For more information about PILAS and my short-term missions trip, please check out my prayer letter. You can also support PILAS by donating online on my fundraising web page.
How will I live differently after this experience?
I don’t want this week to be over and I just go back to my normal life like it was a one-time event. How will I carry this forward with me? How can I really internalize this experience so that I truly “have a deeper sense of Jesus’ love and compassion for the poor”?
I have to keep thinking about this – but one small change I can do right away is to stop wasting so much food. I’m much more conscious now of how much leftover food I discard simply because I’m full, or don’t feel like eating it anymore. My freezer is full of stuff that I bought millions of years ago, yet I keep spending money on new groceries and ignoring the freezer. Instead of buying new food for myself, why don’t I eat everything in the freezer first? (Except the ice cream.) And I can consciously make an effort to not leave any leftovers, to eat everything on my plate and in my fridge.
In addition to realizing just how much food I waste – here are a couple of other important lessons learned I’m taking away from my GLC experience:
#1 – Eating balanced, healthy meals is expensive.
I referenced in Day 5’s blog that those living in extreme poverty eat only $1.75 worth of food per day, or $12.25 per week. I think that my GLC menu probably cost about that, maybe even less. On the left is what I ate for the whole week (plus 2 eggs and some chicken soup), on the right, what I ate for my midnight snack at the end. The midnight snack cost about the same as the entire week’s worth of food.
I’m not saying deep fried chicken and nachos is a balanced healthy meal – but the fact that one meal costs as much as one week, does give some context of the real cost of food.
In Guate last year, when we fed the village kids snacks after the youth group lessons, we would give them “juice” to drink – which was really a Kool-Aid-like mix of powdered flavour crystals and water. I remember thinking at the time, “that’s really not juice” – not the freshly squeezed Tropicana-style juice we’re used to here. But to feed 25 or so kids, we had to bring a keg of juice with us to each village. Can you imagine how much a keg of Tropicana would cost?! And after a week of just water – anything flavoured tastes delicious =) The point being: something as simple as buying a glass of healthy juice, made from real fruit, is out of reach for those living in poverty.
#2 – For the underprivileged, lack of healthy options is not just confined to food.
Living a healthy lifestyle includes much more than a healthy diet, obviously. My GLC week focused only on food, but there are so many other aspects of healthcare that we, in our privilege, don’t realize we have access to.
Here’s a link to a documentary we watched in Guatemala last year that opened our eyes to some of these aspects. It’s about 26 minutes long and well worth watching as it talks about how so many different factors intertwine to either perpetuate or break the cycle of poverty – education, family planning, women’s rights, politics, etc.
Blessed Fruit of the Womb: https://vimeo.com/61691613
As I move forward from this incredible experience of the Guatemalan Life Challenge, I pray that God will keep the marginalized, the underprivileged, and those living in poverty near and dear to my heart, as they are to His.
Once again, thank you all for your support and prayers throughout this week. Your love and encouragement mean more to me than I can say and I couldn’t have done it without you. As I prepare for my work with PILAS in September, your friendship and prayers continue to be very important. If you’d like to support me in this way, you can find my specific prayer requests here.
Lastly, Barb, Gerry, the PILAS students and I wish to extend our deepest gratitude and thanks for the generous donations you’ve offered so far to keep the students in school and support these young leaders. Just as important as the financial contributions are the interest and affirmation you’ve shown for this program. THANK YOU! =) There’s still time to make a donation if you would like to do so; please visit my website HERE. The site will be open until September 3 when I leave for Guatemala.
May you all be deeply blessed.