30,000 +

Each time I have reached 10,000 new page views I have reviewed and commented on some of my old blog post and shared some of my personal favorites. This week, according to my blogger stats, I surpassed 30,000 visits from folks around the world.

Some of my post, even after several years, continue to be read regularly. I'm assuming this happens because the title or content comes up in an internet search. One of these is Road signs: are they really necessary?  I wrote that post on July 18, 2012. We had decided to move to Honduras for "six months or so", but we weren't planning on leaving until January of 2013. I was beginning to feel overwhelmed by the amount of things we needed to do before leaving. Things like closing down my business, renting the house, selling, storing or throwing away so many things we had collected over the years. The expenses we were incurring to make the move were mounting into the thousands of dollars cutting into our savings. On top of this, we were planning on driving to Honduras. Many people thought we were crazy and I was beginning to doubt if our decision was the right one. And then...at least for me....something happened that assured and reassured me that we were still on the right road.

What I realized was that so much of why I needed to be reassured was because of my own personal fear. Fear for our safety, both bodily and financially. Fear of failure itself. Fear of a loss of respect should we fail. Fear of the unknown. I learned a lot about myself in those months leading up to our departure. Below is an excerpt from my post, Fear; What's to worry about? Three years later I am even more convinced that what I wrote is true.

"What are the ill effects of fear.  Fear is often exhibited through self protectionism. Because we are afraid of being hurt we refuse to love or to trust unconditionally. We look down on and deride those who are different than ourselves hoping to cover our own insecurities. Because we are afraid of the future, we are unable to live for the day. Because we are afraid of poverty tomorrow, we hoard today and call it good stewardship. Fear of rejection keeps us from giving of ourselves wholeheartedly. We often hide the fear behind jokes, doctrines, rules, masks and it is that same fear that keeps us there, in hiding." 

Looking back now I wonder what I was worried about. Everything has turned out just fine. We have a great life here. Of course I understand it could have been different. We could have been robbed in Mexico. We might of have had to return to the US broke and disillusioned. I thank God that none of my fears came to pass. On the other hand, who knows what life may have dealt us if we had listened to our fears and stayed home.

As the owners of the Spanish Institute of Honduras, Barbe and I welcome a constant stream of new missionaries arriving in Honduras each month. Their first stop is language school. Here is where they face their own fears, where they learn to match the realities of life here in Honduras with the often false expectations and fears they have arrived with. Some approach this new life as a grand adventure, others with timidity. Eventually, all either adjust to the "new normal" or they return home.

Here is some of what I have learned over the past few years about managing fear and transition, this through my own experience and from being intimately involved in helping over 200 new missionaries adjust to a new life.

• Keeping things in perspective is the greatest thing you can do to help yourself adjust. 
• Matching the actual reality here with the expectations you arrived with.
• Facing your fears honestly, and that means facing yourself.
• Enjoying all of the new experiences, the ups and the downs.   

I could add many other things to this list; but why these?

Because perspective keeps us grounded. A leaky faucet in Honduras leaks exactly the same as one in Texas. Flat tires and car problems are part of life...anywhere. Sometimes we really can't find chocolate chip cookies when we want them, even at Walmart. Bad things happen to good people everywhere in the world. We are not suddenly "special" because we now live in a third world country and we should not allow ourselves or others to elevate us to that status.

Matching reality to your expectations. This is huge. Over and over I hear people complain about the how bad the driving is here, that the heat is horrendous, that the safety issues keep them trapped behind walls, the bugs are... Here is the reality. Mosquitoes in Maine are actually far worse and larger than in Siguatepeque. Many of the southern states are actually hotter and more humid than most of Honduras, yes...even San Pedro Sula. Crime is everywhere, just watch the news. The sooner one actually grounds themselves in reality and let's go of what is false, the sooner everything stops being a big deal and a huge trial. Trust me, the life we Gringos have here is REALLY GOOD. Shhh, don't tell anyone. We wouldn't want folks back home to have to adjust their misconceived ideas to meet reality too.

Facing yourself and your fears. There is no better time to do this than during transition. Fear, change and the unknown bring out the best and the worst in us. It did in me and it has in everyone else I've seen. We can run, but we can't hide. Everywhere I go, there I am. Truths. So use this opportunity to get to know yourself. For those of you with faith in God, let Him use this time to change and transform you.

