The Guatemala City Dump: Keeping the McNuggets and Leaving the Bones

Yesterday I spent the middle part of the day with a Christian Guatemalan university leader.  In this one minute video he describes the sad scene beneath us.  We are standing on an overlook located behind the National Cemetery of Guatemala.  Said to be Central America's largest municipal dump the sifted contents of this place enable thousands of the poorest of the poor to survive.

On our way to this perch we passed through Guatemala's National Cemetery.  It was like no graveyard I've ever seen before.  My host assured me that the layout and architecture is European.

This site featured two types of graves.  The rich erect large and elaborate stone or cement structures for themselves.  We noted that the most elaborate grave was as big as a house.  Integrating Egyptian types and symbols it contains the family remains of Guatemala's most popular beer company, Gallo.  Located in it's shadow is a flat, poorly-maintained, unimpressive structure.  It is the gravesite for the Mayor's family.  It seems they are realistic about the relative value of beer and politicians!  Maybe the beer fortifies them for what they must endure at the hands of their leaders.  It is better, of course, to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit -- Ephesians 5:18

My host views the wall of graves in Guatemala
City's National Cemetery

The other type of grave is integrated in a wall of squares into which the coffin or corpse of one individual can be inserted.  These walls are for those who want to be interred in the National Cemetery but don't have the means to erect a building in their family's honor.  Families lease one of these squares for five years.  If the lease is not renewed at the end of that time the remains are thrown into the dump.

It is the people who separate the discarded bones from pop bottles that brought us to Guatemala.  They are called scavengers, and there are thousands of them.  Over the past five decades they've squatted on patches of ground surrounding the dump.  As the years have gone by the government has been forced to organize and recognize these squatter camps.  Thousands of people form a half dozen communities around the dump.

What I couldn't bring to you in the video was the smell and sounds of the dump.  You can see the vultures circling.  Numberless large black birds hop amongst the human scavengers and join in the fight for a morsel of discarded food, or a worn out shoe.

During my first visit to Guatemala City in May of 2013 I didn't get to visit the graveyard or the dump.  I did, however, visit the Potter's House.  I published an email about the experience.

I love this description from their website of how the ministry started nearly three decades ago:

I, Gladys Acuna, along with my friend, Lisbeth Piedrasanta, received a visit from some good friends from the States. During their stay here in Guatemala they asked us to take them to the city dump, but we declined because the dump was not safe for Guatemalans, let alone Americans.

One day, however, they went by themselves and brought food with them. They handed out the food in the name of Jesus to the people they found there. When they told us about their experience we were surprised that the dump wasn't as dangerous as we had thought.

After returning to the States, our friends sent us a letter requesting a favor. They asked us to buy blankets and give them away in the name of Jesus at Christmas to the people in the dump. And they sent money for 350 blankets.

But we were anxious about this request. First of all, there are thousands of people in the dump, and we didn't have enough blankets for all of them, and secondly, we weren't enthusiastic about the idea of spending Christmas at the dump. I really wanted to spend my time at home, cooking Christmas dinner and wearing my new dress. In retrospect, I realize how selfish that was! Lisbeth and I had hoped to distribute the blankets two days before Christmas, but the truck delivering the blankets didn't arrive until the night before Christmas, so we ventured out on Christmas Day. I now believe that was God's plan all along.

We didn't have a big car in which to take the blankets, and we didn't have a plan as to how we were going to distribute them. We just knew we had to go. We finally found Eleazar Gonzalez, a man with a van and a very big heart. The three of us set out for the dump with the blankets and some tamales, a typical Guatemalan dish.

One block from the dump we found a church and received permission from the pastor to leave the blankets there until we could return with people who needed them.

The moment I set foot in the dump the stench overwhelmed me. Slowly a great pain inside me welled up as I saw children playing in the filth, people rummaging through the trash looking for anything of value, and both children and adults sniffing glue. It was too much for me. I consciously blocked the suffering I saw from my mind. "I'll never be here again," I thought. "I'm just doing this as a favor." Fourteen years later, I'm still here!

Back home, I quickly forgot all I'd seen and experienced that day. Lisbeth, on the other hand, was deeply impacted to the point of depression, asking God how He could allow people to live in such circumstances. That night He showed her that He was going to use Christians to show the scavengers how much He really loves and cares for them. When Lisbeth shared this with me, we decided that the next year (1987) we would host a Christmas celebration for 1,000 people—500 children and 500 adults. We gave out blankets and shared the gospel that they might know more of God's love for them. The following Christmas there were 2,000 people and the next year, 3,000! We were continually amazed at how God provided during these celebrations.

