Last week we had one “tourist day” squeezed in between the end of the leaders’ conference and the start of the Regional Conference with all the YWAM staff from Central America and Mexico. After visiting Apoyo Lagoon, we headed to the colonial city of Granada.

I love history and architecture and Granada did not disappoint. Founded in 1524, it was the first city in mainland America. It has both Spanish and Moorish influence in the architecture and design. Granada was a thriving port located on the massive Lake Nicaragua, which provided trade to the Atlantic through a river. It also left the city vulnerable to pirate attacks as the pirates could sail in from the Caribbean, down the river, through the lake and to Granada. I thought the pirate thing was pretty cool!

We spent a few hours walking around, eating lunch, and checking out the Lake. The kids were very impressed with Lake Nicaragua…it’s the 20th largest lake in the world and the whole country of El Salvador could fit inside! If you are ever in Nicaragua, you’ve got to check out Granada!

We visited the chocolate factory where we saw how the cacao plant is crushed and made into chocolate.

Beautiful churches were all throughout the city.

Inside one of the churches.

So much of the Spanish Colonial influence was seen in the churches, sculptures, and plazas around the city.

The sidestreets had colorful little cafes and restaurants.

The place we ate lunch had this flower garden.

Checking out the street map…how do we get to the lake???

Lake Nicaragua

Central America is an absolutely beautiful part of the world, and Nicaragua is no exception. While we were there, we visited the nearby Apoyo Lagoon or Laguna de Apoyo. Imagine a huge volcano that imploded in on itself thousands of years ago and then filled with water. That is what happened when the Apoyo Volcano erupted. The eruption created a thermally vented warm, clear, and blue body of water in the crater of a volcano. Lush forests slope down into the water, and the area is home to all kinds of birds and animals. We only had time for a quick stop and the day was cloudy, but it was well worth it to see this natural wonder of Nicaragua.

We survived our tri-country road trip to Nicaragua and we had a fun time doing it! The kids were absolutely wonderful in the car thanks to snacks and electronic devices. The trip there and back was fairly uneventful with the exception of Jon getting stung by a bee five minutes into the trip, Honduran roads filled with potholes, immigration officials on lunchbreak, and a policeman who wanted a few bucks in exchange for giving Jon’s license back. It took us about 14 hours to get there counting border crossings, breaks for meals, and police checkpoints. Coming home we made it in 12 hours thanks to Jon finding a short-cut. The road was only semi-paved but it did shave some time off of our trip.

The conference itself was a great experience too. We went to the leaders’ conference the first few days, and then the staff conference started with leaders and staff from all the YWAM bases in Central America and Mexico. It was a great time to praise God and pray together, hear about current trends in missions, and network with others who are working in the region. The kids had the opportunity to be a part of a kids’ program the whole time and they had an absolute blast. There were some tears shed (by Tori, of course) when it was time to say good-bye.

We also got to do the tourist thing, so stay tuned for more posts with pictures of the fun stuff we got to see. Thank you all for your prayers…our time in Nicaragua was great!

Crossing the river into Honduras…hasta luego El Salvador!

Welcome to Honduras!

In Nicaragua…finally!

Beautiful view out the window on the way to Diriamba.

The hotel where we stayed…yes there is a tree in the middle.

The kids playing on the playground at the conference center.

The hotel had several pet birds…the bird lover (Tori) was in heaven.

Tori fell in love with this bird because it talked to her. We’ve had constant requests for “a bird like Rosa, please” since we’ve returned home.

Back to El Salvador…home sweet home!

Preparations are underway for Operation Roadtrip 2012. We are heading to Nicaragua for the YWAM Regional Conference for all the missionaries working in Mexico and Central America. This will definitely be the longest car trip our kids have taken in awhile. Back in 2009 we travelled across a big chunk of the U.S. , but we all seemed to have blocked that out. Any major trips since that time have involved airplanes. As you can imagine, this trip is causing quite a bit of dread excitement around our house

The trip will take us from San Salvador, El Salvador to Diriamba, Nicaragua. Diriamba is located past Managua, somewhere around Granada. Mileage wise, it’s about the distance of driving across Pennsylvania. We’re not sure how many hours it will take us as we will be driving across three countries and dealing with two border crossings. We have the potential of facing “gringo pricing” immigration fees and potentially corrupt police checkpoints. Not to mention a lack of rest stops, cows in the road, and driving in a vehicle that does not have a DVD player. Suddenly, the PA Turnpike isn’t looking so bad.

