French Fries for the team from the hotel restaurant… 640 Limpiras; 1 bag of sweet bread… 5 limpiras; 1 home made rake…. 1 Limpira (of materials); 15 people hearing the Gospel and 3 prayers of Salvation…. Priceless…

Today has been a day of answered prayer and Divine appointments. As we listened to the story of Ramon the future administrator of the Casa Hogar Vidas (the guy in the previous entry) we really got to understand how big of an impact this will have in the lives of the AIDS victims. Ramon’s story is one of powerful conversion. His life was so miserable that he was going kill himself and his children because they also are infected. While in this depression he met the pastor of the Church in Choluteca. He heard the Gospel and accepted Jesus. He is so full of joy and hope and power now!

A divine appointment awaited us on the road back to Ciudad Nueva from Casa Hogar. The special police had set up a check point and were stopping cars looking for… something to help the problems go away. Ian the English missionary who will be overseeing Casa Hogar was driving in front of us. His tag expired yesterday so he was stopped and his car was impounded. Our bus was a few minutes behind so we stopped while they were talking to him and inspecting his car. A few of our translators and Josue got down to help talk with the police while we pulled ahead in the checkpoint and waited. After close to twenty minutes and at least one visit from a policeman we decided we needed to pray for the situation. We asked God to help Ian and to accomplish His work. After agreeing in Prayer we looked up and soon after the Policemen closed the hood on Ian car and the Translators began hugging one another. The policemen had lost interest and told Ian to get a new tag in the city! Thank you God!!

After returning to Ciudad Nueva from Casa Hogar we were surprised and encouraged because in our absence someone had moved all the playground equipment from the Center to the work site. This was such a blessing because we were unable to work on the project in the morning, and moving the pieces was going to be very difficult. We were able to make a lot of visible progress on the playground in the afternoon. We are hopeful that we can finish in the morning if we get an early start.

While the men were working on the playground, the women had a change to go visit more home. These were families of children who are candidates to be in the malnutrition center. We did it the day before where the culture and expectation took us off guard. Today, Kristin was not feeling well, so I (Anne) being ill-prepared felt stretched to share during the visits. But God was gracious and when it came time to share the gospel, Kristin felt better and did an amazing job. We lead a mother and daughter to Christ with the help of Leon, a staff at the Center and our translator, Hector. The second house we visited was of a 70 year old woman who has a mentally and physically handicapped 35 year old son, who she takes care of all by herself. The church has helped and visited her many time before. Upon this visit, Leon shared the Gospel with her and she accepted Christ. We had an opportunity to share and also pray for her and her son during our visit. She has been an amazing example to mothers here. Even her sister told her, the only thing you still need is Christ. And today we shared in her joy of having Christ in her life. Dave also got to share the Gospel with two of the workmen at the playground. He has follow-ups with them tomorrow. Johnny, one of the Hondurans, also shared the Gospel with one of the workmen while shoveling dirt. These were high points of the day. God even showed mercy and answered my (Russs) prayer for shade (a cloud!) and a breeze.

After work, we went to dinner at Pastor Giovannis home where we also met the team from Cedar Creek, Ohio. “They had some really good hot pepper” says Russ. It was a good time to see how the mission teams are impacting Honduras in they own way. The church in Choluteca really made us feel at home. Its good to see that no matter where we are, we are surrounded by the body of Christ.

Today seemed to be a day where God’s hand was evident. We hope to see it even greater tomorrow.

Russ Caldwell
Anne LeongSon
Honduras Mission Members