Garifuna, Traveling & Future Ministry

The past few months have been very full, first in late January with our trip to Belize to renew our visas, my parents (Corey) arriving just 2 days after our return from Belize, daily language school for us and homeschool for the boys, and finally traveling to the north coast to further explore Sambo Creek, a Garifuna community east of the larger northern city of La Ceiba.

Spanish class field trip to a nearby Mennonite farm.

For both Kirsten and I, we both feel we are moving along pretty good in Spanish. We have been discouraged a little with the level of Spanish we need to attain before we are involved in ministry (requirement of our organization), but we have resolved to the fact that having an advanced level of Spanish will only make our ministry stronger. With that said, we hope to be finished with our full-time Spanish school by June, but know we will continue to learn as we live and minister here. We have learned that more and more Garifuna are speaking Spanish as well. Their language is becoming a past time, especially in the more modern communities closer to the larger cities. We do, however, plan to learn Garifuna (a mix of Spanish, English, French, Arawak and African dialect Yorubu) once we are in a Garifuna community as it is spoken at times among the older generations. Knowing their language isn't so much to communicate but to earn respect by the elders and others of the community.

Worshipping together with Garifuna in Sambo Creek.

Our trip to Sambo Creek in February was very encouraging. Although we're not technically supposed to "do" ministry while in language school, ministering to the needs of others is just a by-product of who we are. We have both always been for the underdog and gravitate towards those who are overlooked and, at times, go against the grain of the culture around them. In many ways the Garifuna are counter-cultural to typical Hondurans. Most are looked down upon by the majority of the culture, so naturally we lean towards wanting to know them more than the "status-quo" culture of most of Honduras. Jesus hung out mostly with the "sinners and tax collectors" so why shouldn't we? That is where the harvest is most plentiful, so that is where we want to work, and we are blessed to have been called by God to work alongside those who Jesus called the "overlooked and oppressed." He said, "...whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me." (Matt. 25:40) We see the Lord opening doors for us, but our prayer is that we would have discernment and wisdom about how to serve and where to serve. Please pray with us about this, thank you!

"Christian," an elder in the community of
Sambo Creek, and one of the "rocks" of the
Christian community here.

Over the next several weeks we have a lot of traveling planned, something each week. This Friday we are headed to the south of the country for the first time near Tegucigalpa, the capital, for a conference with 100+ other missionaries from all around the country. This will be a great time to network with other ministries. The following week we head back to Tegucigalpa for our boys passport renewals (they are expiring). The week after that is Samana Santa (Easter week) which is the largest holiday in Honduras. The first week of April we plan to travel back to the north coast to Triunfo de la Cruz to explore some potential areas of ministry. We see the Lord opening doors for us to possibly work in this medium sized Garifuna community or in Sambo Creek. Please pray for doors to open and close as He wills and for discernment of this.

Thank you for praying for us and for those of you who support us financially. We could not be here without either. Prayer is a priority to us as it joins the Kingdom of God together and spiritual battles are won in the name of Jesus! God provides for us in ways that continually surprise us, so thank you for being a part of what God has called us to here. You are VITAL!

With love from Honduras,
Corey, Kirsten, Gavin & Garret