Will and Jared

A Letter from Jared

 

Dear Friends and Family,

 

     Throughout this summer I have had several chances to further mature myself and my relationship with God.  However, the most prominent would certainly be the mission trip to Honduras.  That week forever changed my life and the lives of the people with me. 

           

     The journey started at 3 o’clock on a Saturday morning.  As I woke up and trudged into the car, carrying my 45 lb. suitcase of medicine, suitcase of clothes, and backpack, I started to ask myself, “What had I gotten into?”  Not even one week of my summer gone and I was being whisked away to a foreign country with my dad, one of my best friends and his father, and 11 other people I had never met before.  Being a medical mission, most were nurses, a profession I had no familiarity with and also no passion to pursue.  Little did I know that traveling with complete strangers, meeting people who speak a completely different language, and helping a cause I had no clue about, actually showed what I had a passion to do in the first place.

 

     As I arrived in San Pedro Sula, from Houston, I noticed an immediate change in cultures as soon as we passed through customs.  When we walked through the doors into Honduras a sudden heat hit me and I looked up from the floor to see the blazing sun and thousands of Hondurans staring at me.  As Americans we were often spectacles; being labeled gringos was common and receiving a few menacing glares wasn’t unusual either.  However, contrary to my first impression the Hondurans at the clinic and around the city were hospitable and very welcoming.  They wanted all the help they could get and we gave all the effort that we could in order to fill their desperate needs.

 

 

     The following day, Sunday, we attended Spanish and English church services.  They both were a beautiful beginning to what would be a long and grueling week.  Each day from Monday through Friday we would wake up around 6 o’clock (8 o’clock our time) and head out to get a donut for breakfast and then jump in the van, driven by our gracious driver Javier, to arrive at La Clinica Episcopal.  My job mainly was to entertain the kids while they waited anywhere from one to seven hours in the boiling heat for an available doctor.  We used face paints, basketball, soccer (rightfully called football), coloring pages, Connect Four, and even guitar playing to amuse the kids. The kids showed unearned love to us without even understanding our language.  They behaved amazingly for people they didn’t even know, and never complained about the heat or long hours waiting for a simple check-up.  These kids underlined the values that children in the United States should be learning but in actuality are completely ignoring.

           

     The last day at the clinic, Friday, our group (headed by our two amazing doctors Dr. Richard Hogan and Dr. Marlyn Singleton) traveled to a village located in the shadow of the mountain Pico Bonito.  Here my friend Will and I met a young child that was very troubled.  The child, Brian, had seen one of his 15-year-old friends murdered a month before. He had stopped eating and was having trouble sleeping in fear of dying himself.  Through Will’s intellect and my Spanish translation we helped Brian learn about Jesus and the promise he has for us that if we believe in him and accept Him then we will never truly die, but live with Him throughout eternity.  Brian accepted God with us that night and we knew if he was the only life we touched during the whole trip, it was COMPLETELY worth it.

 

     During the whole trip and the weeks leading up to it, there had been a small thought nagging me in the back of my mind. Finally during the last two or three days I grasped its meaning.  I believe that God sent me to Honduras to realize my future and place in His plans for me.  Through the trip I found out that He wants me to become a missionary. 

    

     Thank you so much for your support and prayers because I truly believe that if you had held back, I would still be trying to snatch that thought from the back of my mind.

 

           

                                                                        Sincerely through His Love,

                                                                                    Jared Billings

The Team

La Clinica Episcopal

The medical clinic serves a local community and has been developed by Monolo and the Episcopal church.  Currently, an Episcopal Church from Texas is funding significant renovations and will visit yearly for ongoing medical missions.  They welcome our participation.  The facilities include a stocked pharmacy,  an administrater, a local physician who provides ongoing care and has been certified for long term use by the government.  The building itself inclueds a waiting area, three offices for physicians and a dentistry office with xray, dentist chair, dental instruments and a suction machine.  It is an ideal site for ongoing care for the community and others.  Don Billings, Will Hogan and Jared Billings were instrumental in caring for the crowds as they waited to receive their care.  Playing soccer, face painting,  making necklaces, coloring book projects and the occasional guitar singalong were critical to the success of the project.  Will even gave up his beloved Michigan hat to one of his favorites.

 

 

 

 

La Iglesia

Scenes from La Ceiba

Honduras Mission

Honduras was amazing.  The beauty of the ocean, lush vegetation and vibrant flowers carpeting the fields that end abruptly at the foot of steep mountains was breathtaking.  In contrast to this was the abject poverty of so many people, free roaming cattle, horses and dogs with each rib starkly visible.  We held medical clinics every day.  The people came humbly to see the doctors.  Children with parasites, skin disorders and malnutrition were the most disheartening.  We could offer treatment for the current situation, but changing basic nutrition and hygiene takes time.  I hope we will have a chance to return and build on what we started. 

 

The overarching theme as captured by others in their blogs is the sovereignty of God.  His orchestration of this mission, the interjection of God moments ongoing throughout the trip, the knowledge of his unfailing love and care for the people we saw above and beyond our abilities to minister to them spoke volumes of his encompassing love and care of all people. 

 

This was evident to me the first day at the clinic.  I was taping up the height chart which needed a little cut and paste to get the chart high enough since it was in centimeters.  I was there to “help” these people.  Without a word a woman appeared beside me to hold the chart while I fumbled with tape and scissors.  No word was spoken, but the smile in her eyes made me realize she was giving to me what I needed, as she waited for us to give her what she needed.  I was humbled by this simple gesture.  It showed me the overarching hand of God, his sovereignty, and ability to speak to us individually in any circumstance.

