The Gospel: in Guatemala

Thank you for taking the time to read this blog entry. For those of you who were aware my travel, thank you for all your prayer for the work that God was doing in Guatemala and thank you for all your prayers concerning preparation of the hearts, safety, and His blessing on my team. I hope that reading this entry can help you gain some insight of some of the things that I experienced and the power of God in this specfic part of the world. This trip was life changing for me and I hope that it can be an encouragement to your faith, and that because of what He is doing in my life; may it show you of His power and His plans. Thank you and I hope you enjoy reading.

It’s been quite sometime since my last entry. Starting college and having 18 credit hours this second semester has been quite the challenge, on top of that, I was pulled out of school for two weeks to attend an annual obligatory training for the Army. Leaving school for two weeks was something that I was trying to prevent, but the logistics didn’t work out quite too well. My unit had only allowed me to come to school for two Fridays to attend my chemistry laboratory that I absolutely could not miss. Missing three would result in an automatic failure. While there are laws that prevent soldiers on active duty orders to be penalized by a federally accredited universities, to fight that and to not do any work at all while I was in Fort Knox would have made things much harder, and would have wasted more of my time. I taught two weeks of material in Fort Knox to myself, and was able to come to school and take my midterm exams successfully. I thank God for giving me the passion and the grit to have the desire to learn and love what I learn. I am continually reminded of how blessed I am to be in college and I have a deeper appreciation for the academic setting that Indiana University provides and the resources that are at a student’s fingertips at any time while on campus. The weekend after I returned back from training in Fort Knox, I had a Ranger Challenge competition that required my attention the entire weekend. The following weekend, I had to go to Fort Thomas for an my actual monthly obligation. I had these events during the weekends while trying to catch up in school. Arabic and chemistry were probably the most hardest to catch up in.

Why does this matter? This is what my life looked like prior to going to Guatemala. It was very hard to see God working in my life and preparing my heart because of how busy I was. It was hard to do anything: I would spend my days on campus from 07:00 to about 19:00, and then I would continue to do school work in the study lounge at my dorm because I didn’t want to walk home when it was 1 am. I was nervous to go on this trip because of this season where everything that mattered to me outside of academia was put on the back burner, including my faith. I had the expectation of going to Guatemala with other believers, sharing the gospel to people who don’t speak my language, and to be a light in a dark place. I started to wonder where God’s hand was in this. Even while in Guatemala, I had to put away homework that was begging for my attention every second I was there. I trusted God’s plan, and before I knew it, I was packing for Guatemala after a nonstop season of life and jumped on a plane the next morning at the start of spring break.

This was my first time out of the country, and that was super exciting. But what was even more astounding was that my team and I had an hour layover in Panama City, Panama. This is where my dad is from: San Blas, Panama. I couldn’t help but buy a sombrero: I felt like I had an obligation too, I mean, I could not not buy something.

Being there, just in the airport, made me feel like I had been so disconnected from my culture and made me sad of all that I had missed out on after my dad’s passing. I started to think about everything that could have been: I could have been to Panama already, known about my culture, be able to speak three languages, and have a father figure growing up; my dad would’ve made me more athletic, I probably wouldn’t be as weird  as I am today, and I would have deeper appreciation for where I come from. Studies show students do better in school when they are connected to their “roots.” It was quite emotional for me, but I did a good job at hiding it — it was however– only in the Panama Airport in Panama City, Panama.

Our first day was spent exploring the city of Guatemala and I encountered a lot of the culture. I saw families, men and women, trying to sell you hand-knitted clothing and hand-made wooden instruments in order to provide their family.

The following day we received training on how the water filters worked from Filter of Hope. To see more on how these filters work, please visit the following website.

http://filterofhope.org/how-it-works.php

The next morning was our first time going into the village. Our mission was to hand out the filters, but more importantly to build relationships with the families in the village. We wanted to focus on showing the love of the Father first, and not on the quantity of filters we were to hand out. The first family we visited, consisted of two houses. Many of the houses in the village of “Los Oorrales” were made of scrap metal, mud, sticks, and occasionally you would see brick and wood. These families lived in one room huts, sometimes with 4 or more children. In high school, it was very easy for me to share the gospel to students that I knew were Christian. It was easy for me, but I was suddenly faced with a fear and a challenge of sharing the gospel with families that did not speak my language. This was unexpected, and I suppose I went in with too much confidence. Furthermore, there was no promise if these families already knew Jesus, or if they had a wrong conception of Him. This put much more pressure on me and my willingness to share the gospel. I started to worry that I was not prepared for this trip, especially after this season I had experienced, and that I should just sit back and allow the team to do what they needed to do, and I can help where I’m needed.

I then remembered that God had brought me through Panama. He reminded me of my Father, of my past, and everything that I had lost and that I missed out in my life. I remembered that God had brought me through Panama to prepare my heart for this moment for this trip. Being in Panama was very emotional for me, and  I could see His power and His plan through every single detail. Suddenly I felt the desire of the Spirit wanting to share with the Guatemalans what I had gone through to show how Jesus changed my heart.