At that time we were both working as Christian counselors in a center that we had founded with other colleagues. The time we had spent with the scavengers at the Christmas celebrations had made us acutely aware of their needs, such as health care. We invited two of our colleagues, Dr. Steve Hammer and Dr. Lucrecia de Hernandez, to fulfill this need. Soon after, we started teaching children and their mothers about the Bible. We got more and more requests to come back.

I had been thinking about perhaps spending only my weekends working at the dump, because I thought, "I already have a ministry" (at that time there was a shortage of Christian counselors). "Besides," I told myself, "I don't want to work in a dump. I want to work in a nice, clean office; I want to wear dresses and high-heeled shoes." But God did not agree with my excuses; He orchestrated circumstances and provided an opportunity that I could not ignore. One day we were approached by a man who offered to donate a piece of land for a ministry to the scavengers; it was only 150 feet from the dump! This was my confirmation that God wanted me to quit my job as a counselor and start working at the dump full-time. In faith, Lisbeth and I both decided to answer God's call to minister there. Some people thought we were crazy: two women, both single and professionals, have no business working in the city dump! Another person told me, "You will never get married. The chances of you finding a husband here are almost non-existent."

With conviction we started working for the poor. I now believe that God put this desire in our hearts because everything we did was His idea first. As the ministry began to grow we decided to register with the government as a legal association. We invited people to join our board of directors and we began thinking about what to call our new association. God gave Jodi Hammer the idea of "Potter's House," based on Jeremiah 18:1-6. In February of 1991 Potter's House became a legal association.

Initially only women were interested in working on staff at Potter's House. But soon, the husbands of the women in our programs started asking us when we were going to provide a program for them, so we prayed that God would send men to be on our staff. Little did I know my future husband would be one of them! God blessed us with Edgar Güitz (my husband) and Hector Rivas, two men with great ability and training in administration. Their vision for the ministry reinforced and improved much of what we were doing. Now we have a 65-member staff, and 40% of our personnel are former scavengers.

This ministry has been successful for the sole reason that God has been with us from the beginning. He began the ministry and He will sustain it. It has not been easy but I know that my life, as well as the lives of all who have worked at Potter's House, has totally changed. We like to say, "After serving at Potter's House, no one is ever the same." That has definitely been true for me. These have been the most beautiful years of my life.

I assisted yesterday in ministry to a number of women from the community, providing audio visual support to Paulie and Susan Blount.  They are giving Potter's House a week of their time, making sure that the ministry is prepared for their November VBS.  The ministry expects to reach 2000 children with the love of Jesus Christ through this outreach.

A Time to Plant: Faith verses Strategy

Al Lowberg is a friend and client of mine.  While he is campaigning as an independent he describes himself, at the end of this article, as a republican.  I'll let you contact him directly to learn his reasoning on that point.  Al is a bold Christian who deserves a hearing.  I enjoyed this article. -- Mike Heath

This is spring time and many will be sowing their gardens, and we all know we can not expect the harvest for several months. We also know we can not predict what kind of harvest we will receive. Last year was a poor harvest but that will not stop any of those who planted last year to try again this year.

From the winter we had, and the spring we are having, I am optimistic we are going to have a better harvest this year. However, from the many comments I am reading I am not so optimistic in the political arena, because we need God’s blessing, but we are not giving Him anything to bless; that is, we are still looking to sow by strategy and not by faith.

The Bible says in Hebrews “through faith [they] subdued kingdoms.”  In both the old and new Testaments we are taught the “just shall live by faith”, it does not say acknowledge faith as a Bible doctrine and then live as we please. And what is faith but our voluntary cooperation with what we know to be God’s will. And what is His will in the election process but to vote our conscience and not strategy.

When we vote, let’s say the strategy of the “lesser of two evils”, by our own admission we are still voting for evil. The prophet Hosea said “They sow the wind, And reap the whirlwind. The stalk has not bud; It shall never produce meal. If it should produce, Aliens would swallow it up; Israel is swallowed up...”  Whenever we vote strategy over conscience we are sowing the wind, and we shall be swallowed up. When we vote strategy we place our trust in our own wisdom and not in God, but in order to sow something that God will bless we must sow in faith.

Many of you are angry, and full of threatening. But James said in the Bible, “ye fight and war, yet you have not because ye ask not. Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lust.”  If many of you would pause for a moment and reflect, you could not deny you are entering into this election season without one particle of faith in All-Mighty God. And yet you will be the first to expect a different result—this is not faith, this is insanity. (Deuteronomy 28:15+28-29)

My beloved friends—I would like to call you friends—it is not too late to sow in faith our political aspirations, but if we sow the same old “lesser of two evils” strategy we shall reap the same old harvest. In Ecclesiastes it say “To every thing there is a season…a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted.” Now is the time to plant your political aspirations by faith.

