honor that is to say.

Our first couple of weeks in Guatemala looked like weeks full of newness and anticipation for what we would be doing! Our first week there, we had been assigned our ministries! The ministry I had been assigned to was Hope ministries! A beautiful ministry that sat in the heart of San Antonio Aguas Calientes that would soon completely capture my own and my team’s heart. October 11th started off our first day! We were welcomed into our new family with the sweetest notes and flowers. This made my day. From that point on, strangers became family! More than I could have ever imagined!

Hope ministry’s prayer was to see Guatemalans sent to the nations and to raise up generations in the way of the Lord! It was the most beautiful thing to be apart of . Something the Lord has shown me time and time again during my time at Hope and in Guatemala was that we get to join into something that is already happening! The Lord is moving and continues to move today! He has paved the way for countless lives to encounter the living God and we have the honor of joining into that! Anytime we did something, that realization marked me.

With Hope, we did plenty of things that I would love to share! Our weeks started off with English classes in Mondays with the kids, a Bible study, house visits, and VBS for the kids on Tuesdays, women’s ministry and house visits on Wednesday, Activation day on Thursday (I will share more on this), and lastly, soccer day on Friday! Days spent at Hope felt like days spent with family. It truly was an environment that I couldn’t have dreamed of! The people there were the most giving people I have ever met. They knew how to serve each other so well and with such joy in doing so. Like I said, we had something called Activation days! These were days with teachings, worship, and usually evangelism! The point of activation was to grow in the things we had learned those days by actually doing them. Whether that be an evangelism teaching where we would go out and evangelize, to a teaching on interceding where we would sit and intercede for hours, we were learning how to walk in what we were learning! It was so challenging for me, but it bore so much fruit.

To go back to some of the things we had done during out time at Hope, I would love to share a testimony from my time at Hope!

My teammate Rose and I went with one of our ministry hosts Jeffery to do house visits around town. We had gone to this part of town I had only been to once, but didn’t know my way around. As we had walked closer to some houses, coming on our first street, Jeffery stood in the middle of the road and says, “Ask the Lord where he wants us to go today!” Rose and I looked at each other and said, “Okay!!” So that’s what  we did! As we had asked the Lord where he wanted us for that day, I felt like we needed to go to the street on our right, which Rose had also felt the same. So we turned and started walking down, but only to the first house. We stopped and knew we needed to go there! Rose and I knocked on the door and an older lady answered the door and welcomed us into her home. We came inside as she served us a cup of coffee (I loved this) and we sat down in their living room. With some time talking to this lady, we found out she and her husband are pastors over a church, but her husband was very sick. He had a terrible heart attack that he should have died from, but by the grace of God was still alive and in the room across from us. At that time, we weren’t able to step foot in the room because of the oxygen. He had been bedridden for a week now. So we sat there and prayed over him in their living room, which was one of the most Holy Spirit led prayers I have ever been apart of. We had finished praying and Rose looked at us and goes, “I want to pray over his door frame!” So she walked over there, and started praying. While she was praying, I had a vision of this man leaving his room! Walking and able to move! But for that day, that didn’t happen. We had eventually left the house with full faith that the Lord would heal this man. A week later, I had gotten very sick with a parasite and was unable to go to our last week of ministry. This also meant that i wouldn’t get the chance to visit with this family again. During my team’s debrief of Guatemala we were sharing testimonies and mine was the story that I am now telling you. When I had finished, my other teammate Aaliyah had looked at me and said, “Was that the pastors house?” To my response I said, “Yes, why?” She began to tell me and my entire team that she had also visited the same house, exactly one week later, to see the man that was bedridden, was told he might not have a full recovery, coming back from the hospital that day after getting his pacemaker removed and being told by doctors that he would have a full recovery. You could say my mouth had dropped after hearing this news. Rose and I had no words! A man that had been bedridden, no chance for a full recovery, was now walking, no longer bedridden, and would be seeing a full recovery in the next three months. Only Jesus can heal in that way. It had been one of the craziest moments during our final week in Guatemala! What a beautiful story!

Guatemala was so full of the growth of walking with Jesus. It had prepared me for so much of what I have been doing here in South Africa! I am so thankful for the place that taught me to know the Lord within simplicity! I couldn’t be more grateful.

I want to also sit here and say thank you to everyone who has supported me and continues to do so! I am now 23% or $3,859.97 from being fully funded! It is so crazy to see the Lord provide in this way in my life! I wouldn’t be here, sharing these testimonies with you if it wasn’t for your generosity and kindness that has brought me here. I am praying to be fully funded by the end of February! So be continuing in prayer that I will reach that goal! Also, continue to pray for my squad as our time in South Africa is coming to an end and we will be traveling to Swaziland! Some have 8 hour travel days, while others have 18… Be praying for our safety and that we will receive rest! Thank you all so much for loving me and supporting me through this time! I couldn’t be more thankful.

Love,

          Hannah