right now // november 2014

READJUSTING to elevation changes. Traveling between Colorado Springs (around 6,000) ft) to Houston (about 75 ft) to Honduras (2,600 ft) in the span of one day was enough to make our bodies go crazy! Thankfully we are starting to feel back to normal, but if the elevation change wasn't enough, the weather was quite a shock as well! It was about ONE degree Fahrenheit when we landed to attend the EMI Conference. Very different than what we are used too! But nevertheless, thankful for the time of learning and fellowship.

RESTING from lots of computer screen time. The Total Water website is finally launched and Lesley is enjoying looking at the computer screen LESS this week. Once you stare at the same thing for too long, your mind starts to play tricks on you. Go check out her hard work at www.totalwater.org and don't forget to share about Total Water for Giving Tuesday (Dec. 2nd)!

CONSIDERING putting the Christmas tree up early... like before Thanksgiving early. Normally, we are very respectful toward the order of the holidays and decorate for Christmas starting the day after Thanksgiving!! But we're considering it because we won't be here to enjoy the tree on Christmas day (which is okay, because we'll be with our families instead this year!) and because we just want to feel like the holidays in always-summer Honduras. Speaking of the holidays, we are...

SEARCHING for easy peasy Thanksgiving recipes. Pray for us as we Lesley will be cooking a Thanksgiving meal by herself with one mini-sized oven, that only has one shelf (gasp!), and that runs on gas (so we'll need to conserve baking times). Last year we played it low key, but this year we have some curious Honduran friends that are being introduced to Thanksgiving food for the first time. We want to do it justice! First item on the list, bake the pumpkin pie the day before.

GETTING creative with crafts that only use paper + glue, because that's what we have the largest quantities of. Most recently, we tried braiding paper at the CDI! Check out these awesome bracelets (or ties, or bookmarks, or belts, or whatever the kids want). These kids are rockstars, and get a kick out of the simplest things!




WONDERING where the time has gone. This month we celebrated ONE YEAR in our host country! Somehow the time seems to go by faster here? Or maybe it's just because we aren't always aware of exactly of what day it is like we were back in the States, and work always spills over to the next day and the next with all that needs to be done, so the day called "Friday" sneaks up on us a bit! Sending a big Thank You to everyone who has supported us and prayed for us this year! Seriously, this ministry wouldn't be possible with each one of you!

INDULGING in anything chai flavored. Chai Tea of course, but we've also gotten into putting chai spices in other things, like cookies. Can you make chai cinnamon rolls? We don't know, but we might figure it out soon!

PRAYING for the two local civil engineers that Jamey is currently discipling. Praying that he is an example to them, and they that would begin to take interest in being open to the Gospel. Praying that they will continue to strive towards integrity-driven professional work, and that they would want to learn more about what has changed our hearts towards wanting to do good for all people.

PLAYING just a little bit more as we are wrapping up the Honduran public school year. The kids studied hard for their exams (well, and crammed a bit too) and they will be receiving their final grades in about a week. Then the government gave them surprise extra school days after their exams were over, with just a days notice, because that's just the kind of thing that happens here and no one really understands! Now they are receiving some well deserved extra play time at the CDI, which many of them don't get very often... time to play with other kids their age, in a safe area, without worrying about anything else. We have plans for a very creative cardboard Christmas tree before we break for the holidays!

5 ways to pray for Honduras

1.) Violence - there are many news reports that depict Honduras as one of the most dangerous countries in the world due to the violence. This comes from the amount of poverty, lack of police force, and corruption within the government. Unfortunately, a lot of times the police force are criminals too.  Even many of our friends don't trust the police.

Pray specifically for this violence to end, for the protection of the innocent people who are involved in this.
Pray that the Gospel transforms the lives of the criminals and the people within the Honduran government and they start to lead as Biblical leaders.
Pray for the safety of people in Honduras especially in areas where it is unsafe to even be outside.

2.) Good Works - Do to the large Catholic background here in Latin America, many people believe it takes "good works" in order for them to spend eternity in heaven.  We've come across many people here who have told us they don't think they will go to heaven that day because they haven't done "enough good things" to be forgiven.  It's very hard because there are many people who don't know why they believe this, only because it has been bred into them by parents, grandparents, even great-grandparents.

