Dios Sabe

Well, here I sit in the Guatemalan Airport, filled with a variety of emotions. But first I should update you on the recent goings on since my last post. For my last clinic with La Misión (at least probably for a long time) we went to the Hot Place to do clinics and pass out water filters. Once again, I worked intake, this time with my good friend Nanne Abbey who came with the church team from Spokane. Nanne is a Spanish middle school teacher who was the one who originally got me connected with Tito. She had been praying that college students from Whitworth would start going down to intern for him, and if it weren’t for her, I probably wouldn’t have ever met these incredible Guatemalan people.

So Nanne, Lauri (another teacher) and I worked in intake. Once again, I was taken aback by the strength and resilience of the mothers who come in to be seen. One woman had an entire entourage of children clinging ALL over her (if you have heard my adventures in breastfeeding down here you would know what I mean). She told me that she was 25 and then proceeded to have all of her 7 children seen. The oldest was 13 years old, meaning that this woman started having children when she was 12 years old! Of course, the father of these children was nowhere in sight

and they probably had multiple different fathers.

While this is always discouraging to me, I was encouraged to hear from the filter teams about some of the progress made in this area. The filter teams would go out to individual homes and demonstrate how to work the filters, explaining that they were giving them as gifts because we love them and wanted to show them the love of Jesus Christ. It is quite a powerful ministry that I wish I would have been able to experience more. Nevertheless, the filter teams told me that as they visited the houses, they noticed that the men of the households were actually present with the mom and kids and seemed to be trying to take a leadership role. This is SUCH a change from the norm here where the men just impregnate women around the village and leave them to fend for themselves.

On the last day of my final clinic in Guatemala, I prayed for God to give me a new perspective. This being my 18th clinic in Guatemala and having worked in the same station almost every clinic, I had found myself losing some of the perspective-altering aspects I had experienced so powerfully my first time here in 2008. Therefore, I prayed for God to strike me with a new lesson as I served these people in intake.

As I was listening to my iPod waiting for God to speak, the song “There Will Be a Day” by Jeremy Camp came up. As I sat there in the truck driving through the Guatemalan jungle, seeing the mothers weary from caring for their family in abject poverty, the thought I had prayed for finally struck me. If they hear and accept the Gospel, there will be a day when God will rescue these Guatemalan natives from their destitute huts, their parasite-ridden water, and their fear of a life subjugated under domestic abuse. He will deliver them from this seemingly hopeless life of filth and usher them into a mansion of gold. More so, He will wipe from their eyes the tears they had cried alone in the middle of the jungle and cradle them in the all-encompassing presence of their Creator. And on this day, all of us who have placed our faith in the saving blood of Christ will hold our hands together with them as we worship the God who made us all. Satan’s attempts to segregate us at Tower of Babel will be a

distant memory as we all sing aloud in one tongue, in one voice.

We serve a God like this. And this is what we are fighting for on the mission field. While God is sovereign and will accomplish His work on earth, I pray that He uses us to bring salvation to these people so that we can rejoice hand in hand on this day in heaven.

Now for a brief break on the lighter side of life. This past week I did two things I never knew I would do in my life. The first was go to a Guatemalan amusement park. Tito took the whole family to this random amusement park smack dab in the middle of Guatemala City for Alejandro’s birthday. Let me tell you, you have not lived until you get on a Guatemalan roller coaster. Not because of the speed or drops, but simply the heightened thrill of the thought that Guatemala doesn’t have a fraction of the American safety regulations and oversight.

We went on a variety of rides but undoubtedly the most thrilling/horrifying was the ride called “Rasca Cielo” (Skyscraper) which was a tower that launched soiled-underweared riders straight up probably 200 feet, leaving them helpless up top for a tortuous amount of time before plummeting them back to the pavement. Sounds like a great way to spend my last day in Guatemala, right? Well as we are waiting in line, Tito of course is freaking my friend David out since David is afraid that a cable is going to snap and chop his feet off like this random girl on a similar ride in the States. Meanwhile, we see the ride operator people working diligently on this one seat, Seat #14, which clearly looks in bad shape and whose seat belt mechanism seems to be malfunctioning. Of course, we all planned on avoiding that seat like the plague since it clearly had issues. Well, it’s finally our turn to meet our maker, and lo and behold, what seat does this Gringo end up in? Seat #14 of course. While I previously wasn’t very

scared since God and I had already figured out where I was going after death, the fact that sitting in that Devil Seat #14 had dramatically increased my probability of meeting Him much sooner got my heart racing quite a bit faster. To make matters worse, the stupid harness thing was junk and there was a disturbing amount of space between myself and the restraint, which was supposedly there to prevent my body from flying back to the States. While I was somewhat perturbed, as my repeated shouting of “I don’t like this! I really don’t like this!” would attest, regardless of my consternation, we hurdled to the top of the tower, leaving my sanity behind. As the operators left us for dead at the top for probably two minutes, Tito both loved the fact that I was in #14 and continued to torture David saying, “The cable, the cable!” After what felt like an eternity, literally without warning, they shot us down in free-fall back to earth. Thanks to my jerry-rigged seat from Hades, my whole body lifted off the seat as my shoulders shoved against the flimsy, poorly regulated harness. After having 24 short years of life flash before my eyes, we were back on the ground, to a welcoming mob of Guatemalan teenagers giggling and pointing at the frightened Gringoes. The rest of the day consisted of me being forced to sit in the front seat of the Guatemalan log ride, eating half of a greasy pizza, and busting out the worm in a dance off with a giant parrot and a very scandalous rat.

As for the other thing I can now cross off my bucket list, for the sake of the length of this post, I will just tease you by saying that I never thought I would sing Karaoke to Enrique Iglesias‘ “Hero” to random women around a Guatemalan Applebee’s. And yes, there is video. Now back to the serious stuff...