 

I join with the others in thanking all of you for supporting us.  I was blessed beyond measure and am humbled to be a part of your outreach to the people of Honduras.  God bless you all.

 

Sandy Griffin

Kids in the Village Episcopal

A Letter from Will

Dear friends and supporters,

           

            I had an amazing experience in Honduras, and I just wanted to tell you all some of the awesome stories and events of my trip.  First of all, I want to thank all of you for your support and prayers.  Whether or not you realize this, your prayer was essential to our trip, and I am truly grateful for all of you who helped out.  The medical mission was a complete success, though it would not have been this effective without your contribution.

            When we arrived in San Pedro Sula, I was instantly shocked by the masses of people waiting for their relatives and friends in the airport.  We later learned that whenever a relative arrives or departs from Honduras, the entire extended family is expected to wait at the airport. We then boarded the bus for La Ceiba, and I then laid eyes on what was truly going on in Honduras.

            Honduras is a very mountainous country, with its only major flat lands on the coastal regions where the port cities are located.  As we passed through the mountains, we saw glimpses of little shacks where the people lived.  Many of these “houses” were only constructed of a few boards and mud to hold them in place.  We also saw huge pineapple plantations where much of the Dole fruit is collected.  After a long three hour ride with our speedy driver Jesus (that was his name), we pulled into La Ceiba.

            The next day, we got to experience what the average Sunday would be like for a Honduran Christian. We attended two services in the morning, one in English and one in Spanish.  I am driven to say that the Spanish service was more powerful because of the realization of the widespread reach of Christianity.  As we attend services on Sunday mornings in the United States, there are people in Honduras praising the Lord in Spanish, along with people on every other continent rejoicing in their own native language.  That realization gave me a sense that I was unified with every other Christian on the earth, which was an amazing start to our week.

            Monday through Friday proved to be very challenging, as we were attacked by the heat, and still accustomed to our comfortable lifestyles in the States.  I ended up doing all types of work during the week, organizing and controlling the crowd, shadowing my father with his patients, but mostly watching the children of the families in the clinic.  Fortunately, I was able to care for the children alongside my friend Jared and his father, Don.  We had an arsenal of crafts and toys for the children, with everything from Connect 4 to face painting to mini-basketball, and I think the children had a great time while they were with us.  It was during these long hours that I had experiences that were truly personal and impossible to have unless I was in a foreign country doing missions.  I bonded with all of the children, and I can still remember their faces and their voices, which is a gift that can’t be bought for a price.  Although I know that the pictures on the last page only represent a fraction of my time in Honduras, they provide an accurate insight into my experiences and all of the fun I had during the week.

            During the week, as God impacted the lives of countless Honduran patients, he also went to work in the members of the team, including myself.  On the trip, every member came together as a group which really impacted the success of our mission.  I was fortunate enough to play guitar for our team a couple days out of the week during our daily devotional, as well as to play for the people of the village on Friday.  Doing this was certainly out of my comfort zone, but by the end of the week I didn’t feel nervous at all, and I felt peace while playing because I knew I was serving the Lord.  I grew in my relationship with the Lord during the week, which I considered to be my primary goal for the trip, along with serving the Hondurans.  My father gave a lecture on the tapestry of our sovereign God, which greatly affected me and the rest of our team.  He shared many of the “coincidences” of his life and of others’ lives, which are not really coincidences at all, but actually the work of God weaving people and places within each other.  What I found really amazing was that, during the morning before he gave his lecture, I came to the conclusion that everything happens for a reason, and there is no such thing as a coincidence.  The fact that we both came to the same conclusion on the same day only adds to my father’s case, for it was not a coincidence, but God speaking to me and to him for a reason.  As he gave his lecture, it became clear to me all of the connections that God has made between the people on our trip, and I couldn’t imagine all of them happening by chance. 

            Going into the trip, I had been asked to give my testimony on the last day of the trip.  This was alarming, because I had never given my testimony and I didn’t have a powerful story or amazing conversion to write about. I accepted Christ when I was very young, and I’ve walked a sheltered path ever since.  Because I was scheduled for the last day, I heard all but two of the testimonies of the members of our group, which were nearly all tales of a person burdened with troubles at a young age, who would grow up to overcome their past and find the Lord.  I haven’t faced any major trouble they way they did so far, and I didn’t know what to say, because my life has been radically different from the lives of the other members on the trip.  The day that I was scheduled to give my testimony, I suddenly realized that my life didn’t have to be a story with tragic beginnings that was filled with hardship.  God has sheltered me by giving me wonderful, loving, parents, a safe living environment, and a mindset to avoid the traps of the world that so many in my age group are falling into.  Because of this rare and fortunate upbringing, it is hard for me to believe that God doesn’t have something big and powerful for my life.  I know I will stumble and fall, and God may bring hardship upon me, but these roadblocks will only be a test of my resilience and of the strength of my relationship with God.

            Once again, I want to thank you all for your time and your support, and I hope you find this letter to be an answer to your prayers, because my time in Honduras truly affected me in ways I couldn’t have imagined before.

 

 

            Sincerely,

 

 

 

 

            Will Hogan

Will at the Village Episcopal