Tree of Life Ministries

Hi Everyone! I'm sorry it has been so long. I have been super busy and when I do have free time I've been trying to soak up as much time as possible with friends. I only have 22 more days! It's really sad. I wanted to write a little more about Tree of Life Ministries:

"In the middle of its street, and on either side of the river was the tree of life, which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations." -Revelations 22:2

Tree of Life's slogan is Find a Need, Meet the Need, Change a Nation. I want to break that down for you a little bit more.

Find a Need:

Honduras is one of the poorest nations in the western hemisphere. Many small villiages deal with deadly parasites, no electricity or potable water, and disregard all medical and dental needs. There are no churches, no leadership, and a sense of hopelessness. School past the 6th grade is expensive and hard to reach. Most just stop going. This sense of hopelessness is then passed down from generation to generation.

Meet the Need:

Tree of Life is working to correct this vicious cycle continuing in families. They do everything from bringing food and clothing to mountain villiages, to offering Bible School to new pastors, to planting churches, to supplying villiage elementary schools. They also hold leadership and pastoral conferences and lead American medical teams into remote villiages. Tree of Life's way of meeting needs is as diverse as the needs themself.

Of course they also have Plan Escalon. This is where I am staying and where most of my work has been. Plan Escalon is a school for kids from 7th grade to 12th. They come on scholarship which they fill by working at the school everyday. The boys cut grass and do different building projects while the girls cook and clean. It's a great way for them to earn their education.

Change a Nation:

Revelations 22:2 talks about how the very leaves of the tree were doing the healing. This is the heart of Tree of Life Ministries, to equip the people of Honduras to change their nation. Pastor Guy, the director of Tree of Life, has always said that if anything ever happened to him where he had to leave the country, he wanted Tree of Life to be able to run without him. And it can. They have raised up Honduran leaders that now basically run the ministry. By educating these young people, they are giving them hope and a chance to go back to their villiages and make a difference. By doing this, God willing, the next generation will have a different outlook on life and will be filled with the hope that only comes from Christ. It's a beautiful process.

So that's a little more about Tree of Life. On a personal note, I have a few prayer requests:

1. I have a head cold. It's not bad, but it makes speaking Spanish even more difficult.
2. English classes-some days are good, some days are terrible. So it goes, I suppose.
3. I will hopefully be traveling to the mountains either tomorrow or Thursday to deliver some food and clothing. It's always an adventure, but well worth it to talk and have fellowship with the mountain people.
4. As always, continued prayer for Tree of Life and what they are doing. They need energy, discernment, and patience. Tree of Life was not set up to have immediate rewards. It's a slow process of building relationships and showing God's love to a group of people who feel like the rest of the world does not care about them.

That's all for now. I'll try to update it a little sooner next time. I love you all.

Learning How to Teach

I am now in my second week of teaching English to the staff and leaders here at Plan Escalon. I teach a class at 9 o'clock and 12 o'clock. As you can imagine, this has been a challenge. Except for dance, I have never taught a day in my life. Now I'm teaching English in a language I am just learning myself. Yeeeah.

Needless to say, some days have been better than others. To be frank, it has been frustrating. I want my students, who are also my friends outside of class, to learn a lot, but at the same time I want them to have fun while learning. It's a difficult balance. I have been making them memorize their favorite verse in English, learn a certain amount of verbs a day and practice speaking English in conversation. 9 and 12 have quickly become my least favorite parts of the day. I don't want that. I have other jobs here, but teaching is my main one. I want to enjoy it if possible.

So I have spent a lot of the last week and a half in prayer. What am I supposed to do? How can I use my gifts to teach these adults? Yesterday, I woke up with the answer. I love to teach dance. Why is that? Because it's interactive. I have never been one to learn by sitting and listening to lecture, so why would I think I would teach like that?

This morning, my class took a field trip. I took them out around campus and just talked. We discussed what we saw. Rocks, trees, buildings, anything and everthing. I then took them back to my kitchen where we talked about potatoes, cabbage and knives. They were so exicited to be doing something other than memorizing verbs from a dry-erase board they made me a Honduran breakfast. It was wonderful. I love Honduran food or "comida Hondurana".

To sum it all up, God is faithful. I really believe the eureka moment I had yesterday morning was not my own thought but straight from God. My students said they learned more today than all of the other days my class combined. I am learning how to teach. Or better, I am learning how I teach. It's a good feeling.

You Say You Want a Revolution?

Greetings Friends and Family,

I just wanted to write a quick note to all of you who have been reading the news about Honduras.

First of all, I am safe. The capital, where most of the action is taking place, is around 4 or 5 hours away from where I am. It's very peaceful here. If not for the news, we wouldn't even know something was going on. Just to make sure, we called the Embassy to make sure I and another group of Americans that are here for the week are indeed safe. They said yes, that we all just fine. Tree of Life also has contacts in the government that are prepared to protect the ministry as a whole.

For the most accurate news on what's going on, go to google and type in "Wallstreet Journal News On Honduras". They seem to have the best and most accurate.

I am very thankful for all of your prayers, but rest easy, I am safe. I would love it if you would pray for Honduras as a whole right now. I don't want to get into the politics of who is right and who is wrong, it seems to be much more complicated than that, but no matter what we are making history right now, and I feel privileged to be apart of it.

In other news, my English Classes have begun. They are going well. I teach at 9, 12 and 6 everyday. I really like it. More on this later. I love you all.

God Bless,
Katelyn