As I said earlier, leaving Guatemala this time for me is mixed with many emotions. While I am so excited to see my family and friends in the States again and begin my new journey through medical school, it is also very sad because I will probably not be returning to Guatemala for a very long time. Because the medical school schedule is so rigorous, after the first summer, you do not have any more vacations until you are pretty much done with residency. While I have a summer next year, I still have to do a research project for 10 weeks, which I am hoping to do internationally, possibly in Uganda or Peru. This means that I will probably not be able to return to Guatemala for at least 7 years, possibly 10 if I choose to specialize.

The prospect of not seeing my Guatemalan family for such a long period has stung my heart in a very unique way. Of course, no one can replace my phenomenal parents, sisters, and friends in the States--you all are a support system for whom I could never thank God enough. But this trip has made me realize how strong God has forged my relationships to my brothers and sisters in Guatemala. It is a connection God has undoubtedly fashioned and it will never be broken. While this may be my last trip to Guatemala for a longer period of time, it will certainly not be my last.

Nevertheless, thinking about this being my last time eating black beans and plantains at the Palacios dinner table, the last time dancing to Michael Jackson songs with Pablo and Alejandro before they grow up to be teenagers, and the last time serving the Guatemalan people through clinics, I can’t help but feel sad. Even this past year before coming down here, I realized that God has carved out a part of my heart and left it in Guatemala.

Although I am momentarily resting in a period of lament, God also has brought to my eyes the brilliant light upon the horizon. I am so incredibly blessed that I am returning to the States to embark upon the greatest adventure of my life. If it were not for God, I would not have such a bright future to look forward to. I am utterly speechless living in this state of grace as God has opened the door to my dream of becoming a Christian physician. And not only am I becoming a doctor, but He has gotten me accepted to one of the best medical schools in the country, UW, while staying close to my family. As I sit in this plane and recount His provisions in my life (whether I have consistently sought Him or not), I have been ushered again to the top of the mountain where He took me after I first got accepted into medical school. From atop this mountain I can once again see all the times He has carried me in His loving Hand, whether there have been deep valleys or soaring peaks. All the while He has been beneath, above, beside and within me, just as He will be the rest of my life and into eternity.

So while I may be downcast at the prospect of my not returning to Guatemala for awhile, God has reminded me that this is not the end. One of my favorite songs that God has brought to my mind recently is called “God of this City” by Chris Tomlin. My favorite line says, “For greater things have yet to come, and greater things are still to be done in this city.” While this season in my life as an intern in Guatemala has come to a close, I KNOW that God has so many greater things yet to be done through my life. He has been there since my birth and will be there until my last breath. There are so many awesome things to come and I cannot wait to return to serve the people of Guatemala with the knowledge and compassion of a Christian physician who knows His place before an Omnipotent and gracious God.

While the flame from this mission trip is currently burning bright, I know that as time goes on and the exams pile up, my confidence in God’s working in my life may dim as I foolishly begin to rely on my abilities instead of Him. This is where I pray that you all who have been reading my blog will continue to hold me accountable. Please remind me of my current passion and the importance of clinging to God through prayer as I jump into the trenches of medical school.

Well, I thank all of you so much for supporting, praying, and joining me in my journey over these past 7 weeks and probably longer. I am so unspeakably grateful for the supportive people God has placed in my life whether you be family, friends, co-workers, or fellow believers. God bless you all and let us look forward together to the “greater things still to be done” by our Creator through each one of us.

Adventures of All Kinds

Yesterday I had a new experience in Guatemala. No, it wasn’t eating some strange food, or going to some family event....no, for the first time ever....I clogged a Guatemalan toilet. Now, it must be explained that my normal problem down here is constipation due to the lack of fiber in the Guatemalan diet. However, this past week I have been being a good little patient and have eaten more fruit and vegetables when available, along with this sandy fiber supplement Tito gives me called Linaza which is kind of like Guatemalan Metamucil. (I swear, with my preoccupation with my bowel habits I feel like I am an 85 year old man trapped in a 24 year old’s body!) Needless to say, while sparing you the gory details, I was pleased to find all these little digestion tricks worked their magic, and the day after we came back from our clinic, I am proud to declare that I had my best BM of the trip.

Despite the plethora of positive things I could say about this country, one thing I abhor here is the feeble suction of their impotent toilets. After several wildly unsuccessful flushes, I realized I would have to call in reinforcements. I quickly looked up the Spanish word for plunger in my dictionary, finding it to be “émbolo.” However, when I sheepishly asked Brenda where the “émbolo” was, she taught me their word for plunger, which is much more aptly named, “La bomba.” (the bomb). Considering this name more accurately describes the clientele for a plunger, I figured we were in business. Brenda graciously made sure I knew what to do, told me not to worry, and just asked that I try not to get the water on the floor. After shooting up a prayer for protection, I opened the door and jumped into the trenches.

However, my zeal to plunge the crap out of that toilet (pun completely intended), was overly ambitious. Contrary to Brenda’s warning, after a few plunges, I plunged too hard and water splashed not only all over the bathroom, but on me as well. Fruitlessly attempting to shove the thought of what had just happened into the deep recesses of my mind, I continued to plunge away, hoping Brenda would not ask what happened. Nevertheless, after many futile cycles of plunging and unsuccessful flushing, I had to call in the cavalry and Brenda quickly came to my aid. With the finesse of a Guatemalan expert, she made quick work of that infernal terd, and I was once again humbled as an inept Gringo. She, of course, made light of the whole thing and told me not to worry, but at least afterwards, to make it up to her, I gave the bathroom a good cleaning.

While I’m sure you all would love to hear more from the chronicles of Justin’s Bathroom Adventures, but I guess I should get to some of the serious stuff. The past week, we went back to Lake Atitlan with an awesome group from Houston, Texas. This time, we took an hour-long boat ride across the lake to a small city called San Pablo. Here we did clinics in the morning and a VBS for the kids in the afternoon. These people speak a different Mayan dialect called Sutujíl. During this clinic we had 3 dentists, glasses, pharmacy, and an area for the children to play. Also, outside in this little grotto type area, one of the Houston women ran a type of women’s ministry group for the women in the village.

