My last few weeks in Guatemala were full of adventure and hard goodbyes. At one point, my team and I were able to take a day trip to Lake Atitlan. It was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been!
There are lots of places to cliff jump on the Lake, including one famous jump in San Marcos that is 40 feet high! I was super hyped to do this jump, so at one point Abigail and I were watching a couple of guys do the jump before I attempted it. One of the guys jumped off, and as soon as he hit the water, it was pretty obvious that something was awry. He was immediately thrown a life jacket because he was clearly hurt, and was having a hard time swimming. We started praying for him as his friends came to the rescue.
Later on, as we were leaving the park, we saw him again. Abigail and I are both nurses, so we wanted to make sure he was okay. We went over to talk to him, and he said he was on his way to the doctor. We asked if we could pray for healing over him, and he agreed.
This was the first time I prayed for a stranger to be healed, outside of my job in the OR back in the states. It was a cool opportunity God placed right in front of us. I have been learning a lot about planting seeds of faith everywhere we go. I pray that the seed of curiosity in Jesus was planted in this man as we prayed over him.
Another adventure that I got to go on was to a place called Hobbitenango! It’s a park outside of Antigua, that is based off of the Lord of the Rings franchise.
Kayla and I got to enjoy this adventure one of our last weekends in Guatemala, and in our Uber ride back, we had one of the deepest God conversations I have ever had with a stranger! To our surprise, our uber driver spoke English! He was from Belize, and was excited to speak to us in English. The conversation quickly turned into “why are you here?” and Kayla and I were able to explain to him what we were doing, and open the conversation about God! He was super open to talking about what he believed. I am not sure exactly what religion he was, but I know it was very obvious that it was works-based. Kayla and I got to explain to him that we serve Jesus because he loves us without ever having to work for anything. I think this concept was hard for him to understand. But we had a very long in-depth conversation about it, and we were able to pray for him. He was very open with is about his feelings, and I was grateful for this, because we were able to pray into exactly those things he was hurting from.
This conversation really hyped Kayla and I up! We were so excited to be sharing the gospel, and it was so cool how God unified us and brought both of us boldness to speak about Jesus in that moment.
Our next adventure/day trip was to Sumpango, Guatemala for a Kite Festival! When someone said “kite festival,” I thought there would be a lot of small kites being flow around in a field, with maybe some vendors selling food, and that would be all. I did NOT expect a hugeee festival with GIANT kites!
It was precious to be in Sumpango, because one of our teams was there. We got to spend the night with them at their ministry house the night before the festival, and we had a prayer burn that night over the nature of the festival. The locals fly these giant kites because they believe it’s a way of communicating with their dead ancestors. So we prayed for the locals to have encounters with the living God, and we prayed for protection of our team as we went into the kite festival the next day.
The next week was our last of ministry, and saying goodbye to our sweet ministry friends was very hard. It was so hard to say goodbye to the children we had spent the last 2 months pouring into every day. It was also hard to say goodbye to the people we had found community in through church as well. But what a gift it was to have something so hard to say goodbye to. San Antonio will always have a place in my heart.
The last 10 days of Guatemala were our squad’s “debrief.” This is a time set aside for us racers to recharge and process what we went through our first 2 months on the field. We started this debrief with the coolest experience of my entire life: hiking an active volcano.
This hike was an all-day adventure. We started off hiking up Volcano Acatenango, which is an inactive volcano. We hiked 10 miles up this volcano to a base camp, where we dropped some stuff off, and had a small break. Then many of us chose to venture on, and hike up Volcano Fuego, which is an active volcano. This was quite an adventure, because to hike up Fuego, we had to hike down Acatenango, then back up Fuego. Oh and… all of this happened in the dark.
This was actually an insane experience. As soon as you start up Fuego, all of your senes start picking up that you are actually on an active Volcano. You can smell the ash in the air. You can feel it rumbling under your feet, and you can hear a crazy loud explosion every time it erupts! I will never forget the first time I heard it, I thought a bomb had just been set off! Of course, the coolest part is, you look straight ahead of you, and you see glowing lava spewing out of the mouth of the volcano directly in front of you.
After some time at the top of Fuego, we hiked down, and then back up Acatenango. We got to base camp, had dinner, and snuggled into our little cabin for a few hours of rest. We woke up the next morning at 3:30am to summit Acatenango at sunrise. Acatenango has the best view of Fuego, so the summit was something we didn’t want to miss. No one told us at the time, but getting to the summit is the hardest part of the entire hike. We hiked through literal volcanic ash for miles, and our bodies were already tired from the adventure the day before. But once we got to the summit, every step was worth it. It was so beautiful. I was in absolute awe of God’s creation on the top of that Volcano. I don’t even have words to describe how amazed I felt. Every time I see something in nature that is THAT beautiful, I am moved to tears. I can’t believe the same God who created volcanoes and sunrises also created me and speaks to me. How freaking cool.
Fun fact: If you look at the last picture, the spine of that volcano is what we hiked up the night before! I didn’t mention how narrow the path up Fuego was because I get shaky just thinking about it. Also I know my mom is reading this and there are some details she doesn’t need to know about! Don’t worry mom! I made it safely down both volcanos!
Debrief in Guatemala was a time of rest, reflection, and reconnection. I spent many hours in prayer and worship, reading the Bible, talking in hammocks, and sitting in the hot Central American sun. Our coaches and mentors flew in to give us teachings and talk to us one-on-one. We talked a lot about our feelings, our expectations for the next country, and how we grew in Guatemala. It was a wonderful week spent at the same base we spent our first few days in Guatemala in!
Guatemala was so special. I grew in so many ways. I learned to lean on community, live with strangers, and speak a little Spanish. I learned in a whole new way that my life is not my own. It is God’s, and he can do whatever he wants to with it. I made so many friends, and I learned how to be a friend as well.
I was stripped of everything coming on this race, and I was faced with that head-on in Guatemala. And was is hard. It was hard to go from living alone and having a career, to living with strangers and taking cold showers everyday. I went from being in control of my time, money, and food, to having no control at all. But that doesn’t mean I was lacking. God provided for my EVERY need. And in the end, loosing control for me meant an increase in my faith. If being away from everything and everyone I have ever known leads me to look even a little more like Christ, then it is 100% worth it.
See you in the next country!!!!!
I am still fundraising! If you feel called to give, here is the link for that!
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