Not for the faint of heart!

Well, our trip to Honduras was wonderful and uneventful until we decided to go home! We left town around 9am because we wanted to be home mid-afternoon. It was only a 5 hour drive, so we thought 9 sounded like a good time to leave. We decided to take the outside road around the center of town because in town the roads were a maze of narrow one ways. As we turned down the road marked as leading to the main highway, it appeared that a bridge had washed out. No problem for Central Americans, although! We watched a small truck approaching, carefully navigating the stream bed, and followed the path he took! Yikes!

We made it to the highway and a short 10 minutes later we were at the border between Honduras and Guatemala. There we learned that the Guatemalan teachers, many of whom have not been paid in 3 - 4 months, had formed a blockade at the border crossing and were not going to let any traffic through until 1.

Okay. This is not the first blockade we've experienced here, so, we decided to turn around and go back to Copan and hang out for a few hours and try again at 1. When we returned at 1, nothing had changed. I went up to the teachers to try and find out some details. This is how it went - I asked, "who was in charge?" and they said, "no one." I asked, "when they were going to take down the blockade?" and they said, "they didn't know." I asked, "who would know?" and they said, "they didn't know, maybe the government." Oh boy!

We learned after from one of the border patrolmen that they were expecting things to open up around 4pm, and so our afternoon of waiting in the screaming heat began. Hope and Karey played crib and Rocky and I tried to nap - a tough accomplishment when you are sweating hot. Around 3:30 we noticed a bunch of rapid movement amongst those right at the border and then the immigration office opened up and suddenly, the blockade was down and we were moving! Yippee! We had quite a bit of traffic to work through, but it sure could have been worse. A short 6 1/2 hours after our planned departure, we were off!

Once we got onto the part of the highway that takes us to Tactic, the rain started. It was already getting dark and there was an unusual amount of traffic on the road (we learned later that a big transport truck had been in an accident down the other highway and blocked traffic for 8hours). As the rain continued to pour down, the roads became a little sketchy. Along the highway to Tactic they have trouble with massive mudslides and areas of the road simply sinking away. There are probably about 10 sections where it is becoming fairly dangerous to drive. The photo below is just one example of how the highway simply washes away. These sections are not marked really well and traffic is expected to simply figure out how to keep moving. I am thankful that we drive this road fairly often and know where the "watch" areas are.

So, if you can picture this: It is dark and the rain is pouring down. Cars and trucks have been waiting for many hours to get moving and now that they are, the traffic is so dense it is only creeping along. Cars are pulling out to pass even when they cannot actually see ahead, hoping to get by the big trucks. The low areas of the road are filled with water and it is a challenge to maintain your speed and control as you literally part the red sea as you drive through!
Driving in this country is not for the faint of heart!
Nor is serving the Lord.
I finished reading Radical and I am more convinced than ever that serving the Lord, really serving Him and surrendering our lives to Him, is not for the faint of heart. When we look at the world with our physical eyes we see so many obstacles. We see rivers to cross where there are no bridges, borders to cross where there is opposition, and paths to follow where the ground has given away. It is exactly for these reasons that our walk with the Lord is called a faith journey. It takes faith to continue moving forward when you do not know exactly where you are going or what you will encounter when you get there. If, although, we are really going to impact this world with the Gospel for the glory of the the Lord, then we are going to have to start living our lives differently...wait...let me rephrase that...I am going to have to start living my life differently. That means I need to brave and courageous, not because of anything that I bring to the table, but because of everything my God brings!
David, when facing Goliath, knew it was not his small stone that was going to win the battle, but it was the Lord Almighty.
In the same way, it is not you and me that are going to win souls for the Lord; it is us, like David, being willing to surrender to the Lord, no matter the situation or cost, so that His glory can be made known through us that will draw others into the Kingdom.
Definitely not for the faint of heart!
Bless you,
Karren