Because many rural parts of Guatemala are still extremely patriarchal, there is a very large problem with domestic abuse. This ministry was targeted at giving the women a chance to share their feelings about life within the company of other women, something that they rarely get a chance to do. The first day, unfortunately, they had a

male Sutujíl translator, which made things kind of awkward. However, the rest of the week, they had a woman, and Robyn (the woman in charge) told me later that it was an amazing time. While at first the women were very closed and did not share much, as time went on, they opened up about some of their problems. One woman thanked Robyn for telling her that God loves her, since she had began to believe that because so many bad things happened in her life, God hated her. It sounded like it was a great time of healing for these struggling women.

This clinic I worked in intake again, greeting the patients, and doing my best to represent Christ, setting the stage for the rest of their clinic experience. While I do my best to imitate Christ with a friendly demeanor at intake, this past clinic I learned a very good lesson regarding how NOT to lighten the mood.

Over my three years of doing intake, I have always tried to be warm and inviting

with the patients, often joking with them regardless of the single and often double language barrier. One way I do this is by often asking the men in Spanish if they are pregnant, causing them to laugh. However, this time, I thought, “Let’s change it up a bit and have some fun.” Normally, I have to ask all the women if they are breast-feeding, so I decided since the pregnant joke always works so well, I’ll now ask the guys if they are breast-feeding instead of the pregnancy joke. Awesome idea, right? Well, an 18-year-old guy sits down, and I think, “Perfect. This guy will think this joke is hilarious!” So after asking his name and other things, I finally ask him if he was breast-feeding. He laughs really hard, and I immediately felt so pleased with myself. However, this pride quickly disappeared, as a woman whom I’m pretty sure was his mother leaned over and said,

“Only with his girlfriend.”

I was utterly shocked and embarrassed as was the mortified 18 year-old-boy sitting in front of me. Needless to say, I learned my lesson about keeping my yap shut when trying to joke with patients.

In the afternoons, we ran a VBS for the children in the village, which was a very fun time. While we didn’t know how many kids were going to show up, about 80 kids showed up each day! The Houston team did a fantastic job at making the curriculum for the VBS. We started off each day singing several songs, including “Soldados de Jesus” (Soldiers of Jesus) and my personal favorite “Sapo” which was a song with a bunch of gestures describing a frog who meets a girl frog who’s friends with Jesus. After singing, they did a Bible lesson with a felt board (total blast from my nerdy Christian past), and then a skit, and then a craft.

While it is a great time with these kids, and we present the Gospel, I sometimes wonder if any of the kids are really absorbing the message of Jesus Christ. With this group especially, it was more difficult because there was a double language barrier along with the fact that they were quite rambunctious on the day we presented the Gospel to them. Despite my skepticism as to the effectiveness of our VBS, God gave me a little object lesson.

While most of the crafts were relatively simple, one of the days, the group told me that they were going to have the kids step in paint and put their footprint on a paper plate, signifying them stepping into faith on the cross. Being the clean and possibly mildly OCD person that I am, I prepared for the worst on this craft day. In my mind, I envisioned blue paint from the floor to the ceiling after those kids wreaked their havoc upon it. Last minute, the Houston team decided to use the children’s fists and fingers to make the footprints instead of taking off their shoes. Although I still envisioned a complete disaster, God taught me an important lesson. The children were very organized and were even meticulous with washing their hands in the water basins afterwards! I feel like this was God’s way of telling me, see? You worry about these silly little things and expect the worst, when so many times things work out, even when before you couldn’t see how I would make it work.

God used this smaller object lesson with the paint to remind me of His bigger lesson regarding the entire VBS. Even when I felt that maybe we weren’t getting through to those kids, God showed me that in His own transcendent way, our job was merely to present the information, and He would take care of the rest. We often never know exactly how our words or actions in Christ will affect someone else. It is our job to simply be God’s instruments and rest in the fact that God will bring the music He plays through us to the right ears at the right time.

I don’t believe it was coincidence that during this time I was reading from Mark 4:1-20, in which Jesus tells the parable about the seeds falling on different soil. Some fall on the path and immediately get eaten up by birds, others fall onto rocky places where the soil is shallow and they spring up quickly, but because they don’t have a root, they dry up and wither. Others grow among thorns and are choked out. Finally, some fall on good soil, grow strong and produce a crop, and multiply thirty, sixty, or even hundred times their original size.

This became my prayer for those children. While to me it seemed like our words were falling on the shallow path of confused or inattentive little ears, I realized that my finite perspective is nothing like God’s. Instead, I prayed that with each Bible lesson, skit, and craft, the Gospel would fall upon good soil in these precious hearts, and in a way

I will never understand, God would multiply the seed to not only change their little lives, but also their parents and eventually their entire village. While in my economy of reasoning this may seem like idealistic lunacy, God reminded me that we are playing by His rules, not mine. I will probably never know what ultimately happened to those children until heaven, but at least I can pray that our words fell on good soil and rest in God’s transcendent plan for them.

Lessons on Perspective

So today is finally a complete day of rest so I can catch up on some blogging, laundry, and maybe work out a little bit. This week, the team from Wenatchee led by Drs. Dave and Susan Weber, came down. It has been great to work with them since they are the group I am closest to and I have worked with them three times in Guatemala and visited them in Wenatchee. I am always impressed with their solid committment to Tito, La Mision, the children at Palencia, and the people of Guatemala.

In Palencia, we did a clinic and the children did their annual performance for the Wenatchee team. For those who don’t know, several years back this school had gone into disrepair and it was essentially a barren wasteland. When the Webers and the Wenatchee team saw this, they felt God was telling them to breathe life into this school again. Thus, with the financial support of their church and another church in Texas, they got the school up and running, with each teacher and child supported by sponsors from the states. Also, every year they have brought a construction team down to extend a classroom or storage room, and allowed them to add on a grade every year. Thus, Palencia always holds a special place in the heart of the Wenatchee team, and the children always do a performance to show their gratitude and what God is doing in their lives through their education.

