What did ya hear, what did ya see, what did ya touch, what did ya taste, what did ya smell, what did ya feel???

Every night in Honduras after incredible worship to our King with accapella singing Mark would ask this/these questions. We have now been back in the states for two weeks and I can still hear him saying this and still processing the answers. We have been blessed to get some rest - even though Ellen is at it again with the Birmingham Mission trip - visit with a few friends and family to tell about our trip and reflect on the whole experience. I will have to say that it is hard to explain to anyone who has never been. I have friends saying "It is time to be glad to be home" "You are needed here too" etc. I know that and God is showing me that but for those of you who have experienced Honduras whether it be years ago when you stayed at Baxter or this year, you understand what I mean when I say "It was the most incredible thing I have ever experienced" "I can't wait to go back" "It was awesome". So, for you - but mainly for me since I am old and afraid I will forget - I am going to list some of the answers to those questions that were posed to me daily by Marco.

I saw beautiful mountains, naked children, joy in the Honduran faces, meat hanging in windows for purchase, water in sealed bags, sickness, outhouses, people living in shacks with no running water, electricity, doors or windows, human beings and vultures chasing a garbage truck to get food to eat, red mimosa trees, mango trees full of ripe mangos, traffic in a major city with no red lights, mountainside after mountainside of villages full of "houses" that were really only shacks, grateful eyes when we finished a house for a family, excitement when the gringos showed up, overwhelmed teens who had never seen anything like this in their lives, clouds hanging so low or we were so high that I was in them.

I heard the laughter of little children being played with, the laughter of teens and adults building new relationships that would be forged forever, a group of over 100 singing praises to our God in unison, encouraging words being spoken to "newbies" who really didn't know what they were doing, the sound of kids getting sick (sorry - gotta take the good with the bad!), the sound of teens playing all kinds of games and teaching their new friends, Mark yelling "You people are killing me!", the quiet sobbing/crying of people as they are overwhelmed by what they have done that day, groaning from carrying lumber up a mountain or hauling buckets of rock that are too full (no mas!), translators (Rachel, Josue, Steve) telling/asking the Hondurans questions for those of us who know no Spanish, the sound of Honduran children trying to speak English and copying me down to the so Southern accent, 80's music blairing over Enrique's radio on the bus (they are 25 years behind in music so I was back in high school/college), SILENCE - when we left the dump and hospital and were all so sad, the words "I love you" and "I will miss you" being said over and over to our new friends as we leave each other at the airport.

I tasted beans with goat cheese, fresh mango, pineapple and watermelon, the most amazing homemade tortilla chips ever, pan de pan (their version of bread pudding that I made myself sick on because I ate so much, Fresca that isn't diet, Coca Light (diet coke but not really), the best rice I have ever put in my mouth, the best french toast I have ever put in my mouth, the Lord's supper at a small church where we actually had to share the cup, a few things I wasn't sure about but I ate anyway......

I smelled sweat (mine and others!), garbage in the villages, the most horrid smell I have ever smelt the day we fed the people at the dump...you cannot imagine and have never smelled anything like it. The amazing thing is once we were actually all the way up the mountain to the place we needed to be the smell was not an issue at all - that was all God, sweet teen girls hair when I would hug them every night at dinner when they had had a shower and I hadn't, stinky little garbage cans beside the toilets(you don't flush anything that doesn't naturally come out of your body), Lysol (Lori and I sprayed down every single thing in a two story dorm after a virus hit), bugspray and sunscreen, sawdust, rain on the mountain.

I touched people who just needed to be touched, teens who needed a hug, lumber, nails, tin, dirty laundry, clean laundry, sick children and babies, parents of sick children and babies, post hole diggers, shovels, buckets, rocks, mud, old box springs with barb wire and a Santa hat stuck in a mountain, hands of people helping each other up and down mountains, cold dishwater in the kitchen because there was no hot water to wash dishes with, cold water in the shower when there was no hot water, lots of wounds (Nurse Lee to the rescue with no gloves!), lots of hand sanitizer and wipes.

I have left out many things I know but these flood my mind. The last question "What did ya feel?" - well, I felt God.

running on faith,
Lee