But we will have a great adventure, I am sure. Tori is beyond thrilled that she is getting two more stamps in her passport this week and we are all excited to see Honduras and Nicaragua up close.  Not to mention the fact that we get to spend a week in Nicaragua eating the food and checking out the tourist sites.

We ask for your prayers as we travel, and as we spend time this week praying, meeting, and networking with our co-workers from Mexico and Central America. Pray that God would give us new strategies for reaching the youth of these nations. This region is one of the most violent in the world and all of us face the issues that come with poverty, gangs, and drugs. Thank you for your prayers…now back to packing!

Giving a Mother’s Day gift to a prostitute has a way of making me think long and hard about a lot of things.

Like how grateful I am, and how helpless I feel, and how I wish every mother could be home with her child and not selling her body on the street corner.

Today is Mother’s Day in El Salvador, so last night we gave Mother’s Day cards and a snack to our friends who work on the streets to support their children. Their reasons vary, but all of them agree that they can’t make that much money, that fast, at a time when they aren’t getting their kids to school or helping them with their homework. I think every working mother can appreciate their struggle.

The chances of these women ever leaving the streets are slim to none. Once a woman becomes involved in this lifestyle it’s incredibly difficult to get out of it. It damages her mind, her body, and her soul. There are some stories of hope, some stories of women who have made it out.  Right now there is one woman considering taking steps to get out. Please pray for her. But the odds are not in these women’s favor.

But we care about them anyway, without an agenda. We simply want these moms to know that they are valuable, and that they matter. Tears rolled down their cheeks as we encouraged them to continue to care for their children, and as we prayed for God to guard their lives each night as they stand on the corner.

I am grateful to God for the blessings in my life. The childhood I had, the country I was born in, the opportunities I have had for an education, and the ability I have to work in a fullfilling job. It’s easy for me to forget how many woman around the world tonight will go to the street corner again to make the money they can in the hope of giving their kids a chance. Some of them may love the extra money, some of them may not believe there is another way, some of them may be forced by a pimp or a boyfriend to stand on that street corner. But all of them are women, they are mothers. Like me. Like you.

So I want to say to all the mothers on the street corner tonight, “Your life matters.”

“Is it hard to live in a foreign country?”

This was the last question that my kids were answering as they responded to a letter from a Sunday School class in Maryland last week. The letter asked some questions about life as a missionary.  Tori and Ian discussed them, and Tori wrote down the answers. But this one had them stumped. They weren’t even sure which “foreign” country the letter was referring to. I explained it to them and after a lot of thinking and a little confusion, they finally settled on answering that they missed their friends and family in the U.S.

This conversation made me realize that my kids have made a transition into becoming full-fledged Third Culture Kids. TCKs.  They were born in the U.S.A., but they are growing up in El Salvador. They speak two languages, and they go to an international school. They have friends from all over the world, and they are very comfortable interacting with people from other cultures. They love to travel. El Salvador is far closer to “home” for them than the United States. Their culture is different from ours. They live in a “third culture” that is not completely that of their parents, nor completely that of their host country. It is unique, it is their own.

I think the experience is making them amazing individuals. Their lives are enriched because they can easily relate to other people, regardless of their culture. They are bi-lingual without an accent in either language. The world is open to them, and even now they have a sense of that. I’m jealous of them in many ways.

But many TCKs struggle with lingering questions about home, putting down roots, and cultural identification as they enter adulthood. I found this video on another missionary blog and it seems to be making the rounds on the internet. It gave me a lot to think about in terms of what my children will face as they grow into adulthood. If you are a TCK, know a TCK, or are raising a TCK I think you will find it worth checking out.

We’ve got a new project going on in El Salvador! We recently signed an agreement with the government to open two new computer labs. These labs will be opened in two centers for orphaned, abused, and abandoned children. A year ago, thanks to generous donors, we opened a lab in the CISNA boys’ center. This center has been a huge success as the boys have the opportunity to learn a marketable job skill and interact with healthy adult role models. Due to the success of this project, the government wanted to work with us to help other kids at risk. We are excited to be working with them on this project!

One of the computer labs will be in a center for girls, and the other in a center with both boys and girls. All of these children are required to leave the centers at the age of 18. Many of them struggle to make it on their own, and many of them lack job skills. As a result, they often end up living on the streets or joining a gang. Through computer classes, they can learn skills to find a job and provide for themselves.