This past week we stayed at a hotel in Panajachel, which is a fun touristy town around Lake Atitlan, considered one of the most beautiful lakes in the world because it has five volcanoes around it. We spent the first two days doing a clinic at one location where I have been before. We do clinics at government health department clinic buildings, which often have only one nurse with extremely limited resources to serve their community. It has been interesting though to see the expansions to the building made in the past two years. There is even an ambulance to transfer patients to the local hospital! Over the course of two days in this location I believe we saw around 180 patients, and I worked in intake. Here most people speak the Mayan dialect of Katchiquel which sounds like someone choking on a chicken bone. Thus, we always need an additional translator from Katchiquel to Spanish for me to translate from Spanish to English.

At this clinic there was this one woman named Maria who came to be seen for some health problem. In these clinics, we have to be very specific in only allowing people into the clinic who have a number that we pass out at the beginning of the day. While we wish we could see everyone, that simply is not possible and if we always let just “one” more person in, than other people without a number expect to have the same special treatment. While Maria had a number, it was much later in line, and later I found out it was even for the dental line not for medical. I tried to explain to her that she had to wait in line, and then she would go wandering around for awhile. I would return to my work trying to cycle through patients in intake as quickly as possible so that they could see the doctors. Minutes later, however, Maria would butt her way in again next to the patient I was talking to, trying to be seen. Again, I had to have someone explain to her in Katchiquel that she needed to wait her turn in line. After about 3-4 times of this happening, I began to be annoyed. While these people are incredibly poor and have such poor living conditions, it is amazing how in intake when my mind needs to thin slice quickly, these patients begin to resemble some of those frequent fliers I saw in the ER in the States. As I said before, I

am working on redeveloping my compassion for patients regardless of their demeanor (or in the case of the ER if they are narcotic seeking). Maria definitely tested this compassion for me. Eventually, she wore me down and I told her we would just see her now so that she would stop wandering around and distracting me. While she ended up being seen and getting some medication, glasses, and teeth pulled in dental, I felt like she was omnipresently wandering throughout the clinic the entire day. You can see her poking her head in this photo, which was kind of how the whole day went with her.

Sarah, a nurse from Whitworth who the only other time I have seen was on my Core 250 Europe trip (very small world), was working with me in intake that day and experienced the oddity that was Maria, and eventually we had to just laugh about it instead of getting frustrated. It wasn’t that Maria was trying to be rude, she just did not get what was going on. And it wasn’t a matter of languages not being translated effectively, because I have enough experience to know when that is happening and I usually have the patience to make sure the message is being translated effectively. No, with Maria it was different. She simply could not comprehend no matter how we explai

ned it. I actually experienced this while translating for Dr. Susan Weber with several patients our last day of clinics. I realize many of these people had never seen a doctor before and didn’t know the drill, but even when we physically showed them how to lay down on the bed for the doctor to the examine them, they looked at us completely dumbfounded. And it wasn’t a cultural thing, because the majority of the patients understood our instructions, it was just a handful of outliers. And these people, including Maria, were the ones that truly tested my patience.

As Sarah and I discussed it later, while working with Maria was frustrating, she proved to be a very good lesson for us.

Sometimes patients that simply don’t possess a very high level of intelligence or suffer from mental illness require a lot of special attention and instruction and can become very draining, especially when you have limited time with each patient. This is the case in Guatemala, at St. Clare ER in the States, and healthcare throughout the world. Maria clearly had mental health issues in addition to whatever physical complaint she was specifically there for. However, when I stepped back and thought about the life that woman has probably led, both with mental illness and with all the immense challenges of living in a place without clean water and possibly under the authority of an abusive husband, it transformed my frustration into compassion.

While it may be uncomfortable sitting in a rickety chair for several hours trying to cycle through as many patients as possible, while flies circle overhead, and the people wreak of feces, B.O., dirt, and urine, this is not the life I have to live every day. I can simply wake up, get my Jesus compassion fix for the day through serving these people, and return to my comfortable hotel to hang out with friends. These people could not even comprehend such luxury. While I am eating my plate of fettuccini and bottled water for dinner, they are returning to their shack after walking 4 miles to our clinic to begin preparing their meal consisting of tortillas and parasite-infested water, perpetuating their endless cycle of diarrhea. While I am complaining about only have ten minutes to enjoy a hot shower in order to conserve water, they are taking 3-4 members of their family into a sweat lodge for their weekly bathing with boiled water for a sponge bath. As I complain about the few bug bites I suffered a week ago, these people suffer for years with unbearable itching as scabies wreaks havoc upon their entire family, never to be eradicated without adequate washing of their clothes.

Yes, while Maria may have been “draining” as she wandered around the clinic distracting me from other patients, I must never forget that despite my temporary inconvenience with her, at the end of the day, I at least could escape. There is no escape for her. While I don’t understand God’s reasons for this, she was born into this life of poverty and illness, and despite our attempts to alleviate the oppression this lifestyle holds over this woman, our efforts are merely a drop in an endless ocean of heartache.

Despite the apparent hopelessness cast over the homes of these people, this is exactly where the omnipresence and omnipotence of God comes rushing in. Yes, our clinics can temporarily help with diarrhea, muscle aches, and a rotten tooth, but truly it is only a bandaid covering a much larger infection. The best thing we can do for these people is to use our medical help as a vehicle for sharing the love of Jesus Christ. Because in the midst of their suffering both physical and spiritual misery, our vitamins won’t be the thing that they cling to. If they understand the love of Christ and that He died on the cross for their sins, in their suffering they will finally have access to the One who has been sitting right beside them all along. They can pray to the One who went without food for 40 days in the desert to understand the plight of their starvation. And they can cry to the One who suffered the ridicule at the hands of men in order to empathize with their shame after being beaten by a drunk, unfaithful husband. Yes, I praise God that He uses us as instruments for His peace, but in the end, God is the only One who can dry the tears from their eyes and give them a Father who will never leave them or forsake them.

