Boy Scouts Mejores!

Our men had quite the experience with the boy scouts on Saturday. Though we had mapped the day out during the previous night’s planning session, our activities always seemed to run their course more quickly than anticipated, and the team suddenly faced a rather daunting challenge. Yet despite having only a single Spanish-speaker in our ranks and over 40 kids to care for and entertain, the team rose to the challenge, leading our scouts through many activities such as fire-building, singing camp songs, picking up trash throughout the community, and an impromptu game of futbol all while making sure they learned important lessons of the scouts like the salute and motto. Although it was challenging, all the team members agree that it was a worthwhile endeavor that definitely made an impact on the kids and the team, as evidenced by our “reunion” after the church service with many of the children. Truly, our trust in God helped create an amazing opportunity out of a potentially crazy situation. Sunday’s are always a very interesting day because we go to church and get to spend the day in Antigua. Because the majority of the team members this year are veterans, many of us don’t think twice about the Guatemala church service that we attend. However, it is a very different experience, and it is hard to prepare for what happens during the hour and half worship service. The Guatemalan people come to church with the expectation of seeing God, and they don’t hold back. Since the entire service is conducted in Spanish, the group usually leaves with the children for children’s church. This year we re-enacted David and Goliath. Our acting may not be the best, but it was fun seeing Hunter throw bean bags at Dale. After the skit, the kids colored their own mini Goliaths and threw little rubber balls at them, like David threw pebbles at the real Goliath. These kinds of activities never take as long planned so the last half of children’s church was spent running around and chasing kids. The second half of Sunday was spent shopping and sightseeing in Antigua. Many of us bartered for things in the market like quilts and purses, and of course many of the guys bought knives. After shopping, everyone met up for dinner. On Monday, we did a medical clinic in Gorion, some of the boy scouts and church staff live here. We saw upwards of 80 people and Kathy saw 23. Carolyn also got the hair salon up and running, and the boy scouts help do lice washes and braiding. We are currently preparing for a clinic in Embaulada and we are excited to see how God will work today.