Service Changed My Life

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Thousands of missionaries have served the poor alongside Amigos for Christ.  While working to better lives, their lives were changed in the process.  Hear from some of our missionaries below, or send us your story (as video link or written to Kristin@AmigosForChrist.org).

Joey McGinn - Full Time Missionary

Joey McGinn - Missions Support Video from Matt Giesler on Vimeo.

Sharon Harrison - Mission Trip Participant

I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for children.  I’ve taught Sunday School, been a team mom, a room mother, and read to kindergarteners.  That was me….always involved with children.  So when God prompted me to go to Nicaragua with Amigos for Christ, I thought “but that’s not where my passions lie….I enjoy working with children and helping them to become strong, faith-filled adults.  Isn’t Amigos for Christ all about building and digging?”  

I am middle-aged women who is not particularly strong or in good shape, but God just kept knocking on my door, telling me to go to Nicaragua.  Not one to argue with my Lord, I signed up for the trip and took my first trip with Amigos for Christ in July of 2008.  What I found when I arrived there is that Amigos is all about building and digging, but they are also all about building relationships, improving education and providing hope for moms, dads and children.  The tasks are construction oriented, but the goals are for better lives for the families of Chinandega.

After my first trip, I discovered Bead Amigas and became involved with this wonderful group of women.  On the surface, Bead Amigas is a women’s ministry, but on closer inspection I realized that this group is really a children’s ministry.  For by helping women to be financially independent their families are the winners.  Yes, I’ve enjoyed time spent with the beaders in Nicaragua, but my greatest joy is in spending time with their children. 

Now we’ve come full circle because as I said in the beginning, I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for children.  I’ve learned that God’s plans are not my plans and that He has plans for me that are far beyond what I can imagine.  I thought my trip to Nicaragua was for manual labor only, but God knew that Amigos for Christ and Bead Amigas were right where I needed to be.  I’m planning to take my fourth trip to Nicaragua this summer and can’t wait to build more relationships with the “future” of Chinandega and Nicaragua.

Zach Ivie - Mission Trip Participant

Maybe it's being in a bustling restaurant. Maybe it's overhearing Spanish in a booth across the way. But in this moment I fondly recall eating at that burrito place in Chinandega. The dim lights, dirt floor, plastic furniture, new menus. How it felt and how we all seemed to rest in the company of our native tongue, it was, in fact "the good times" that are included in so many gallery retrospectives; a still of some native's impossibly wrinkled face, a child's smile captured in full color and light.
 That moment was all of these things to me...distilled into existence and compressed into time of course. Only God authors that densely.

My experience in Nica provoked me to reshape my discomfort into productive energy, increasing my tendency to lean into others, to be aware of the simple. The beautiful.

So now I sit. Relocated. Realigned. And I still feel the limp from wrestling with thoughts I encountered on a journey I took some time ago.
 I'm grateful. I'm different. Thought I'd tell you.

Your friend,


Z

Katie Athaide - Extended Stay Missionary

I am used to a world where my clothing, my accomplishments, and my grades at school define me. Judgment calls are based on material things.  When I came to Nicaragua, I noticed that was not the case. No one seemed to focus on my successes or failures, but rather, looked at me for who I was outside of all that. It puzzled me at first.  Getting to know the Amigos employees, the kids in the villa, and all of the workers was much easier than I could have ever imagined. Knowing nothing else about me but my name, the Nicaraguans would invited me into their homes to share their hearts, food, and stories.  I have never encountered that kind of friendliness before, and it never ceases to surprise and comfort me year after year. I don’t think anyone can help but feel a overwhelming sense of welcome when so many people want to help, whether with physical labor or with spiritual guidance. There is always someone to help unload a truck whether they are eight years old or thirty-eight years old. I hope that everyone who has come to Nicaragua and who will come in the future feel the same.

Has service changed your life?  Send us your story - Kristin@AmigosForChrist.org (written with picture or as a video link).