March 2001, Honduras
“The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.” Isaiah 2:11
In March of 2001, in addition to our trip to the north coast of Honduras, Quenton also took us high into the mountains outside of the city of Limon, where he lived, to a small village named La Fortuna. Quenton had been visiting this village before we came and he hoped that one day it would become a church plant.
Each morning Jack, Jennifer and Patrick started off with Quenton in his cantankerous truck. The engine had to be finessed into life by using a screw driver under the hood and the windshield wipers no longer worked. This was rainy season so we knew that might come back to bite us at some point.
The road up the mountain became progressively narrower the higher we went. It was only wide enough for one vehicle as it leveled off. On the left side of the road was the mountain, on the right side was a drop off of hundreds of feet. We made it a point not to look down. We hated to think about what would happen if we met another vehicle coming toward us. Of course, it happened one morning on the way to La Fortuna and Quenton had to back the truck up for quite a way until he found a spot that was just wide enough for the other truck to get around us. That alone was pretty scary.
Quenton loved telling us stories of the dangers of the road. The dirt road was made of clay and when it would rain, the clay would become as slick as ice. On a previous trip to La Fortuna, Quenton’s truck slid on the mud and he was unable to stop it from sliding over the side of the cliff! Praying as he fell, he knew this was certain death, but the Lord in His mercy broke the fall with a tree growing sideways out of the cliff! There the truck rested precariously while Quenton slowly climbed out and was able to climb up the cliff to the road, and walk home. He was able to retrieve the truck later with some help.
His next story was equally disconcerting, as he told of being held up by bandits at gun point and being relieved of his truck. Again he made the long walk home but was thankful they hadn’t killed him, like they usually would, when stealing a vehicle. Any thought of buying a nicer, newer truck were removed from his thinking after this experience.
After sharing all of these fun facts with us he told us that he would be staying overnight that night in La Fortuna but we could drive the truck back to Limon and come back out in the morning. It took us about five seconds to say “We’ll stay overnight with you!” He said we might not be comfortable there because he was going to be sleeping in the school building and there were fleas. He said he usually pushed the desks together and slept on top of them. We assured him that we would be fine with those arrangements and we would be glad to join him.
So we worked all day in another building having our dental clinic and removing a lot of teeth. Jack was glad he was able to save some of the decayed teeth by doing fillings on them. A number of people wanted all their teeth removed so they could get “a plaqua” – a denture, when they could get some money. We usually didn’t go along with this as that would leave them without anything to chew with. Who knew when they would have the money for a plaqua or a way to get into town to have one made? Some teenage girls wanted their upper two front teeth removed so they could have gold teeth put in and look stylish. We refused because there was nothing wrong with their teeth! They weren’t happy with us.
Quenton had told us that La Ceiba, and the north coast area, was considered the “Wild West” of Honduras. In La Fortuna, all the young men wore cowboy boots with spurs and were very macho as they had their teeth removed. They didn’t flinch while receiving an injection or during the treatment. They ignored us when we greeted them and as they sat for treatment and they left without a word, not even looking at us. Quenton said this was a hard village to reach out to with the gospel and he hadn’t had much response. No one seemed interested in what he was sharing. He wanted to share an evangelistic film in the village that night, after the sun went down, and he didn’t want to drive home in the dark. The fact that Quenton, who took just about everything in stride, didn’t want to travel the road in the dark told us we had made the right decision in staying overnight in the village. He didn’t know how people would react to the story of Jesus’ crucifixion because their hearts seemed hard against the gospel. Quenton had the disadvantage of being a “gringo” plus one who was sharing something other than the official religion of the country, which had been the accepted religion of Honduras for generations. We wondered if anyone would even come when the “Jesus” film was shown.
To our surprise the entire village turned out for the movie, including the young men! It was probably more that it was a novel thing to have a movie shown in the village than any real interest in the subject material. Everyone sat quietly and respectfully and seemed moved by what they were seeing. (We were just about to sit down with them on a log when someone jumped up yelling that there were fire ants in the log.)
They were very excited that Jesus knew how to speak Spanish! It seemed to make Him one of them that He spoke their language. We smiled at this as they didn’t realize it was just translated into their language. That night the hard hearted were softened by Jesus’ loving treatment of the sick and the poor. They clearly heard the gospel and saw how He gave his life to pay for their sins. Some wanted to talk to Quenton about Jesus after the film was over!
It was a beautiful sight to see all of this and we were so glad we didn’t miss it! It was a good lesson learned. God has a way of working in the most unexpected places and people. In God’s economy, there are often blessings at the end of a bad road! We were glad we risked the uncomfortable prospect of sleeping where there would be fleas, especially when we realized that the fleas couldn’t jump as high as the top of the desks in the schoolroom!