Pray that God will open up their hearts to the message of the Gospel, that they will understand that it is by grace that you are saved and that Jesus is the only way to heaven.
Pray not only that they will understand this so that they can spend eternity in heaven, but also so they can have a personal relationship with Jesus while they are still on this earth and feel purpose in their lives.

3.) Food Shortage - Due to the large drought in Central America during this rainy season, we are expected to experience the worst food shortage in 2015 since Hurricane Mitch that devastated the country in 1998.  We've already seen prices rises in supermarkets of staple items like beans and rice due to failed harvests especially in Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua.

Pray for all of the families that will be affected by this and that God will provide for them.  $0.30 a pound increase in beans may not seem like a lot, but to the people here, it is a huge amount of increase as 60% of the population live on less than $2 a day.
Pray specifically for the children at our Children's Development Center and their families as they will be greatly affected by this.
Pray for God to provide our center the resources to help these families and be the hands and feet of Jesus if needed.  

4.) Lack of Sanitation - A lot of work has been accomplished in the last decade for clean water and sanitation in Central America, but it is still greatly lacking.  In Honduras alone, 954,000 people still lack access to safe drinking water and 1.6 million people lacked access to improved sanitation.  When we say "improved sanitation" that doesn't necessarily mean they have a toilet, it could only mean they have a latrine that has treatment.  Only 74% of rural Honduras have access to these "improved" sanitation sources.

Pray against the diseases that are caused by lack of sanitation and for the people who are sick because of it.  A child dies every 20 seconds because of a diarrheal illness that could be prevented with adequate sanitation.
Pray for ministries around the world who are trying to combat this humanitarian injustice and are sharing the Living Water through this.
Pray for us, Great Commission Latin America, as an organization who are in the process developing a water and sanitation project here in Danli. Though it takes a lot of effort, funds, communication, and education to start efforts like these, we know that this is not how God desires His children to be living and we want to help solve this problem. Pray for us as we raise awareness, raise funds, meet with government agencies, and as we share the love of Jesus. Pray that God will use us for His will.

5.) Education - 60% of the population in Honduras live under the international poverty line and a large part of this is due to lack of education. The public school systems here are stretched very thin with very little funding. Most kids only go to school at most 4 hours a day, if they choose to go every day.  There is no requirement for children to go to school in Honduras.  If they can afford it, most parents send their children to private schools, but because the income gap is so large here the families in poverty will never be able to do that. A lot of children have to drop out of school at age 14 or 15 to help their families with the bills and never complete high school, thus furthering the cycle of poverty.  Most families in poverty live for today, and can't think about the future.  The goal of the Children's Development Center is to help and encourage our kids to complete high school and provide them with the resources to do that.

Pray for children to stay in school, finish high school and to have the desire to do this.  Pray they understand the importance of education and how they can use it to change their family.
Pray for the Children's Development Center's efforts in helping bring up Christian men and women and encourging/helping them complete high school.  Pray that God gives us wisdom in this ministry.

training // a double weekend wrap-up & a birthday

We are loving Colorado and our time spent in community with fellow missionaries about to enter the field so much that we wanted to share about some of our other great experiences here outside of class while you wait for our "part 2" portion of what we're learning about at training. This Saturday marks the end of our training and the end of our cross-cultural training portion of the training. Be on the lookout after that to hear from us on all that we have learned from this second half of training soon!

Our second weekend in Colorado, we went on an adventure out to the Garden of the Gods -- a spot that everyone had told us was a do not miss! We went with our close friends we've made here, Casey and Keri. It was such a beautiful day and the sun was so warm coming down on us. The rock formations were awesome and we saw a lot of registered rock climbers enjoying the park, and even accidentally happened upon a wedding! Here are some pictures of the beauty: 

Then after lunch, we headed to this little town called Manitou Springs just to explore. We were quickly told by a local townie that there were 7 naturally carbonated springs full of different minerals that we needed to try while we were there! People have been drinking from them for hundreds of years because of the health benefits of the mineral contents, and each one of them tastes completely different.