I am so thankful that Tito established La Mision on the basis of this truth, and that at the beginning of every day we pray for God’s grace to be shown to these people instead of our abilities for which we hold such pride. We are the hands and feet of God, and if we ask Him to redeem our actions, then truly amazing things happen. An example of this came on the first day of clinics in a place where La Mision had only been to once before. At times as I said above, I feel like we are just applying a bandaid to these people’s chronic problems, such as diarrhea, abdominal pain, or muscle aches from working hard in the fields or weaving. However, this one woman came into the clinic and as soon as Dr. Susan and I saw her, we knew she was sick. She had right upper quadrant abdominal pain for a week, vomiting and diarrhea, and told us she was diabetic but didn’t have medicines because she couldn’t afford them. After getting an ultrasound, a urinalysis, and a blood sugar (all of the tests we have), this woman not only had an infected gallbladder, but her urine was filthy with every color on the dip stick being off the charts for leukocytes, glucose, and ketones. To top it all off, her blood sugar was 532, and who knows how long it has been that high. For my medical friends, she basically had a cholecystitis, a raging UTI, and was probably in DKA with a one-way trip towards sepsis. Obviously, we did not have the resources to care for her, so one of the doctors basically did a direct admit over the phone to the nearby hospital and an ambulance came to take her there. However, her husband apparently did not want her there and we found her again at our clinic the next day with an even higher blood sugar. All we could do was give her a bag of saline IV, and once the doctor finally convinced the husband that she needed to stay in the hospital she was taken again by ambulance.

This story is so amazing to me because so often I have felt like we are not making a dent. While God has blessed La Mision with a lot of equipment, there is still so much that we cannot do at the clinics. However, this was a prime example that the rudimentary resources we have were exactly what we needed to discover how sick this woman was. Moreover, without all the work of Tito and numerous others in creating this organization and the financial and prayer support of people around the world, we would not have been there at that specific moment in time, and that woman would most likely have died in her home. What a miracle from God! Another woman came in that same day with a blood pressure of 70/44 which anyone in the medical field knows is extremely dangerous. However, after merely 500cc of IV fluids, her pressure was back up to 114/70! Despite my lack of faith in the movement of God, whether it be in these acute illnesses or the chronic abdominal pains, God is using us as instruments for His peace.

Well, I hope you are all doing well and I hope some people are reading this besides my family :) I so appreciate all the prayers and support, keep ‘em coming! I have less than a month left in my trip. While my parents would disagree, I can’t believe how fast time has flown down here! In light of all we have talked about in this post, I leave you with these comforting words from Jesus in John 14:27 and 16:33

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

Jungle Fever

Today we finally returned from our journey across the whole country of Guatemala...literally. When we last met I was writing my blog entry fro

m the office last Saturday night. Needless to say, that whole night was a mad dash. First, the team of high school seniors from Two Rivers Church in Tennessee arrived at around

3 (6 hours before the Guatemalans thought they were going to arrive). After they got situated at their hostel we still had a ton of work to do packing up the trucks to head out to “The Hot Place.” Suitcases and giant duffle bugs capable of holding three midgets were flung across the office into four different pickup trucks, cinched down with tarps to protect from the rain. Then Makko and I rushed to take the new gringo team to dinner while we shopped like crazy for all the lunch food at the Guatemalan Costco minutes before it closed. I have never seen more loaves of bread purchased in my life. We returned to the office to continue packing. It was a classic Guatemalan moment when at 11:30 at night, Koki (one of the Guatemalan workers) asks me to start drilling holes into 30 plastic buckets to use for the water filters

we would be handing out. Keep in mind I needed to get up at 4:30 the next morning to take the previous team of women to the airport and then leave for the next clinic with all our gear at 5:30am. But here I was drilling holes into plastic buckets at 11:30 at night without a care in the world, because I just know that’s how things work down here.

To make a long story short, after getting 3 hours of sleep, we got off the next day relatively without a hitch. The ladies got to the airport, we picked up the new team and off we went on our 7 hour car ride to “The Hot Place” which always lives up to its name. This is the farthest that La Mision goes for its clinics, and in this place we see some of the poorest people in the whole country who live in the jungle. We have to take the 4x4 trucks over the rugged roads in order to reach these far off places. However, the place where we stayed this time was a plush resort about 2 hours away from ou

r first clinic site. This place had air conditioning, a pool, slides, and even a tank of iguanas and turtles. While we didn’t really feel like we were rough

ing it like missionaries, this place was truly a place of respite and a blessing from God since these clinics are very draining with the extreme heat and humidity.

We did clinics in two different villages, the first being more remote with the people who

speak the Mayan dialect requiring an additional translator. Here I worked both in intake and pharmacy. The new wrist blood pressure cuff I got for intake worked like a charm, except for the complication of the women who had 5 children in tow and needed to pass off their baby to someone. These people are incredibly poor, and all t

heir possessions wouldn’t amount to more than $100. Notice in the picture the emaciated and mangey dog that laid beneath their feet the entire day at intake without them thinking twice about it.

La Mision has developed some new forms of ministry since I was here last, all of which I really am happy they are doing. Along with the medical,

dental, and vision services they provide, there was a station for prayer and handing out clothes and shoes, a station for the adolescent girls to do girly stuff like paint their nails and talk about life (luckily I was NOT asked to help with this one), a construction team, a team to play with the kids and teach them about Jesus, and a group that went out to families‘ huts giving water filters. I accompanied one group that handed out a filter to a family and I absolutely loved it. Water filtration is something I am very passionate about because we can hand out all the vitamins we want to but if the people are continually ingesting and cooking with diseased water, we are fighting a losing battle. These filters are a simple design of a bucket and a filter device attached to a hose. All they need to do is fill the bucket with “clean” water (water without a bunch of dirt) and open the spigot at the bottom of the filter. Supposedly, all they have to do to clean it is about once a week use this syringe to shove water through the filter to cleanse it. The filter

instructions claims it filters out a ton of the specific bacteria, viruses, and other microscopic pathogens that often plague these people, so I am really excited and

hope over time it makes a big difference in the health of these villages.

Over the course of the four days we were there (two days at each clinic) we treated about 320 patients in medical, not including dental. Watching all the different stations in action and all the different ways that the La Mision team serves these people, I am always amazed at the strength of people working together as a team. Everybody had their own tasks but we were all working together--Gringo and Guatemalan--to help these people. It is truly a beautiful representation of the body of Christ and I love how all our different gifts and abilities are used to serve a variety of needs in these communities.

