The Bridge that Love Built

Hello Everyone from Guatemala,

Whew! We Did It! In four long back breaking days, 17 Americans and an entire Mayan Quetchie Village built a bridge. In all the years we have been here in Guatemala, we have only had one construction team before. It was a group of guys from Presque Isle, Maine. Presque Isle is almost on the Canadian boarder. Riechelle and I lived there for about 5 years when I was in the U.S. Air Force. So we have had long time friends from there for years. The same church that came and helped us put in our foundation 3 years ago, came back last week and helped us build a bridge.

When we arrived at the stream, this is what it looked like.

Every man and male child was there waiting to help us.
They had taken time off from their fields to work with us.

We began placing the cement tubes in the stream bed by hand. (You may recognize the guy in the middle. He is the model they use on the Bow-flex commercials.)

After the tubes were in place, we began building ramps on both sides of the tubes with rocks from the stream and surrounding area.


This is how we got up the mountain each day for work.

It truly was amazing to see everyone working together as a family.

Americans and Guatemalans all working together for the same goal.

Every rock and every bag of cement and every bucket of mixed cement was carried by hand.

The Quetchie Men were amazed at the American women and how hard they worked. To be honest, I was blown away by their hard work and determination. These were wonderful Christian women but after seeing them work, I would not want to meet them in a dark alley and try to take their purse. (They could kill a poor robber.) One of the highlights of the work was that most of the people on this team were unbelievable singers and had sang for years together in a chorus group. When they began to sing in accapello and in harmony, the Villagers had never heard singing or music like this before. They literally all stopped working and stood in awe listening with their jaws dropped open.

After their first song the villagers clapped and began chanting 4 more, 4 more songs. I told them they could sing 4 more and then they had to get back to work. (I was not paying them big bucks to sing you know, then they reminded me that I was not paying them any bucks.) But the villagers loved it so much it was a very special moment in our time together. I really believe the Lord brought our hearts together at that point.

Also one day while we worked the women of the team did a mini Medical clinic since we had Dr. Bill Schnurr with us.

However it tuned out not being such a mini clinic when they saw 206 patients.

Then after the rocks were in place we had to build metal rebar units to hold everything together under the cement.

After the metal units were all in place we then began mixing 150 bags of cement with sand and gravel by hand. We would then carry the buckets of cement on our shoulders and haul it to were it was needed. (Now you know why the Bow-flex Co. constantly pesters me to do more commercials huh?)

Finally 4 days later we finished the bridge.

We had not only built a bridge of cement but more importantly We had built a relationship with people the Americans didn’t even know. The people of Santa Elena did not hear the word of God. I think they saw it.

The next day we went back to the village and held a celebration. We had brought in hundreds of pounds of rice and beans and 100 lbs of beef. The women of the villages cooked the rice and beans and corn tortillas, and we cooked the meat and brought it to the village. We played tug of war and had balloon toss and Riechelle was in her glory getting the women involved with the games. We gave prizes if they won and so man they really gave it their all. We all laughed so hard it was for them like being in Disney World. But then something happened that we were not expecting. The Chief of the village came to me and said, "Would you and your team please come down to the bridge?" I said, "It is getting dark." But he said it would be fine. The reason I was concerned was that it has rained for the past 4 nights The clouds made it very dark out. There was no electricity in this village so we would not be able to see to even walk. But to my surprise there was not a cloud in the sky and the moon was full. We all walked together, the team and the villagers down to the bridge. When we got down there they began to sing to us in Quetchie. Then they began to pray in Quetchie and thanked God for sending us to help them and be their friends. There in the night, in the jungle in a remote Mayan Village I felt the Lord over us as real as I felt the breeze.

There are no words to describe to you the experience we felt together with this village, but I know lives were changed no matter what the skin color was. We went back to the school building and then we served every man woman and child a meal and they were so grateful. I really needed this. It was very hard work but it was worth every penny and every drop of sweat, believe me. I can now get my bus into the village to do medical and dental work. Also they can now get a supply truck into the village easier for more staples and supplies. Also my friend David Alvarez's church is going there doing the Feeding Program for the kids and teaching them the real Word of God, through Evangelism, and isn't that what this is all about?

So I know God has a special plan for this village. Please pray with me for guidance as to the possibility of helping them to build a fish farm and raise Tilapia fish for income and for protein for their families. This would truly teach them to fish instead of just giving them a fish.

The team leader Mark is an architect and he figured the cost of total man hours work and materials and supplies if this project were done in the United States, would have cost approximately $35,000.00. We did it for $3,325.00! God is good!

I guess the thing that hit me the most of all we did was that in the end, when we were done and being prayed over by the Chief and the villagers, I could hear them giving God the Thanks and Glory. I think it worked.

Thanks to all of you who prayed and supported and gave to this project. I know it will ultimately play a role on bringing people to Jesus.

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 11/27/07