What I learned at El Ayudante

“What did you do this summer?” This is one of my all-time favorite questions. Oh the joy that fills my heart as I tell someone about El Ayudante. And I’m sure they can see the glimmer in my eyes as I go on and on about my sweet and humbling adventures.

I am an 18 year-old recent high school graduate and I now attend Baylor University in Waco, Texas. My high school years were spent at Chesapeake Church in Maryland as a part of Peake Youth, which is how I came across the opportunity to travel with a group of teens to Honduras and spread the love of Christ, twice.

I was a 16 year-old girl who was unsure of most things, including who I was as a person. But the day I got a glimpse of the incredible trip to El Ayudante that some teens in Peake Youth took that summer of 2013, one thing became sure to me—I wanted to go there. A few months later, after anxiously waiting for the final decision of the Peake Youth team for the 2014 trip, I got the phone call that began the adventure that changed my life forever. I was in. And now I want to share that adventure with you.

I remember the first night in El Ayudante like it was yesterday. We arrived and went inside the mission house to a room lit up by candles. The power was out. We had been traveling all day, so I could see the frustration in peoples’ eyes. We sat around the tables waiting to see what was next. Suddenly, music starting playing, and three young children began performing a song for us. Although I couldn’t understand what they were singing, their smiles and passion moved me. Almost instantly, a smile spread across my face as I watched these kids sing their hearts out, praising our Lord. I looked around at the formerly aggravated faces that now had smiles spread across them, too. What I didn’t yet know that night, was that God would be doing that a lot in the next week I spent there. He would be filling my heart with an overwhelming joy in even the most challenging moments.

Challenging. The definition of challenging is the testing of one’s abilities. That’s exactly what that week was like. You can read about third world countries, or watch those depressing commercials, and feel like you have an understanding of the struggles those people are facing. Not having enough food, drinking parasite-invested water, not having access to medicine for your sick child—these things are hard to even imagine when we have everything we need at our fingertips. So I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know how I would be affected when I would see these things firsthand. But challenging also means exciting, stimulating, and inspiring. And that week spent in Honduras that summer was exactly that—it changed the way I viewed life.

God used Diana to teach me about love

The week consisted of many projects like vacation bible school with a local elementary school, painting classrooms, and installing cement floors. Another project we did often was installing water filters for local families in the communities nearby. A few of us would be working on the filters, while the others would be communicating to the families through a translator. Every person I had the pleasure of meeting was genuine and caring, and every moment shared with these families was wonderful. I find myself thinking of these faces that now have names, whose stories I now know, very often. One of these faces was Diana. (picture below) I had the delight of visiting Diana everyday for three days to install her water filter. And everyday, her laughter never failed to bring my heart joy. One of the days, Diana had disappeared while we were working diligently on the filter. An hour later, she returned, beaming, holding a liter of banana soda. With the little she had, she traveled in the heat to bring us something refreshing. What a sweet gesture that was, and an example of what it means to be like Jesus. I learned so much from Diana. One day I asked her if she liked living there. She grinned as she told me about how even on the days when things become overwhelmingly difficult (which for her, means her children becoming fatally ill or running out of food for days), she loved her life. She thinks about how great God is and how much He has blessed her. My eyes had been opened to the true power of God’s love that day.

The PX90 church

Another memory that always resonates in my heart when I think back to that week is when we attended a church service one night. We called it the “P90x church.” Why did we call it that, you ask? Probably because I burned at least 600 calories that night. We danced alongside a Honduran community, in a room with no ventilation, resulting in saturated clothing, for what seemed like hours. Hours I would relive over and over again if I could. The entire room was filled with cheers, laughter, singing, dancing, and a kind of joy that I had never felt before. My eyes flooded with tears of pure happiness as I locked arms with strangers, and laughed as we danced in circles. We didn’t have to speak the same language to express the love that was felt that night. As we left, one member of our team said that if tonight were his last night here on earth, he would have died happy and feeling as though he experienced all of the greatness this world has to offer.

I had the amazing opportunity to go back to El Ayudante this past summer. I wasn’t sure how God would work in my heart since it was my second time there and I had experienced it all—at least I thought I had.
Although I had learned so many things from my first time there, He brought forth new challenges and experiences that helped continue my growth and reignite the passion to live for Christ. Both of these trips contributed to my newly discovered desire to live life to its fullest and not to chase after what the world has to offer, but what God has to offer. That’s what happens when you spend two weeks living in simplicity and vulnerability—you discover the pureness of His purpose for our time here on earth.

I went to El Ayudante hoping to make a life changing impact on families. What I didn’t expect was for those families to make a life changing impact on me. They showed me what it means to love unconditionally, to be thankful in the hard times, and to trust God with all of your heart. I went to Honduras to feed the hungry, but I was the one that was truly hungry. My soul was hungry. It was hungry for the true purpose of life. And they showed me exactly that—a life lived for Christ is the most satisfying life you can live. Thank you El Ayudante for helping me see that.

– Guest Blogger: Bree Sherbondy