Enjoy it. As my globe trotting friend Bob Beckett says, "After the pain of the event is over, it's all about the stories." This philosophy has literally changed my life. Wrap your arms around each new experience. Inhale it, make it yours and part of who you are becoming.

Well, when I started writing this morning I had no intentions of going in this direction or rambling on for so long. I still haven't commented on my top, most read post Live Like a King on $1200 a Month. Talk about perspective and reality! Yeah, I definitely need to comment on this one.

Our First Well for Public Schools; we need your help

Team NGF at the school where we installed the purification system, June 3013

We became involved in water projects in public schools shortly after we arrived in Honduras three years ago. It all began when we were preparing to host our first STM team from our home church. We had only been down here a few months and I was struggling to put something together for them to do while in-country. A week before the team arrived, everything I had planned started to unravel. My friend Paul Hosier, a missionary with BMDMI, suggested that some of my team help him install a water purification system in one of the rural schools in our area. I immediately agreed, and so began my interest in water purification and our on-going relationship with the public school system.


Not being satisfied with the purification system we were using lead me to start our own company, Inversiones Wolfe Honduras SA de CV, in order to become a distributor for Sawyer Water Filters whose product I felt was far more efficient and cost effective. I then created our own social project "Agua Limpia para las Escuelas" where our company donates Sawyer filters to public schools, gives charlas (talks) to the students on why drinking purified water is critical to a healthy life and, as time allows us, we return to talk about Christian values. Our project has received recognition by the Minister of Education and is one of the things I love best about what we do in Honduras.

Chris (left) and me with Minister of Education Marlon Escoto 

As Chris and I traveled around Honduras, speaking at public schools and working through them to bring purified water and health education to the students, one of the things we realized is that often the schools have no water source of their own. Children have to bring their own water, and usually if the school doesn't have water it's because the community doesn't have water. Seeing what many of these kids are drinking and seeing how difficult it is to provide drinking water and proper sanitation for them lead me to enlarge our vision for what we do in public schools to include drilling wells. Out of this desire, and the need for water in general here in Honduras, was born our newest company, Pozos para Todos. (Wells for Everyone)

I have identified the first school we would like to drill at. The name of the school is Enma Romero de Callejas and is located in Colonia Juan de La Cruz Avelar here in Siguatepeque. This particular barrio is very dry and has extremely limited water resources. The water the school does receive is very contaminated and should only be used for flushing toilets, which doesn't stop the kids from drinking it. The school has almost 500 students, so as you can imagine, there is rarely enough water even for sanitation.

Centro Basico Enma Romero de Callejas

This natural "pool" on the edge of the school property indicates water is here

Although contaminated, some of the kids still drink from this

Solicitud

I have already begun the permitting process needed to open a well. I have the "solicitud" from the school requesting the project and our geologist has begun the required geological study. I have asked the Ministry of Education to be involved and this coming week will meet with the patronato of the colonia asking them to provide manual labor as needed including guarding the rig at night. Hopefully, we will have the drilling permit by mid May and can begin shortly afterward.

The cost of drilling a well is substantial and although we support ourselves personally, we do need your help funding projects like this. We have some funds already available thanks to gifts from some dear friends and two churches who regularly give towards our water projects. Should we decide that a hand style pump is suitable for this well, we have a tentative commitment from a Canadian organization to provide the pump, which is a large expense item. And of course our company will cover a substantial part of the cost as our gift back to missions.

Your help in funding this project, and future ones, would be very much appreciated. If you would like to give a tax deductible gift to help bring water to the school children of Honduras, the Camino Foundation has a set up an account to receive donations specifically for our water projects. Clicking on this link will take you directly to the donate page.

Thank you so much for your generousity

2015 in Review

Last year we experienced many challenges, struggles, changes and victories. Overall, I would say that 2015 was a successful year. We expanded our businesses substantially, and saw continued growth in the Spanish Institute of Honduras and in our family's personal ministries.

Last goodbye at the airport

One of our greatest successes was to finally see the adoption of Luis completed. Luis came to live with us near the beginning of March 2013. One year and 9 months later his adoption was finalized and he now lives with his forever family in North Carolina. His adoptive parents came and stayed with us two and a half months as they waited for the final papers to be done. They were so patient and on Dec. 23rd, they flew home just in time to spend their first Christmas together as a new family. We saw a recent picture of Luis playing in the snow, a first for him. Our house seems much emptier without him.