Pictures from three different springs that we found & tried!

Well, since we were just along for the ride of whatever this town had to offer, we went off to find them! They were truly very different from each other just as had been described to us! Thankfully that sweet lady had also given us some little cups to use so we didn't just dunk our faces in. :) 

Lesley's birthday was on the following Thursday, but we can still count it in the double weekend wrap-up, right? Well, it was the deepest, most stressful day of our training but Jamey made sure we still celebrated it well! He had a surprise cake brought out at our community lunch AND took Lesley out for a dinner date complete with an ice cream run! It was so great to get our own little alone time away from the training center. 

Our new friends at MTI also helped make Lesley's birthday extra special as well! It was so amazing. They decorated our room door with signs, balloons, and gifts and were so, so gracious to us and showed us that they have been really been paying attention to things we like! They thoughtfully stocked Lesley up on her favorite candy, tea, a Spanish gift bag, AND got her a new Camelbak water bottle for Honduras since her's was breaking. It was such a blessing! She also got mailed cards and gifts from family, including a beautiful arrangement of flowers! She felt so loved and at home for our first birthday away from Virginia.

This past weekend, we intentionally spent time having a more calm down time since our lives will be getting much crazier and more fast-paced as soon as we leave training. On Saturday morning, Jamey spent time with 4 other friends tackling a really difficult 1500 piece puzzle, and Lesley had a ladies coffee & tea morning with her small group here to share our life stories with one another. 

We then went out to Red Robin for lunch to get Lesley's free birthday burger (and endless fries!!) and something wonderful happened.... 

...... our HOKIES were on the tv right in front of us! While we were in Colorado! It was wonderful! 

Later on that day, Lesley spent the afternoon babysitting for a couple she's gotten to know here that has four kids so that they could go on one last huge shopping trip to get everything they need to move to Niger. Jamey got invited to go play mini golf (where he got completely beat!), and we spent the rest of the day just resting our bodies and minds. 

We were overjoyed on Sunday when we found a church that we really loved with awesome biblical teaching. We and our friends left feeling so refreshed from the sermon; it was exactly what we needed, especially after the draining week we had. Then for the rest of the day, Jamey went on a hike with a bunch of the guys from our training class, and Lesley had re-doing nail polish party with some of the little girls & their moms, and painted a lot of tiny little polka dots on tiny little finger nails. :) 

We having been SOAKING in the wealth of knowledge we are receiving here, and we are so excited to share it with you in just few short days! Please be praying with us that our last days here will go well, as well as our goodbyes with our great new friends. 

newsletter // july 2013

Our latest newsletter to share with you! We would so appreciate you taking the time to read the prayer requests included, and pray with us about them. As always, please let us know if you'd like to join the list to have these emailed to you personally. If so, you can email Jamey at jamey.smith@gcmweb.org.

(Click the photo to make it a readable size!)

prayer request // this morning

We have a short prayer request this morning to ask our readers to pray for. As you could probably guess, there are some things that we are having to take care of before we leave for Honduras, and one of those is happening this morning -- Jamey is having his wisdom teeth removed! We've known for a little while that this needed to happen, and we're glad to go ahead have it done. Now we both know that this has become a pretty routine procedure in medicine these days (I've already had this procedure, actually!), but it is the first time that Jamey has ever been put under anesthesia. And let's be honest, that's enough to make anyone nervous! So please be praying this morning over Jamey's surgery, the doctor's and nurses' hands, and for Jamey's nerves. Pray that God will remind him of his control in the situation, and the fear that we never have to have with knowing the Lord in any situation we come to.

A comforting lyrics that have blessed us this morning:

"Whom shall I fear?
I know Who goes before me
I know Who stands behind
The God of angel armies
Is always by my side
The One who reigns forever
He is a friend of mine
The God of angel armies
Is always by my side"

Isn't it incredible that God goes before us in every aspect of our everyday lives? Not only has He gone before Jamey's surgery, but God went before us in our marriage, He went before us in this ministry team development process, and He has already gone before us to prepare our place in Honduras! Praise the Lord! He is so good.

sending love,
Lesley