Saturday, March 2nd, 2019
Today was an exciting day for the SOVA Mountain Medical Team, as we had fourteen team members travel from four different states to meet in Miami to begin our week long adventure serving various communities in rural Honduras. Our team is a bit unique as we come from all over the east coast, and many of us did not know each other prior to our arrival at Miami airport. After brief introductions, we were off to board our flight.
The next leg of our journey consisted of a 1.5 hour bus ride that became a 3 hour bus ride due to traffic. However, this gave us an opportunity to marvel at the logistics of a Honduran traffic jam, where a two-lane road miraculously expanded into a six-lane road, complete with a motorcycle lane running up the middle. The delay also gave our team a chance to start bonding and getting to know each other, an activity that we continued throughout dinner at the Friends of Barnabas compound. We are now are safely settled in at the compound for the night to rest and prepare for the week to come.
As one team member so wisely commented, we might be a hastily-thrown-together, rag-tag team of fourteen vastly different members from all walks of life....but so were the Twelve Disciples. We all know what incredible works God used them to complete, and we can't wait to see what He has planned for us in the week to come.
~Gabbi Beck
Sunday, March 3rd 2019
"Whoever believes in Me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them."
John 7:38 was the theme of our team's first full day here in Honduras. We started off the day by heading to Pulhapanzak waterfall to spend some time together as a team and enjoy the incredible beauty that surrounds us. We were astounded by the view of the waterfall and the rainbows created by the mist below, reminding us of God's love and promises. The morning was also a great reminder of our purpose here--to allow the streams of living water to flow from us into the hearts and lives all of the people we encounter over the next five days.
Our afternoon was spent preparing for the five clinic days to come. Tomorrow, we head up into the mountains to the tiny village of Loma Larga, where all of the community's water comes from a fountain and the nearest access to healthcare is a two-hour walk away. This afternoon's activities included packing up donations of clothes and food, and sorting thousands of Tums (used as a calcium supplement), vitamins, and Tylenol to be distributed over the next few days. Amid good-natured gripes about the hours spent completing the tedious task of sorting the pills, we reminded ourselves that we were packing a little bit of God's love into each little bag of pills, and that the pills will become just one of many tools we will use over the next few days to show His love to our patients.
We also spent some time this afternoon celebrating one of our amazing team member's birthdays....Happy Birthday Lynn!!
After another delicious Honduran dinner, we all sat down together for the Commitment Ceremony. We talked a little bit about the community that we will be serving tomorrow and were then given beautiful wooden crosses with a really neat back-story. Our team leader Kristy's father, who many of you reading this probably know personally to be a very special man, has been making wooden cross necklaces for much of his life. He wears a cross every day, and when someone compliments his cross or impacts his life in some other way, he gives them the necklace to keep for themselves, assuring them that he will make another. He also gives them out to other people in his life with the instructions to do the same. He sent a wooden cross for each member of our team to give to someone who really impacts us this week. Having these crosses to give out will be a great reminder of God's love for the people we serve. It is also a great reminder to us to constantly be looking for God in others. While Kristy's father can't be with us in person this week, we are all amazed by how many lives he has touched and continues to touch all over the world, from his own home. God's living water is certainly flowing out of him and reaching people worldwide.
I hope that this can be reminder to all of you that you, too, can have an impact from right where you are. Please take some time to pray for our team as we head off into the communities for the first time tomorrow. I'm sure that we will all have amazing stories of the ways God's living water is flowing in this little community to share when we return.
~Gabbi Beck
