(I chose to repost this memory of one of my trips to El Salvador. This is the month when a team will be visiting this same village, arriving in the country on July 17th. I will be returning in January, leading another team, but will be waiting anxiously for news of these loved ones in San Diego de Tenango.)
Where do I start to write about my recent trip to El Salvador to visit the village of San Diego de Tenango? So many memories. I find it difficult to process at this point in my journey. I felt the same after a visit to the same village last year. My brain and heart fills to capacity, and I need some time to let the joys and sorrows sink in. Our main purpose in visiting is to build relationships with the people. We do some physical labor, working with the people, but mostly we are challenged to work on relationships. Our village has had an ongoing relationship with Agros and UPC for 6 years now. But it has been the last 3 teams (July 07, January 08, and July 08) that have seen an opening up of the villagers to us. Many of our team members were now on their second visit to the village. We have one member who has visited this same village 5 times now. The villagers are beginning to trust us and seek us out during our visit. And we find commonality in the hopes, dreams, worries that we all share as humans.
I have always noticed that returning missionaries show slide after slide of people. I confess I have often found myself slightly bored, waiting for the pictures of scenery, houses, animals, flowers. But anyone with a heart for missions soon realizes that the faces of the people are the pull on the heartstrings of the caring. I give you faces from San Diego de Tenango .
Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.
No comments:
Post a Comment