my geek life

There is a lot to this story and I only know a little bit. I wish I could remember all of the different parts that I’ve heard. I guess it starts with a little girl. She had to do dialysis three times a week. That is the reason the she was living at Pan American Health Services (PAHS). Well, this last Fall or Winter, her family’s house was destroyed by a storm. It was an adobe house of some sort, mostly sticks and mud. There was a lot of horizontal rain which softened up the walls and then a heavy wind knocked them down. They moved down to PAHS to be with their daughter who also developed a problem with the shunt. She basically was done fighting and I’ve also heard that the government doctor refused to treat her, but at any rate, she died just a couple weeks before we went down. The family then moved in with family or neighbors in their village.

The first Sabbath down there, we went for a hike through the rain forest land owned by PAHS. The trail starts in the village that the girl comes from, so we went and checked out the house before the hike. Basically, there were the four corner posts and three other support posts holding up a tin roof. PAHS didn’t have a major project planned for us; so, we decided to build the house back up. Pastor Steve had been to Pakistan and learned a new way of building a small structure. He shared that with Gary, our resident engineer, and promptly left us. (To be totally fair, it was always planned that he was only there for four or five days.)

Sunday, we pretty much finished up the painting project on the PAHS campus and Monday, I was part of the crew that went up. That was one of those times I was glad I was the #2 cameraman on the trip (Tom was #1). It was only a partial crew because the rest were supposed to stay behind and finish the painting, but wasps made it impossible to finish. At any rate, the first day was spent digging a trench, pouring cement into the trench for the wall foundation, and stretching seventeen wires around the whole structure. And, that’s how we left it for a couple days. It kinda looked funny.

Tuesday/Wednesday were mostly touristy days and Wednesday evening four of us picked up three metric tons of sand in town and shoveled it off at the site. Oh, something I forgot to mention. This town is quite a bit higher up in the mountains and probably only reachable with four wheel drive. We carried everything up there on a flatbed trailer behind a good sized truck and when there was more than four people, most of us rode on the trailer as well. Definitely not something you could get away with in the states. I’m not to sure of the trip time, because I didn’t have a watch or cellphone while down there, but I think it was about 45 min drive. With the sand on Wednesday, if I remember correctly, it took one and a half hours. It was quite the heavy load. Although, Thursday’s load wasn’t light.

Thursday, we loaded up 25 100lb bags of cement, a cement mixer, and 20 people. On this day, I actually arrived late because of a little adventure, but that’s another story. During that time, they had back filled the trenches and stretched the wires vertically, so they were taut. Next, was tar paper and chicken wire around the whole structure. They also erected the window and door that I had helped Gary make on Monday. Next was putting cement mud against the side walls. This took the rest of the day and most of Friday.

Friday was spent finishing up the mud and also adding plywood. When we realized that we wouldn’t be able to finish mudding all the way up the wall, due to time constraints, and it was decided that plywood would be used on the upper half. Also, Tim did some electrical work so they would have two lights and a plug. That pretty much sums it up and I’ve got a slide show uploaded now. Just click the picture below.

cheers!

Ok, I’m finally getting around to writing something about my trip. This post won’t have pictures, but there will be plenty to come. This is mostly to give you an overview of what happened down there and why there. This the fifth trip down there from my church, but my first. Normally, it is a youth group mission trip. But this time it turned into a mostly young adult/youth group. The destination is Pan American Health Services. They run an “orphanage” that caters to abused and malnourished children. They also help the underprivileged get an education. In the past the group has built and improved a casita, basically the home for the babies and young ones. They’ve also constructed a kitchen for visitors to use and poured lots of concrete for walkways. On this trip, besides me, there were 4 youth, 6 young adults and 6 adults.

We left home on the 13th and flew out a little after midnight on Valentines. We flew to El Salvador and then on to San Pedro Sula, Honduras. There we boarded a bus, grabbed some food and then headed up to Peña Blanca. That gets us there and instead of giving you a day by day I’ll explain generally what happened. We spent quite a bit of time hanging out with the kids and playing games when not working. For work, we were painting steel so that it wouldn’t rust away. Another project we picked up was building a home for a family in one of the mountain villages. A lot more on that later. We also took a day to go see Copán. We flew back on the 24th and arrived back in town at about 4:30 in the morning on the 25th.

I intend to put up quite a bit more especially about the house building project and pics of the kids.  I couldn’t wait any longer to get something up, however. So now you’ve read the teaser.

cheers!