In order to open these centers, we need to buy 20 computer workstations. Each workstation costs $500 and includes a computer, monitor, mouse, keyboard, speakers, chair, and a desk (check out the picture below). Our hope is to raise the needed $10,000 over the next month so that we can get these computer classes started as soon as possible!

We need your help to open these computer labs! A donation towards a computer workstation is a tangible way that you can touch the life of a child in El Salvador. Providing these kids with a computer education, and healthy interaction with adults can make all the difference in the world for them! Please pray with us that we will receive the funding that we need, and please pray for the lives of the kids who will be touched through this project.

Any donation that you make towards our Technology for Kids Fund goes directly to benefit the children in these centers. Your donation is tax-deductible and 100% of your donation will be used for this project. There are two ways that you can donate. You can donate securely online right now by going here or you can send a donation to our sending church, Discovery Christian Church at this address:

Mission to El Salvador

c/o Discovery Christian Church

P.O. Box 1964

Cranberry Township, PA  16066

Please indicate that your donation is going to the Technology for Kids Fund. Thank you so much for partnering with us to make a difference for kids in El Salvador!

Each workstation donated offers a child in El Salvador an oportunity for a better future.

Yesterday afternoon Ian took me on a guided tour around his world. We rode bikes, tried to find different ways to help “ninja lego guys” survive a Tonka truck crash, and explored the garden. He showed me all of his favorite plants and kept up a steady stream of Spanglish conversation about his toys, and the dog, and his climbing tree.

After our walk, I suggested that we sit down on the terrace. He had a different idea. He sat down on the hill in our backyard right in the grass and said, “Down here is better Mommy.” I was hesitant because the grass in El Salvador is really sharp (weird, I know…just how it is) but I agreed.

Ian was right. It was better. From our view on the grass we could look right up into the trees and see the birds flying back and forth. There were yellow and brown birds, squirrels, and butterflies. The big leaves and bright flowers of the tropical plants around our house were at eye level, and we had the perfect view to watch the dusk roll in.

The longer we sat, the more birds we saw. While we watched, a beautiful torogoz swooped over our heads and settled on a branch nearby. For all you bird fans out there, the “torogoz” is the national bird of El Salvador and is known as the Turquoise Browed Motmot. It’s a bright colored tropical bird with turquoise, yellow, and reddish feathers.

Ian was transfixed. As we watched, the bird’s yellow breast moved in and out and he sang his distinctive croaking song. He sang for a few minutes, hopped from branch to branch and flew out of sight. Ian took so much joy in that little moment, and his point of view had given us a front row seat.

If I didn’t stop and look at things the way Ian saw them, I would have missed that moment. I would have missed the shadow of the plants as evening fell, and I would have missed the torogoz’s song. I forget to do this. I forget to get down on the grass and look at things a different way. I forget that my way is not the only way to see the world.

As I thought about my time with my son, I realized that living in another culture is constantly about remembering that my point of view isn’t the only one.  I have so many ideas about what is “right” and “efficient” and “makes more sense.” But maybe my way doesn’t make sense at all, and I’m missing things all along the way. It takes humility, and a desire to learn, to begin to understand someone else’s point of view…it’s hard work. Sometimes I have to get down low, to places I really don’t want to go, to understand how someone else thinks.

But it’s so worth it. There is so much beauty in the world that I will never understand from my own point of view. There are so many things to experience and learn when I let someone else show me what they think is valuable and beautiful and worth doing.

My life in El Salvador is a gift. It is hard work, but it is a gift. I daily have the opportunity to do this. I daily have the challenge to think on someone else’s terms, I daily have the task of laying my own rights aside for the privilege of entering into someone else’s world. To be honest, most of the time I don’t want to do it!

But the struggle is changing me. Profoundly. God is making me into someone new through my life here, because this daily challenge leads me to Him again and again. It leads me to ask for his help, and to walk with Him through the frustrations, and annoyances, and stresses, and fears. The truth is, I am the one who is most changed by my life in El Salvador. God is making me more like Him and the greatest gift of all is the opportunity to be led by God into seeing things from His point of view.

I didn’t have a camera handy…but I did find this picture of a torogoz.

Jon wanted to share some thoughts on an experience he had last week. In his words…

Mid-morning on Friday, I was on my way to the immigration office for our yearly residency renewal, when I received a phone call asking for my help. It was someone from one of our ministry sites calling to tell me that four boys had run away. Three of them had lived on the street before, but one was pressured into going along. It is a bad situation for any boy to be on the street, but the fourth boy caused particular concern. The streets of San Salvador are rough, and this boy had no experience being out there alone. “Jon, please look out for Pedro *”, they asked.  Because of our work on the streets, and the familiarity of my red truck to Pedro, they thought I might be able to find him while I was out.