Also, for those of you who don’t know, several high school students from America

Latina come on these trips to help out. Honestly, without them, we would never be able to do these clinics. These Guatemalan

high schoolers are so mature and work so hard to help their people, I always have so much respect for them. It has been wonderful getting to know them better, whether

it be working together in the clinics or giving each other whiplash at the bottom of the water slide after going down 10 in a row at terminal velocity.

After we were done with the clinics, the Guatemalan team headed back down to Guatemala City while the Gringoes, Makko, Tito, Ashley, two America Latina stu

dents, and I headed up to Tikal which was another 6 hour drive up north. Tikal is the site of the oldest Mayan ruins and has to do with the whole 2012 stuff. On the drive up, we were stopped by military soldiers for a random traffic stop. I’m not exactly sure what the purpose was for stopping us. Maybe to see if we were narcotic smugglers so that they could get a bribe for turning a blind eye? Regardless, they stopped us and had us

all get out of the van so that they could see our passports. Now I have been told before about stuff like this and been advised to at least carry a copy of my passport on me at all times. Since I do not want my passport to be stolen, I usually leave the original passport safe at Tito’s place and then take a copy with me in my backpack in case I need to prove identification. Well the time came for me to hand my passport to the intimidating Guatemalan soldier with the M-16, and I handed him my copy assuming that it would be okay. He looks at me and at the paper quite puzzled and I try to explain to him in Spanish how I don’t carry the original because I don’t want it to get stolen, but that it is a copy of the original. I failed to see Tito in the background giving me this horrified look which apparently meant, “Don’t speak Spanish...You need to act as ignorantly Gringo as possible!” The guard looked at the paper and then back at me and said these three terrifying words: “No es legal.”

Instantly, my heart pounded as I envisioned myself grasping the bars of a Guatemalan prison with eyes as big as saucers, holding up the tattered copy of my passport as an emaciated dog dangles keys to my cell from its mouth while hardened Guatemalan criminals snicker at me in the background. I definitely would not do well in prison. Thank God, that he apparently was trying to just intimidate me since he said something random and then decided to let us all pass. Needless to say, I learned my lesson and will now always have the correct documentation with me at hand.

We finally reached Tikal and stayed at this place called the Jungle Lodge. Tikal is dead center in the jungle and it had to the flora and fauna to prove it. Every bug was at least twice the normal size and we had to sleep with giant mosquito nets over our beds. Fortunately, while others experienced sleepless nights with stinging centipedes landing on their chest or scorpions near their shoes, Tito and I enj

oyed a very restful night.

Well, except for me constantly scratching at the multitude of mosquito bites I got from the days before on the beach at the resort. While the church group had a formalized tour with a guide, Tito, me, and two of the America Latina students (Josue and Jerson) took the express tour on our own. The ruins were definitely impressive, though it would have been nice to hear some more of the history behind them. We left at about 1pm to head back to Guatemala City which was an 8-9 hour drive while the Gringoes took a 45 minute flight overhead. However, because it got dark and the roads became dangerous trying to pass the slow trucks with about 2 feet visibility distance on the poorly lit roads, Tito decided to put us up in another hotel in the night and do the rest of the trip in the morning. It was quite the adventure, especially finishing it with Josue putting his feet on the seat in front of us to find a live scorpion crawling on his sock. It must have traveled with us all the way from Tikal and I could only imagine all the other critters that were probably rummaging through my bags.

We finally arrived in Guatemala City yesterday afternoon, and went out as a family to one of their favorite restaurants: TGI Fridays. Then afterwards Alejandro, Tito, and I got a haircut at this kids haircut place. I could not get over how hilarious it was that in a children’s haircut parlor they played music videos of rock bands from the 80s with outrageous hair playing songs like Final Countdown. I felt so proud because Alejandro asked specifically to get a haircut that looked like mine (well minus the blonde dye of course). Brenda and Tito told me that Alejandro really wanted to look like me and that even if the haircut didn’t turn out right I still needed to tell him it looked like mine. :) It actually turned out great and I got my first Guatemalan haircut as well and was quite impressed....especially since it only cost $5! Those rip-offs at Great Clips are crooks having charged me $14 all these years!

Well, I need to start resting some more because I have been having continual bouts with some uninvited GI critters. The food we have been eating on the road not only does not compare to Brenda’s cooking, but probably is not the best for my stomach which has still not converted from Gringo to Chapin (Guatemalan). Yesterday I had my first experience with Chicharrones (Guatemalan Pork Rinds) which I found disgusting but they absolutely love here.

Lastly, I wanted to thank you all so much those who are praying for me on this trip. Especially this past clinic off in the jungle, I realized how I am so at peace here. God has definitely quieted my heart to the anxieties I have had regarding school and other aspects of my future, and I feel so content simply existing in the present. It has been a unique experience and I truly feel like I am just resting in the Hand of God each day I spend here. While I am looking forward to starting school this fall and beginning a new adventure, God has made me so content and at peace with where I am now at this exact moment in time. For someone who has trouble with worrying and anxiety like I do, it has been such a refreshing experience. However, I do not doubt that a large reason for God’s peace that passes understanding during this time is thanks to the prayers of so many of you. This trip has definitely convinced me more of the power that prayer has to not only strengthen one’s relationship with God, but to also tangibly effect change in our world. So I thank you all so much for those who are praying for me, and want to let you know that it is absolutely making a difference.

I will leave you with some verses which many of us have heard before, but I hope God will use as a restful reassurance for you.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?...Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” ---Matthew 6:25-34

Week of Women

Well today has finished week 2 of my journey here in Guatemala. A lot of stuff has happened since my last post. The beginning of this week we went to Palencia for our first clinic. Here I worked intake, which I am very comfortable doing since that is the main job I have done in the past. Basically I greet each new patient and ask them about their chief complaint and get their vitals and old records. Because we are trying to see so many people, we have three people working at this station. I talked to the

patients and I enjoyed the help from two wonderful assistants, Paula and Geovanna. They are two students from America Latina (the large Christian school in Guatemala City) who came with a group of their friends to help. They did a fantastic job getting vitals and digging up old records.