If you are reading this, and you have never heard my story, I would love to share what I shared with the Guatemalans. It was our mission to show the love of Jesus in a tangible way through first providing the very basic needs of these peoples, to meet them where they were and to truly love on them. Many times, it is easy to want to share the gospel without proving the needs of what we clearly see is in front of us.

In Isaiah 58 it says, “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter — when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not turn away from your own flesh and blood?

For the first time I truly understood that sometimes it is impossible to share the gospel with someone who is starving, or someone who does not have the basic necessity of life. Jesus healed the blind, commanded the lame to walk, and through this He showed the love of His Father. Our team wanted to use the filter to show that we cared for them, and that we love them. We love them because they are people, because they matter, because they belong to God, and He has not forgotten His people. After showing the Guatemalans how to install the filter and clean it, we shared the gospel with the metaphor of what the filter represents in our lives and how it had changed us. My story is shared like the following:

In 2005, I lost my father to a mixed drug intoxication. My father was an alcoholic, and had cirrhosis of the liver. The amount of scarring in his tissue did not allow his liver to overcome what it would have been able to otherwise. His marijuana was laced with cocaine, and unfortunately he lost his life (possibly in his sleep) after the cocaine mixed with fentanyl in pain medication. My father was an amazing father to me, and I never recalled him being angry from any drugs that he ever took, and many of the memories I had with him are still vivid and comforting.

There was a season in my life when I was very angry with my father, because I felt that he had chosen this “drug life” over his children, and that he had chosen to leave us. I felt abandoned. I started my mourning process in high school, almost 10 years later, when I understood the fullness of his absence and how much I needed him during that time. Up to that moment, his death had caused so much pain in my life. My family constantly experienced poverty, and up to my senior year, we had moved over thirteen times. It is not easy to stay in one place when you have no money, or when where your living is in a basement. I had many bad influences in my life, and I’d be happy to share more of what that looked like and further details of my life, but for the sake of the length of this post, I will leave those details out. Below are some of the statics of fatherless children in America, that I shared briefly with the families of Guatemala.

1. Of students in grades 1 through 12, 39 percent (17.7 million) live in homes absent their biological fathers
2. 63% of youth suicides are from fatherless homes (US Dept. Of Health/Census) – 5 times the average.
3. 90% of all homeless and runaway children are from fatherless homes – 32 times the average.
4. 85% of all children who show behavior disorders come from fatherless homes – 20 times the average.  (Center for Disease Control)
5. 80% of rapists with anger problems come from fatherless homes –14 times the average.  (Justice & Behavior, Vol 14, p. 403-26)
6. 71% of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes – 9 times the average.  (National Principals Association Report)

Reading these statics is very hard for me, because I know how easy it is to become one, and I almost did. I started going to Southeast Christian Church when I was in 7th grade, and became fully committed in being involved in the student ministry going into my eighth grade year, after being baptized. I thank the Koch family for continuing to invite my mother to church when she was a manager at a Marathon gas station. Never underestimate the power of the Holy Spirit at work in someone’s life, and never stop loving those who God is calling you to. If my mom was given up on, I believe with all my heart that I would not be at IU today, I would not know Jesus, and that my life may have had a similar outcome of my father’s. My dad did not know his father, and never met him. He had also grew up in poverty in Panama before coming to the states, and his childhood was much much worse than mine. I grew to know Jesus through the families that loved me at Southeast: the Haire’s, the Dale’s, the Walker’s, the Hutchcrafts, and many more. The men in the church continued to show me the love of Jesus all the way onto the point that I graduated, and even after that. When it was my birthday, men in the church would take me out to eat. Families would provide some of my very basic needs: new shoes for a school year, a birthday dinner, a role model, a literal house to live in. Recalling on all that they have done for me is so impassioned, but even more so, I know that they did all those things because of what Jesus was and is doing in their lives. It is because of His love, that they chose to love me, and to provide for my spiritual needs and basic needs. Families in the church made it financially feasible for me to go to church conferences for five years, each experience life changing, and each experience bringing me closer to the people I call my best friends today. This is the Jesus and the church I was introduced to and that I grew to know. I found a family, an eternal family that would never be shaken or broken apart, and purpose for and from my life experiences. I was fathered by our Heavenly Father, and he taught me more than anything that He will always love me more than any earthly Father ever could, and it has been forever life changing.

After installing the filters, we would take a handful of dirt and throw it in the bucket to show how dirty the water was and the effectiveness of the filter. Our lives are filled with many mistakes and sin against our Father. After the Fall, we were separated from God because of His holiness, and in his holiness, it would be impossible to be with Him. Many times in our lives, we try to do things that will make the water clean so that we can have favor with God again. We go to church, we stop cussing, we are nice to people, we read the bible, and we check off a list that things will earn us favor with God. But all of things are like dirty rags, and there is absolutely nothing that we can do that will ever be good enough to earn favor with God. We are imperfect; even when water looks clean, it is still contaminated with parasites that have the potential to cause death. The gospel shows that there is, however, One who is perfect, and that there is a way to be with God again. Jesus acts like the filter on our behalf, and it is only through Him that we can be rid of all of the parasites and dirt in our life, and we become holy, and one with God again. More than that, we can experience an unexplainable joy that overflows our hearts. We have a sense of belonging: we chosen, justified, blameless, adopted, and loved.