The thing is Pedro has never lived on the street before. He has never been forced to survive in the world of drugs, alcohol, sniffing glue, gangs, and crimes. I promised to look for him, told the rest of our staff, and began praying that he would be found. 

I met Danielle and the kids at immigration and spent a lot of time sitting and waiting for everything to be processed to renew our visas. During this time, thoughts of Pedro kept running through my head. I spent time praying for him…for his safety and his survival. Finally we got our residency renewed for another year (thank God!) and we left immigration. The first thing I did was check-in to see if Pedro had been found.  He hadn’t been.

Three people had spent the whole day looking all around the city and they hadn’t seen any signs of Pedro, or the three other missing boys. Then I was asked to be part of a team to go out on Friday night to search for and rescue this lost boy. I agreed.

A small team of five people, including me, set out around 7:30 and spent hours driving around the city in all the areas where we knew the other three boys had spent time when they lived on the street. I found myself in the absolutely worst areas of San Salvador. We were in the “red light” areas, we saw drug deals going down, we were in and out of abandoned buildings where some of San Salvador’s most violent people live and work.

That’s when we were directed to a literal hole in the wall. The “hole house” was an abandoned factory behind a wall that could only be reached by climbing through the hole in the wall. We heard from those on the streets that many boys lived in the abandoned factory, but it was a very dangerous situation. We spotted some patrolling miliary soldiers, and four of them went with us into the house to try to find some traces of Pedro.

We also received some help from some others who live in that zone. They recognized me personally, or recognized my truck from our feeding program. We really needed the extra help as it was now approaching 11:30 and we had been searching four hours for Pedro.

Then I saw him walking down the street toward us. Embarassed and ashamed, he approached us with his head down. We loved on him and encouraged him. Miraculously, and thanks to God, Pedro was okay. He was alive and unharmed. He didn’t try drugs, or smoking, or sniffing glue. We got him some food and brought him back safe and sound to where he belonged.

As I was driving home, I found myself thinking about the parable of The Lost Sheep that Jesus told. In the parable, the shepherd has 100 sheep in his care. One day, one of them was lost. He left the 99 other sheep to go in search of his one lost sheep.

This story came alive to me. It didn’t matter that I had my own 2 kids at home, or that many other kids were safely off the street. Those “100″ didn’t matter to me at that moment. All that mattered was that we find this one lost sheep. It didn’t matter that it was a long night, and that I was putting myself in danger. It only mattered that the one made it safely home.

It reminded me that at one point in our lives all of us are lost. God, our Shepherd, searches for us. He looks for us and will stop at nothing to find us and bring us back to Him…back to the safe place.

Thank you God for searching for us and while we were sinners, you sent your only son, Jesus Christ, to die for us and to bring us back to you.

 Thank you, God,  for helping us find this lost boy and bringing us all back to safety.

 *Name has been changed to protect privacy.

Last night we had an invasion at our house. An insect invasion.

The sun was setting and we were finishing our dinner ,just minding our own business, when we noticed a bug or two buzzing around. They were skinny little harmless bugs. One by one they buzzed in through the open windows. Then more came…and more…and more. It was like a scene from an Alfred Hitchcock movie. They were in our food, stuck in our hair, and clinging to the lights. They didn’t bite, they didn’t sting but they covered everything in a matter of minutes.

Let me tell you, nothing brings a family together like an insect invasion! We all scrambled to finish our dinners, get the food off the table, and close the windows. The next thing we knew, various other bugs were joining the party. Locusts, ants, spiders, and flies. The kids were screaming and we were all diving for cover.

Then it was time to break out the big guns. Jon got the electric tennis racket  bug killer. Yup, someone invented a tennis racket that kills bugs. It is awesome. Ian joined the offensive with his butterfly net and Tori and I swatted at the bugs with anything we could get our hands on.

After about 15 minutes, our kitchen was littered with corpses. Weird bug corpses. We held the line, we reclaimed our home, we killed the bugs. And we kind of had fun doing it.

These are the moments I love. The spontaneous, teamwork, crazy times that only our family shares. Despite the grossness of the bugs, I’m grateful for the moment to laugh and tackle the invasion together. I hope that someday when our children look back on their childhood in El Salvador these kinds of moments are the ones that stick out to them.

                      Sorry it’s so blurry. It’s not easy to kill bugs and take pictures at the same time!