I always love working intake because you get to greet every patient that comes through clinic. While I don’t really get a chance to talk to them about Jesus because we are moving so quickly to see patients, these people are coming with a lot of burdens. Just smiling and being a friendly person can be the initial actions of sharing the love of Christ without explicitly saying it. In the beginning, I have a list of the patients for the day and I call out their name in order for them to come to be seen. However, sometimes I call and either it takes awhile for people to come or they simply are not there. It was very funny, because this one woman sat near our table and whenever I would call out a name and nobody responded for awhile, she would say stuff like, “They’re not here!” or “They are not coming” or something like that. Eventually she said it so many times (although she was often right) that I joked with her, “I think you’re just saying that so you can move up in line!” We all laughed and took a picture together where she primped herself beforehand so she would look good with the Gringo canche (“blondie”). She actually reminded me of some of the frequent flyers we had in the ER, since

I’m pretty sure she had quite an extensive history with our clinics.

Nevertheless, in this situation in Guatemala, I am GLAD that we have frequent flyers. Tito has created a relationship with this city through the Christian school in the town and by having clinics there on a more regular basis. It is amazing to see how God is using La Mision’s regular clinics to change the health of this city, both physical and spiritual. I have not been here in two years and I was shocked when I would talk to some patients and they would tell me about how they felt their blood pressure was high when before if I would have asked them about their blood pressure, they would have not even known what I was talking about. One lady said her blood sugar was high and even told me her most recent glucose level! It is incredible to see the importance of health education and how much we take for granted in the states just simply KNOWING about basic health principles (though we may not exactly obey them as we are pulling up to get our Treinta sized Starbucks while manhandling a Big Mac).

A special mission of this group of women from the states was to pray for different groups of people wherever they went. They held a workshop for the teachers of Palencia while we were there. Also while I was there I was able to meet

my new sponsor child, Manuel, and his mother since they were patients in the clinic. While I miss my old sponsor child, it is nice to have met my new one in order to more specifically pray for him and his family. When I asked him what he wants to be when he grows up he said a “forensic doctor” which I’m thinking is something like a medical examiner. How impressive! I don’t think I even know what that was when I was his age!

Everytime I come here I work with students from America Latina Christian private schools. All these kids are so motivated and often end up being the doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc. of the country. However, I have never actually learned about or seen the public schools. Apparently, the public schools are incredibly overcrowded, and the children can barely hear what the teachers are saying and the school buildings are incredibly run down. However, this trip was my first time visiting this small Christian school that the women from Reach Beyond Borders have been supporting. It was started back in 1994 by our friend Rosita’s mother, Rosa. The story behind it is absolutely amazing to me.

After Rosita got married and moved out of the house, Rosa was very lonely. These children would come by everyday asking for food, and she didn’t understand why they weren’t in school or where their parents were. They

were from the slums and didn’t have a school to go to. Therefore, Rosa took them in and would feed them on the condition that they took a shower in her home. This developed into her educating them in her home and eventually running a full first grade. So many children came for education that they had to find another place. To make a long story short, after many years, pray

ers, and being kicked out of buildings due to lack of funding for rent, they have now found a new building that hopefully they can stay at. It is truly incredible to hear how this woman’s ministry has blossomed from her living room to a school of 220 kids grades K-6, run solely on faith. These kids don’t even have sponsors in the states like the ones from America Latina! It is run entirely on faith. People donate occasionally from the states through organizations like Reach Beyond Borders and Compassion International, but every month is a step of faith. These children are beautiful and would fold their little hands and bow their little hands as the women from RBB prayed for every classroom.

It has been amazing to me to see how the rest of the world must educate their children--often with muddy cement or dirt floors. Yes our schools could use some work and are often under-funded, but compared to the rest of the world, we should be thankful for what we have. We constantly are striving to be #1 in the world in everything, from our science and math education to our economy. If we are even “slipping” into the #2 spot in the world in anything, we freak out and act as if we are just terrible in whatever and need to completely revamp it before falling behind. Yes, I am grateful for growing up in such an “earthly” successful country and that I will be getting the best medical education in the world. However, I think at times we need to step back and look at what it’s like to be #47 in the world in something, instead of perpetually fretting over being less than #1.

On a different note, Rosita told us a tragic story about one of the students from the school. One night, one of the students who was only around 11 years old was looking for his mother who was drunk. The little boy was wandering around in the slums and taverns looking for her. No one knows how but this precious child was killed and his body was not found until 2 days later. Grieving the child, they held a service for him a week later at an evangelical church. One of the boy’s friends who also went to the school years earlier came to the service but stood outside since he was Catholic and did not feel comfortable coming into an evangelical church. Apparently, this boy was being pressured by the local gang to join them, but he refused. Nevertheless, while waiting outside the funeral, the gang came by and killed him right in front of the church. Rosita told us that after this happened, for the next week the children at the school were dead quiet in shock at what had happened to their peers.

While this is such a tragic story, and I didn’t know how to feel about it, seeing the school that day with the children laughing and playing and getting a Christian education, almost seemed like a river running through a desert. All these children easily could have gone a different path living in the slums--they could have been involved in gangs, addicted to drugs, or probably dead. But God took them from that dark place, placed a fire inside Rosa to protect these innocent children, and continually miraculously keeps that school going. Yes it is a small school and merely a drop in the bucket in relation to the problems in Guatemala City, the country of Guatemala, and the world. But despite Satan’s cruel attempts to tear this world apart, through this school providing quality education grounded in the Bible, God is restoring His creation...one ch

ild at a time.

