More pictures here, one album of a birthday party, and another of Rachel teaching Alba to read. Sorry they`re dark - there`s no light inside. Click herefor the birthday party, and here for Alba and the rest of the gang at Santito`s house.
It’s been raining for days here, and the roads that go up and down the mountain are sometimes closed, so we’re on our own little island. Things like rain and heat have not yet been driven from these parts by the airconditioners, and suddenly they are forces to be reckoned with. The river becomes a raging torrent and rises over its banks to attack all life before it. Landslides occupy the road, and fallen trees assault our supply lines of fuel and water.
But that’s only here. A few hundred miles away, down South, the dry season begins. There, it has been decided that there will be no rain for months. All green life dies, and one can only hope that the cows will live through and that there will be enough corn for the whole family to eat until April brings the new rains.
The Weather lives here. People still speak of hurricane Mitch with reverence. The power fueled the rivers to swallow houses, bridges, farms, cities. Tens of thousands of people were washed away. One of twenty requirements at the Kindergarten here is that in addition to letters, numbers, and Jesus, all children will learn about Natural Disasters. As Ramirez puts the walls on his house, he shows me the screw-nails he has bought. “Mitch wll not get these.” Santitos stands by the house he built by the river and tells me the story of Mitch. “My wife was afraid. But I am brave.”
The Weather takes their new seeds, knocks down their corn, drowns or fries their animals, and brutalizes their lives.
What am I to think of this? Tempted though I may be to ascribe strength to the weather, I know that it has no personality, it is not a god. It is subject to Yahweh, the Lord. He wields the weather at his will, and with His might. The Psalms tell us of the stormy power of His presence, and Jesus shows the storm-calming power of peace.
That is an answer I am content with, but I must say that it makes me uncomfortable. Why, God? Why bring them into poverty, grow them up malnourished, make them work someone else’s land to survive, send a disease, and wipe them out with a storm? Why all these plagues?
I know that you discipline your people, but this seems too much. These men are Job! They live their lives with love – when they eat beans, they make me eat chicken. When they serve me orange juice, I see them secretly watering it down for themselves. They live their lives with loyalty - at the end of each blighted day they cast an eye towards the Promised Land – the good ol` USA, sigh, and say “No. I must stay with my wife, my children, my father, my mother. They need me.” The live their lives for you – they thank you for the crops, they praise you for their children, and they cry for you in the church.
I cannot fix this, Lord Jesus. Rachel and I spend days tutoring Alba and trying to teach Meiner to walk. He is four, malnourished, and obviously mentally damaged in the realm of self-balance. We will spend this Christmas with Donya Nativa, who coughs and coughs and cries out to you with every breath she has to spare. This is wrong, very wrong.
You have made me a warrior in your kingdom, but I feel so weak. You’ve given me dominion over the earth, and it swallows me. My heart retreats daily from the fight - I don’t know who to fight anymore! Point us where you want us, and lead us.
If I cry with the cries of Job, then put me in my place. There is none beside You, and we live and die knowing little of your world.
But if I cry with the cries of Moses, and David, and Isaiah, then answer, oh God! Bring justice, rescue your people and lead to victory! The lips that want to bring forth your praises are tormented with sickness, and the wind drinks up the hymns of your children.
Rachel loves and teaches a small girl named Alba Luz, who lives in a small dirtfloor house with her family. As her father walks the miles up the mountainside to plant the beans, and as her younger brother drags himself across the floor, she works hard to learn the things that she cannot know, and about the things that she cannot have. Her name means “Dawning Light.”
How long, Lord Jesus?
We took a bunch of pictures for a kindergarten graduation on our digital camera, and posted them at ofoto. Here´s the link if you want to see them. http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=aj662wp.iujr7op&x=0&y=-rorq66 . Also, Here´s some pics I took of my friends fishing in the river out back. http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=aj662wp.q5e8vvp&x=0&y=-mf1qd4