Is your life in the dumps?

Arriving to the dumps I just felt discouraged about the oppression that was felt. I also got discouraged from not knowing what I would be saying to people. How would I tell people there is hope for them when they see my nice clothes and know I don’t live in the same conditions they do. How was I going to share with them without doubt? Then Matthew 10:19-20 popped in my head "But when they hand you over, do not worry about how or what you are to say; for it will be given you in that hour what you are to say. For it is not you who speak, but it is the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you." That verse has always been helpful to me because I know that God is in me, and he is going to work through me if I step up. In the dumps people lived in sheets of metal just laying on each other with a little support to keep the walls up. The floors were just muddy ground and seemed to be constantly wet from rain dripping through the roofs. Sheets on the beds were muddy, clothes were muddy, and everything that they had which wasn't much was just filthy. I always saw on TV were people lived in the dumps but now I have seen it firsthand.

In the dumps we were split into groups and Alaina, Sam, Darren, and I were in a group and we were praying for a woman and her granddaughter and great granddaughter. At that time a man tapped Darren on the shoulder to come pray for his house. When we got to the house we just felt this dark oppression, the tiny room wreaked of alcohol and there was a woman on the bed crying. We didn't know what was going on and the man (Luis) did not make sense and he was speaking to me in Spanish. Darren just said we need to pray and the girls prayed for the woman as Darren and I prayed for the man. The man just started sharing how his wife left him and he said his life was in ruins. I told him there was hope and God has a plan for him! He just kept coming back at me with sense of hopelessness and how his heart was impossible and wanted to kill himself before his friend (the woman that was crying on the bed) stopped him. Right then I just started speaking truth to him, truth after truth was pouring out of my mouth. God was in control at the time. God was sending me scripture after scripture as I was battling Satan’s lies. After 45 minutes of just sharing truth I told Luis that I wanted to hear him cry out to God and just ask God for forgiveness if that is what he really wanted. When he started praying he just broke and wept and cried out for God's mercy and forgiveness. It was a beautiful site. It was time for us to leave soon after and I left him a wristband that says "Walt was here" "Guatemala 2011" with the verse Isaiah 58:10 inside. I told him to put it on and remember the time that we were in his house praying and how God was in that room with us. I also told him to pray EVERY time he looked down at that wristband and that I would pray just as much that God would keep working in his life.