Tomorrow the RBB women leave and today a new team of high school seniors comes from Tennessee. Tomorrow we leave for the “hot place” to do four days of clinics. I will probably be out of internet contact, thus I am trying to finish a blog post now. Please pray for safety as we travel and increased sweat gland production as we do clinics in 109 degree humid jungle. I LOVE this clinic because we really go out and serve some intensely poor and indigenous people. But overtime through La Mision’s continual ministry there, this part of Guatemala is changing. Please pray for God working through

the lives of these people and through me. God has definitely been working on my heart. I don’t really have a whole lot of time to write about it since we are packing up. But after my experience in the St. Clare ER my heart was somewhat hardened towards patients because of the difficult patient clientele we had there. However, I believe that God is working on softening this somewhat calloused heart towards patients. It is easy here because these people have nothing, but I pray to return to the United States with a renewed passion for serving and loving patients, even if they do manipulate me for narcotics. Dr. Robyn who is down here with me said something interesting, which I hope to integrate into my practice. “I would rather be scammed several times for drugs than miss one person who truly needs my help.”

So my goal for this trip is for peace before med school (which He is giving me more and more) and for getting back the bleeding heart idealism that I used to have before working with the pleasant patients of Lakewood. Thank you so much for your prayers and please keep them coming!

En Cristo,

Justin

PS. I am not complaining at all about my job just FYI. It was a priceless experience that I always will thank God for. And without it, I wouldn’t have gotten to know the awesome staff at St. Clare!

Week 1

(I apologize for the formatting problems...I'm still trying to figure this blog out.

Well I have been here almost a week. When I arrived, Tito was on a trip, so Brenda and Tito’s mom picked me up from the airport. (For those of you just starting this journey with me, Tito is the doctor who is in charge and founded this medical missions organization. I live with him, his lovely wife Brenda, and their two sons Alejandro and Pablo. They adopt me as part of their family and it is such an awesome relationship dynamic that we share. However, my new hair is definitely not something the Guatemalans envy. Brenda was like “you had such beautiful hair, why did you paint it!” (In truth, it’s kinda of starting to grow on me...I can see more horror on my mom’s face now).

Naturally, when I arrived at the Palacios home, there were black beans and steaming tortillas awaiting me. The next morning Brenda and I went to pick up Alejandro and Pablo from their school. It was so neat to see how they have grown and that they still remember me as their big brother. (One of many since different gringos are always staying with them). At least THEY appreciated the hair. Alejandro’s first word was, “WOW.” They are both speaking English so much better, especially Alejandro. The rule for him is that he only speaks to me in English.

One of the first mornings, Tito took me to a conference that he had to go to for credits for continuing his medical education like we have in the States. I guess this requirement for Guatemalan doctors just started recently. The conference was held at a restaurant and was a short presentation about seizures, their different classifications, and effective treatments. It is always so interesting to me to see the universality of both my passions: Christianity and medicine. One of the biggest reasons I am entering medicine is the fact that what I learn in med school is what people are learning throughout the world, though in different languages. Nevertheless, we all are working to make the human condition better through treating and healing diseases which plague us all, regardless of what culture and country we are from.

This past week was spent primarily in the office working to prepare for when the teams of gringo

s come down over the next several months. I was pleased to find that the organizational system we

made for the pharmacy for the most part has endured these past two years--a feat which is quite rare here. Most of the time,

because interns are constantly coming and going, there is not much consistency when we try

to organize things. However, I still created a hefty job for myself compiling all the medicines we bring on the clinics into a master list that you only have to look at one list to figure out where the medicines are.

While this is my third time, it is definitely a new experience. Many of the people that worked with La Mision when I was here have moved onto other things. There are two new Guatemalan doctors who are in their last year of school before residency and a new dentist who just graduated. While I definitely miss my old motley Guatemalan crew, the new staff is nice and I hope we have a great time working together.

This trip I really wanted to make a concerted effort to continue working out once in awhile down her

e. So, even though it was humid, I made up my mind to turn on that darn treadmill in my guest room and get to running. Well, that lasted a good 20 minutes before my knees hurt, I got lightheaded, and was sweating up a storm. Pablo and Alejandro just stared at me and laughed. Sweet little Pablo tried to help encourage me by turning on the TV to some Spanish Disney Channel teeny-bopper show, but to no avail. Then I thought it would be a good idea that since I wasn’t doing a great job running,

I would still try to do some push ups and sit ups. Well, as you can see from the photo of my room

, there is not exactly a ton of space for calisthenics. Plus the tile floor proved difficult for a variety of reasons. The worst of which was that the deluge of sweat I was excreting created a slippery mess on the ground that several times almo

s

t caused my hands to slip while doing push

ups nearly breaking my nose. While that would have been an interesting beginning to this trip, I guess God decided to spare me that embarrassment.

Today, however, God decided NOT to spare me the embarrassment of some pretty horrendous tummy troubles. Normally my problem with changing to the Guatemalan diet is “estreñamiento” or constipation. However, after having two meals of chinese food yesterday and

taking my weekly dose of anti-malarial pills, let’s just say that my problem got fixed...in spades.

Yesterday, an all female team arrived of women who have been coming down here the past 11 years or so. They did a Bible study with some teachers and are going to help with a clinic. It is so incredible to me to see their commitme

nt to Tito, his family, and all the people of Guatemala. Brenda and I spent the majority of the day in the kitchen cooking the biggest vat of spaghetti sauce in the world, while Pablo enjoyed playing Michael Jackson songs on my iPhone.

It has been so wonderful to be back with these gracious and faithful people. It always strikes me how integral prayer and faith is in their lives. Prayer for them is like the breath they breathe. And it’s not like something to cross off their “Good Christian Checklist.” It’s something that they truly believe God protects them, answers them, and provid

es for them through prayer. They look for and see God’s hand in everything. It’s always so convicting to my faith since often I honestly don’t believe in the true tangible power of prayer. Today was a beautiful new experience because we had our church service and then went to a pool for the baptisms of people in the church. I

never get over the awesome concept of the global church and how God is the same everywhere.

Well, it is time to sign off, but thanks again so much to those of you praying for me. I feel so comfortable and at peace, which was one of my biggest prayers for this trip. Things are going to start getting crazy around here over the next 6 weeks with new teams coming and clinics to be done, but I am so excited. Gracias a Dios.