Thought from a pair of overalls....John Harris

Lori,

Not having responded to the "Honduras Blog," I don't know
if replying to you gets me to the blog. 
Let me know what I need to do.  If this does not make it
to the blog, would you get it on for me?

As you can see  from the above,
 this is my first time to contribute to the
Honduras Blog.  Now that some time has passed,
 I find myself thinking of our time there and of
all of you individually.  And I want to tell you how
impressive all of you were and are.

Jr. Prine's driving brought me closer to Jesus,
and Page has my sympathies.  Jr. obviously feels
 very close to Jesus because he's obviously not afraid to die.
Another indication of his closeness to Jesus is the big
 loving heart hid inside his barroom brawler exterior. 
If he had been fishing in the Galilee in about 30
A.D., he would probably been the third Son of Thunder. 
Junior, my life is richer for having been with you, and
I'm thankful to our Heavenly Father for a
brother like you.

Somebody could make a lot of money if they could catch
David Koski's crooked grin on Candid Camera and even more
money if they could record the dialogues between David
and Jr. on the job.  Cutting the other guy is a measure of how
much he's loved, these two guys are joined at the hip. 
If I were a rich man, I would like to have David build
 a house for Linda.  I have no doubt that it would
be done very well, but alas I'm not John Harbert.
 Watching a craftsman like David work patiently
with a bunch of inexperienced people like me was a living
lesson in servant leadership.

Wow! What a great group of young people. 
Being something of depressed cynic, my
hopes for the future were brightened by the
 high school and college people on
this trip.  They worked hard and well while
having a good time.  They obviously
loved the little children.  I had the pleasure
of working closely with Owen
Parrish as Jr.'s slave putting up conduit.
The first day as Jr.'s slave
assistant, I worked alone.  The next day,
he let Owen work with me.  I may not
have ever had five words of conversation with
before Honduras.  Bless his heart,
he willingly worked with me when I hardly knew what
I was doing.  As you would
expect knowing him and me, he quickly moved
ahead of the old man to figure out
better ways to do our work.  Yet he remained
 polite and respectful the whole
time.  Lynn and Ralph have much to be proud of
and look forward to given such a
son.  Thanks Owen for being so kind and helpful.
I only singled out Owen
because we worked side-by-side for a day.
But I saw goodness and hard work all
of the other young people.

I stand in awe of you, Lori, and Mark for giving of yourselves
 so faithfully and generously.  It's wonderful to see both
of you so happy and filled with joy
doing such hard but helpful work.  I don't know
 how or where young and older
Christians could get to know one another better
than building these houses for
the poorest of the poor.

You as a professor, I have to suggest a couple of books
you might find helpful.
While controversial, perhaps no one has written
better about the kind of
learning and teaching the poor of Latin and South
America need than Paulo
Freire.  He wrote several books, but the two you might
find most interesting
are: Pedagogy of the Oppressed and Pedagogy of Hope.

John