A Year-12 student recalls a mission trip to Honduras building an orphanage, where a malnourished toddler and a boy who wanted his shoes changed how he sees giving. The boy died before the team left. Back home, everyday moments trigger memories of the mission and a conviction to love the vulnerable as a way to know Jesus.
Chapters
You know, it's good to tell our stories, and I was just thinking of a time and a story that I haven't told in a long time, and I'm just remembering it. And it's about when I went as a Fly and Build missionary during Year 12. We took one of the holidays and we flew down to Honduras, and when we got down there, there was an orphanage that we were working on, and we worked for 10 days. We built and we were adding on, you know, doing the next stage of building this orphanage. And as we were there, we had a team leader, and she was this beautiful young lady who was probably 10, 15 years older than me, and she was our leader, but she was also our spiritual leader, and she took us on a couple adventures, and one of the adventures we went on was to a place where they had babies, and these were babies that had been abandoned or babies that parents had died or for whatever reason these babies were there, and there was this picture that we took of her holding this one baby, and we found out while she was holding it that it wasn't actually a baby. He was nearly 2 years old, but he was so malnourished that he had barely formed, barely grown since he was born. He was about the size of maybe a 2 or 3 month old baby, and except that he is distended. His arms were really long and skinny, his stomach was bloated from the starvation, and his head was too big for his body. He was very, very sick. And she held him and then she gave him back very gently to the person there, the nurse, and And then we left and we had that photo. And so I still remember that photo and that time so well because of that photo. And that photo, you know, retold the story to me. And when we got back to the orphanage, there was a little boy who every day he would come up to me and he would point at my shoes. And I couldn't speak his language. He only spoke Portuguese. And he would point at my shoes and he would say something. And I would say, "You want my shoes?" And I would start to reach to take them off. And he would shake, "No, no, no." And then he would say something and I could never tell what he was saying. This day, there was a translator nearby. And it was just a couple days before we were leaving. And the translator came over and I said, "Can you tell me what does this boy want? He keeps pointing at my shoes, but he doesn't want my shoes." And the translator listened to the boy and he said, "Ah, he wants shoes, but they're not those shoes, not your work boots. He says the day you came here you had a different pair of shoes on and your work boots would be too heavy for him," which was true, he was a little boy, but he had no shoes. And many of these children have never had shoes and they live in cardboard boxes. And this orphanage was a dream home for them because they were going to be cared for in a way they'd never been cared for. And this little boy had seen my runners, my tennis shoes, and he was dreaming of them. You know, they would fit him perfectly, he thought. And I was so willing to give them, but what was so sad was just that morning a local man had come who ran a charity where they gave things away to people, and he had said, "You're all about to go back to America. Is there anything you'd like to leave? Particularly, we could use shoes in this range of sizes." and that was my shoes. So I had gone and got them because I hadn't been wearing them. They were a spare pair of shoes, and I gave them that morning to this gentleman who was long gone. And I had to tell this little boy, "No, I just gave them away." And it felt so sad. It felt like I could have given him those yesterday or the day before or the day before. And it's often like that in our spiritual journey. We can give things, and it's so timely to give immediately when we're asked. And in the scriptures, it actually says when you're asked for something, give, and give generously, immediately. And I think that was a good example of a time when if I could have understood what he was asking, I would have done it, but I didn't. Anyway, this spiritual leader, this young lady who was leading us, she taught us a song, and the song has again stuck with me for my whole life.
And it goes like this: Jesus, Jesus, Holy and Anointed One, Jesus, your name is like honey to my lips, your spirit like water to my soul. Your word is a lamp unto my feet. My Jesus, I love you, I love you.
The day we left, as we were having our final worship, we got news about that boy. He had passed away the day before. In that picture is so emblazoned in my mind now because that was the last memory anyone really has of that child other than the nurse who cared for him until the day that he died. We were the last people to really notice him and offer him, um, well, hope for him and pray for him. And when I got back to America and I'm standing in line one day at the cafeteria, the kid behind me, some, I don't know, 2 or 3 spots behind me, he goes, oh, This line is so slow, I'm starving. And something just snapped inside of my head, and I spun around and I said, you're not starving, you don't even know what starving means. And he's like, whoa, dude, what's wrong? And I said, um, yeah, sorry. And I just had to think about it myself and told him about going to Honduras and stuff. And I've thought about that a lot since then. That's called reverse culture shock, when you come back from a place and the culture you've been in has so affected you that you almost wish you could be there because you made a difference when you were there. And being back home, you feel like we're taking everything for granted. But the truth is you can make a difference where you are today, right now, just by caring for particularly the children around you, but anyone with a need because we're all children of God. And so I would invite you as you see those around you to think to yourself of Jesus, to think of that song, Jesus, You are the honey to my lips, you are like water to my soul.
Your word is like honey to my lips, your spirit like water to my soul. Your word is a lamp unto my feet. My Jesus, I love you. I love you.
And Jesus calls us to go and love others. That's what it is to be known and to know him, is to be one who loves his children. And in fact, he says that's how he'll know who are his at the end of time, if you have shown love to the unlovely. Thank you.