So, I’m super excited today. I got new batteries and charger for my camera and … I finished up my classwork. If everything goes as planned, I will be getting my degree this spring. I have to write some letters and say pretty please to the important people at PUC and hopefully they say, “Good job.”

Another reason is that I’m leaving for Honduras Wednesday night. We are leaving from up here Wednesday evening and then flying out of San Francisco at 12 somthin’ in the morning. This is the first time I’ve ever flown internationally, so, really the first time through foreign customs. I’ll be down there for 10 days.

Oh, I have to grow my beard out, too. Made a bet with a guy that if I would grow it out, he would shave his. Now he hasn’t shaved his since his 20s and his wife has never seen him clean-shaven. So, even though I’m not real thrilled at the prospect, I’m taking one for the team. I wonder if I’ll look just like my dad…

Well that’s it for now. It’s been an awesome day. I got new stuff. Going on a trip. And God’s taken care of my finances, which I knew he would, but, argh!, its so hard to let go.

cheers!

So, a friend mentioned in a blog post this statement.

The most basic of emotional needs in life: To know we matter and are important enough to have someone else care.

I think this is probably one of the best definitions of what it means to be loved. And I don’t mean the romantic love; I’m talking about the true love that can only come from God.

I’ve only really been completely overwhelmed by the power of the sacrifice given on the cross a couple times. The first time was at a Dallas Holm concert, probably when I was in junior high. He performed Rise Again with a slide show. The second time was more recent, when I was still in college. Nicole Nordeman came and did a concert and for some reason, hearing her perform the song Why live really brought it to a whole new level for me. I remember having to blink back the tears when she hit that last section. I had loved that song before, but that time it totally hit me square in the face.

To bring this back around, it was at those times that I really felt that I mattered to God and He cared about me. “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13).” I don’t care what love language speaks to you the most, this trumps them all. How much more is this when it is God incarnate?

I normally don’t post lyrics, I think it’s kind of lame to do it regularly, but I do want to share the song that made me most feel the love of my god recently.

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Why – Nicole Nordeman

We rode into town the other day
Just me and my Daddy
He said I’d finally reached that age
And I could ride next to him on a horse
That of course was not quite as wide
We heard a crowd of people shouting
And so we stopped to find out why
And there was that man
That my dad said he loved
But today there was fear in his eyes

So I said “Daddy, why are they screaming?
Why are the faces of some of them beaming?
Why is He dressed in that bright purple robe?
I’ll bet that crown hurts Him more than He shows
Daddy, please can’t you do something?
He looks as though He’s gonna cry
you said he was stronger than all of those guys
Daddy, please tell me why
Why does everyone want him to die?”

Later that day the sky grew cloudy
And Daddy said I should go inside
Somehow he knew things would get stormy
Boy was he right
But I could not keep from wondering
If there was something he had to hide

So after he left I had to find out
I was not afraid of getting lost
So I followed the crowds
To a hill where I knew men had been killed
And I heard a voice come from the cross

And it said, “Father, why are they screaming?
Why are the faces of some of them beaming?
Why are they casting their lots for My robe?
This crown of thorns hurts Me more than it shows
Father, please can’t You do something?
I know that You must hear My cry
I thought I could handle the cross of this size
Father, remind Me why
Why does everyone want Me to die?
When will I understand why?”

“My precious Son, I hear them screaming
I’m watching the face of the enemy beaming
But soon I will clothe You in robes of My own
Jesus, this hurts Me much more than You know
But this dark hour I must do nothing
Though I’ve heard Your unbearable cry
The power in Your blood destroys all of the lies
Soon You’ll see past their unmerciful eyes
Look there below, see the child
Trembling by her father’s side
Now I can tell You why
She is why You must die”

I should be sleeping, but I feel that I should write this down before I put it off again. I was reading a friend’s blog and she posted a story about God’s providence when finances get tight. This happened to me recently, too. I checked my bank account just before leaving home and found out it was really low. I also remembered that there were some charges that hadn’t posted yet. This really hit me while I was at the gas station filling up. I was getting stressed out as much as possible for me when I suddenly remembered that I had a check in my wallet for a random job I had done the previous weekend. For some reason, a church member had contacted me about fixing some satellite issues. I promptly felt quite relieved and was able to enjoy the evening without worries. Quite a bit of money that I was expecting came in the next day, so I didn’t actually need that check. You can totally chock that up to just another of life’s coincidences, but I don’t believe in those that much. I’m pretty sure it was God just reminding me that even before I think I need to worry about something, He’s already provided the solution or at least started the snowball rolling.