Won’t you give up this faithless, “lesser of two evils” strategy and sow with me a crop of faith in this political season. The only way we shall regain our country is by faith. We may yet lose another election, but by placing the matter in God’s hands some good will come from it. Our seeds of faith will be in good ground, and if we continue to water it by faith we shall have a political harvest of abundance very soon.

In Proverbs we read “If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.” Many are growing strong in their own strength, but fainted long ago in the only battle that counts. That battle is the battle of faith, and you do not have to be part of any organized religion to exercise faith in this election. (Hebrews 11:31) This chapter also says that by faith the weak were made strong, became valiant in battle, and turned to flight [rout] the armies of the “aliens.”

The illegal aliens from Mexico are far less dangerous to this Republic than what I call “illegal aliens” in the White House, the Halls of Congress, the Courts, and in State legislatures across this land. These illegal aliens are elected or appointed leaders who have denied the Constitutional rule of Law; and this has caused “we the people” to be swallowed up by them. Our Constitution is the only constitution in the World that recognizes Religious Freedom. We as a people have relinquished that freedom; it is time to exercise that freedom again.

The only way these ‘illegal aliens” can be driven out of the halls of government is by faith. It is time to subdue “by faith” the kingdom of America for righteousness. Trust God and Vote Conscience Not Strategy!

Alan Lowberg is Maine’s only Republican candidate for Congress District 1 www.standforfreedom.info

Just Three Reasons Why

Two institutions and one movement experienced catastrophic moral failures over the past two decades.  This failure created Maine's current extremely toxic cultural climate on so-called "sexual orientation."  One institution is political.  The other two are religious.

Maine's Republican Party and Roman Catholic Church failed Maine people over the past two decades.  Maine's Evangelical Protestant movement held on until 2004, when they also capitulated.  Everything always rises or falls on leadership.  The leaders of these institutions, churches and movements are what failed the people of Maine.  There is no doubt in my mind that Maine would not have any "sexual orientation" laws today if it weren't for compromises at the leadership level.  I've been professionally active at that level since the late 1980s.

No reasonable person believes that the liberal leadership of the death culture is going to stop with their radical redefinition of marriage.  They will press that through later this year, or next year.  There exists no solid reasonable foundation to stop them.  Evangelical and Roman Catholic leadership granted the legitimacy of "gay rights" once again last year.  They did so in a crass political move designed to appeal to couch potatoes who might vote in the November election.  They ran a last minute television ad just before last year's vote on marriage allowing that Maine might need more legal rights for homosexuals and their friends.  Unbelievably, they offered the support of their institutions to these unnamed expansions in immoral rights.

I am left wondering if they meant they would allow the current effort to lock in government protections for cross dressing men to succeed.  Conspicuously absent in the debate over transgender bathrooms here in Maine are leaders from either the Evangelical or Roman Catholic tradition.  The only ones speaking out boldly are activists who tend to embarrass their leadership with passionate prayers in public, and bold public displays of the symbols of their faith, like rosary beads and big black bibles.

A few wonderful folks showed up to a work session in Augusta on the bathroom guidelines.  They contacted the press and made life generally miserable for the five members of the Maine Human Rights Commission, the governmental body that is creating the new bathroom guidelines.  Their efforts paid a rich dividend.  The Commission was forced to put the guidelines out to a public hearing.  That hearing will happen later this year.

Leaders will now have an opportunity to lead on this issue.  The Maine Human Rights Commission is arguing that they are merely doing the will of the people as enacted by law in 2004.  That is the year that homosexual rights finally passed.  Republicans and Roman Catholics sat on the sidelines while Christian (Catholic and Evangelical) activists and the Christian Civic League of Maine attempted another Peoples Veto.  The League nearly pulled it off at the polls a third time.  The relentless propagandizing of liberals finally pushed this evil idea over the top, and homosexual rights became the law of the land.

One Evangelical leader who spoke out in a blog post just before the bathroom guidelines work session suggested that guidelines like these shouldn't concern citizens as much as laws.  Perhaps leaders like this will now step up and work to strip the phrase "sexual orientation" from all Maine's laws?  This is an effort I am eager to support, but only if Christians will unite to make it happen.

It is never too late to do the right thing.  All Maine people must pray (or hope, if you don't have the spiritual muscle to pray) that these institutions will stop pretending that they are bold defenders of the family and marriage.  The upcoming Maine Human Rights Commission PUBLIC hearing on bathroom rules for cross dressers will reveal a lot.