Mark, after more than half a year spent in the USA and three months traveling through Europe and Africa, returned to Honduras in November to become the Administrator at the Spanish Institute of Honduras. Not only am I very happy to have him working with me again, but he is a huge help as I have gotten busier and busier with my other businesses. He is doing a great job running the school, and as he is interested in studying international business in college, he is gaining real life experience in this field as we truly are a multi-national business.

Ben and Thomas learning to run the new rig.

Ben, Thomas and I, after much discussion and research, decided to expand Inversiones Wolfe Honduras beyond the distributorship of Sawyer filters and open a separate branch of the business called Pozos para Todos. With the help of some generous friends we were able to obtain a flexible loan through the Camino Foundation in order to purchase a used Bucyrus Erie cable tool rig and the necessary equipment and tools to open a well drilling business. We successfully completed two wells with the "new" rig, one for a church and one at Sparrow Missions' new children's home near Tela. It feels so good to be back working with machinery, getting dirty and making a living with my hands. And it feels really, really good to be working with my boys again. All three of them!


You can visit us at www.pozosparatodos.com or on Facebook. Below is a short video of the rig at work.

One my passions has been to bring jobs to Honduras. As the Institute has grown, we have nearly tripled the size of our teaching staff and now through the school and the other three businesses we, directly and indirectly, provide jobs for over twenty people. We have also added substantially to the local economy by renting numerous houses or contracting with Honduran families to house students, to the neighborhood pulperia (corner store) and other businesses, and through local and national taxes as we are a legally registered Honduran company. Seeing this growth develop has been extremely satisfying.

Some of the challenges and struggles we faced last year were; the importation of the drill rig, a very ugly and discouraging experience for me, and a review of our vision for the Spanish Institute of Honduras (fb link) and what it's Kingdom purpose is which ended in a complete overhaul of how we "do language school". Change is always difficult, especially when it affects many people, but I believe we have come through it stronger and more focused than ever before. Thanks to all of our students and their missions agencies who worked with us to implement the changes. A big thank you to our new chaplain/counselor, Gordon and his wife Anna who came on staff part time in January, for being willing to travel from Tegucigalpa each month to spend time with our students. And a very special thank you to our incredible staff of teachers. This past year, with the help of our three senior teachers, we have grown into a unified team who shares the same vision and commitment to helping missionaries not only learn Spanish, but succeed in life here in Honduras. Each day I watch with pride as our teachers, despite their own life struggles, pour their hearts and souls into each of our students as they struggle through learning how to live in a new country and learn a new language and a new culture. Our staff has been one of our greatest blessings here and I know that feeling is shared by the vast majority of our students past and present.

Our wonder, crazy beautiful bunch of teachers, but where is Jose Luis? (photo by Sarah Larson)

We have seen victories in many areas as well. Our Bible study in Cerro Azul is bearing much fruit. (That's Christianese for seeing a lot of personal growth and spiritual development happen). Barbe and I have now been traveling the two hour round trip every other Sunday for over two years. Our relationships there have deepened tremendously this past year. It has been a privilege to watch God at work in the lives of those who faithfully meet with us and to share with each other the joys and struggles of life. It is humbling to watch the mighty power of God at work changing lives. BAM, our missionary kids youth group that David Guevara and I teach, is maturing. Pastor Steve visits from Florida about every six months and spends time with Barbe and me. While he is here, we do a lot of visitation, often traveling deep into the mountains on nearly impassable roads to visit, preach and pray with the sick. Thanks Steve for all the encouragement you have been to us.

I am often asked by Hondurans and Americans alike how long we plan on living in Honduras. I always say (with the understanding that life is uncertain and the future unpredictable) that we are here to stay. With each passing year, and we are now in our third year, we are more and more deeply connected to Honduras. Of course we miss family immensely and we occasionally have a hankering for Taco Bell or Waffle House, but I can honestly say that I no longer feel as though I am a foreigner living in a foreign country. This is home. It has absolutely been a challenge to do business here, but business has also opened incredible opportunities for me to meet people and to do things I would never have been able to do otherwise. These past three years have been a grand adventure and one I am grateful to have been able to participate in.

I want to thank my wife Barbe for supporting me in all I have attempted here. For being patient with me when I take on too much and for being willing to ride the ups and downs of life with me. Thanks also to our three incredible sons. They are competent and confident young men at ease living in a foreign country. I am glad you are here doing life different with me.