Why?

Hello from Guatemala,

We have Riechelle's family here visiting us and we have done several medical clinics in the last two days. We went to some pretty remote villages. It looks like my friend Dave Main in Atlanta is getting the winch for the bus and we sure will use it. There were a few times this past two weeks I sure could have used a winch. The kids are really enjoying having their grandma and grandpa here.

The kids wanted them to see the Iguanas. We have a fairly large pet Iguana and he is a lot better than a dog. Very low maintenance. Last week we had a team here from Portland Maine. These guys were great. We went by boat to a couple of new villages and they loved it. Getting there is half the fun! At one point the river got so shallow some of the guys had to get out and push the boat up river, but it was pretty hot and they didn't seem to mind, until I told them about the Piranha's (Just kidding there are only Boa's here).

We finally got to the end of the tributary off the Rio Dulce River an hour after leaving the main river and there we did a medical clinic for lots of sick folks. This team worked as hard as any team ever has and did not complain about the heat or the jungle or anything. I have to tell you that the Lord really sends us the cream of the crop. The next day we were up a mountain and in a new village. The people we wonderful and helped us set up the bus and get ready for the clinic.

After the medical clinic they did some songs with action and the villagers loved it! In between clinics we tended to emergency patients in the ER and they all pitched in and again worked as long as it took to take care of the people. But you know, I watched the people's faces this time I guess more than normal for some reason. I don't really know why, but I want you to see if you can feel what I felt last week.

Imagine you are born in a stick house with a dirt floor and no running water or electricity. Imagine that as you grow up you see your mother work everyday to go our and collect fire wood and carry clothes down to the river to wash them. Then after cooking and collecting wood to cook with and walking miles in the heat, you get home to 5 other children. That evening your father comes home and hits your mother and demands his tortillas and maybe if you are lucky some beans. Sometimes you are afraid of your father when he has been drinking or even your neighbor when he comes over. So you hide and keep out of sight as much as you can. You try and keep your little sister from being alone when they are acting funny and drinking.

Maybe you have a birth defect and everyone makes fun of you and calls you a monster. So as you grow up you do not trust people. Especially strangers. But then one day some people come to your village in a big white bus. When they get out they set up nice tables and have big bags full of medicines. They have a funny little machine in their hand and they cover their face with it then they turn it around and show you a picture of your friends. But you don’t know who the new girl in the picture is. You have never seen her in your villages before and then your friend looks at you with her eyes as wide a saucers and say's "That is you!" You do not have a mirror and you have never seen yourself, so you did not know what you looked like.

For the first time in your life a stranger showed you a picture of you. Then she smiled and you felt like she liked you. At first you are afraid. Will these people try and steal me and sell me? What do they want here? Why did they come to my village? Then the team holds hands and prays. You hear them pray to someone they call Jesus. Then they go to their tables and begin serving our whole village. Why do these rich people come and help us? We have nothing to give them? We have no money? One man stops and bends down and gives me a pill to eat that will make the worms in my stomach go away. He smiles and winks at me and I realized he does not want to hurt me. Then a lady gives my Mom some vitamins. Then I go ahead and a man and a lady have funny looking hands that are very white like rubber.

They clean my feet which are caked with dirt and then but a cream on that makes the constant pain I live with go away. The man holds me on his lap while the lady puts an ointment on my ears and neck because I have had soars there for months and it hurts all the time. Then Mother takes us to a table where they give her some special medicine for my cold and infection. As we are leaving, they tell mom to take me and my sisters to two big teenage boys. They are washing other children's hair. For the first time in my life I have had a man show me attention and not want something in return. I wonder if this man knew that man Jesus they talk about, because I feel like they love me like He would.

I say, "Why would these people leave America the richest country on earth, and come here to wash the lice out of my hair.?" Why don't they go on vacation? Why do they come here to Guatemala and work so hard in the heat? One of them said, "Because we love you and that is what Jesus would do". Why do people save up money and sacrifice their vacation time, and leave their family and come down here in this unforgiving heat? What would possess a person in their right mind to choose riding in a old bus on a road so bumpy your teeth rattle, and sweat like you have never sweat before, only to go into the remote Mayan villages of the Guatemalan jungle and take care of people you don’t even know, or who cannot pay you for your service? All the time knowing you could have gone on a luxury cruise ship instead. It does not make sense.

But I have people like you e-mail almost every day asking, "When can we come back?"

Why?

God Bless,

In His Service,

Bryan & Riechelle and Kids

Junglemedic Missions
Rio Dulce, Izabal
Guatemala Central America

E-Mail: Bryan@JungleMedicMissions.org
Web Site: http://www.junglemedicmissions.org/

This page was last updated 11/12/07