“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; one you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” – 2 Peter 

After loosing my father, I spent all my time searching for acceptance, to be loved, and I projected my anger to those around me. As I saw the families drink the clean water for the first time, it reminded me what it was like to know Jesus for the first time. How fresh, how life giving, and overwhelming. What have I done to deserve such a gift as this? I’ve come to learn that we actually don’t deserve it at all. When God created this universe, He set in motion for everything to glorify Him, and for His finest creation, man, to be in unity and harmony with Him. I wonder what it must’ve been like the days when Adam and Eve walked among the presence of God. We then forced God’s Hand to be separated from us, and he loved his creation so much, because we belonged to Him and we were His children in the first place, to come down to earth in the form of a baby, to live blameless and to show us the way, the truth, and the life. It was His plan that nobody would come to Him except through His son, and that His son would take all the sin and the wrath that we deserved, to take it upon himself and to become sin. God crushed His very Son and released His wrath so that he could be in relation with His creation again, and He did this with a smile. And because of the resurrection, whenever we accept Christ, we have that same exact power living inside of us and have unity with our Father again.

I learned about the boldness and the faith required to truly live the life of Jesus in Guatemala. The village we visited had been abandoned. There are no doctors, there is no medicine; the only chance for people to be healed is from the power of God. God doesn’t need experience, or seasoned Christians to do His work, he needs faith. The families may not see people outside of their village for an entire year, so their only experience of who God is may have only been our presence. With expectation and faith, we prayed for families in their health, their many broken marriages, alcoholism, sick children, their families, and the issues that brought despair and depression. We believe with all of our hearts that God will heal them of whatever sickness they had or issue because of our faith, because it is who God is. Because of his goodness, and because He answers those that love Him. Whenever we show this kind of love, people will praise God because of our faith. Even if the people don’t believe, God will honor us because of our faith, and this is when I experienced some of the powerful prayers I have heard. I seen a side of ministry that was not so focused on speaking the gospel, but truly showing the gospel. American psychologist Abraham Maslow introduced a hierarchy of needs in 1943, showing that in order for people to experience self actualization and empowerment, basic needs needed to be met, followed by physiological and self fulfillment needs. It is easy to forget and recognize the needs of those around us, and we focus on teaching the gospel without seeing people in their pain. In Matthew 8 we see a man with a skin disease run to Jesus, and in his faith asked Jesus to heal him if it was His will. Men with these skin diseases would have to go throughout the cities yelling “Unclean!” to warn the surrounding people of their presence. If someone touched him, they would be considered unclean and “contaminated.” Jesus “reached out his hand and touched the man,” healing him instantly. This man probably hasn’t been touched in years, and most likely in the eyes of many, Jesus became contaminated…this is the story of the gospel. This is the gospel we are called to: to reach out, and touch those who are forgotten and are unclean.

I came at peace that although we may not see the fruits of our labor, such as families accepting Jesus for the first time or being physically healed, that God was using us to plant seeds and to expand His kingdom. He is capable of so much more than I could ever imagine, and that God is working even though I may not see it.

God truly cares for His people, and in some families that we visited, the gospel was already very present and alive. Some of the faith of the families encouraged my team and I. With a huge Catholic population, Christians sometimes experienced persecution and bad treatment from their neighbors because of the way that they decided to live. Families would remain in their faith despite a husband and father not believing, faced with sickness, hunger. With little that they had, they understood that every good and perfect thing comes from heaven. I was so honored and humbled to be considered part of their family. I look forward to the day when I will see them again, and to see the things that God will entrust to them in Heaven.  It is compelling to be part of God’s ancient story, to come along side Christians across the world and to encourage them to be steadfast and unwavering in their faith, and to know Jesus.

God brought me to Guatemala to show His love, but to also speak to me and show me the urgency and importance of those around me in my sphere of influence. Every life, every friend, and my family: lives are at stake. There is an enemy that is seeking to steal, kill, and destroy. I have been like a solider sleeping on guard, and I have failed to realize that the enemy is attacking the very people that are closest to me, and has blinded me in the process. I have seem to have forgotten God’s redeeming story of my life and how He has given me life, He has given me purpose, He has given me a passion for certain things, and this is all to build His eternal kingdom that is coming soon. If help does not arise from me, “it will arise from another place,” because there is nothing the Father won’t do to chase after the hearts He loves. “…Who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such  time as this.” The Father wants to be near to all His children, and He desires to spend eternity with them and even more so, for them to experience the overwhelming, unspeakable, overfilling joy that he initially intended for them. To know that :

“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” – John 4

In Christ,

Ricardo Stuck