December 2001

Dear Friends,

I was riding in the back of a pickup truck, bumping along a dusty road, an unexpected place to find of sign of hope. I had been in a small rural community on the southwest coast of Guatemala, a community that is best remembered for its dust! Along with another pastor from the presbytery of Suchitepéquez, I had helped to lead a worship service of thanksgiving to God for the end of the school year. All the students, ages 7 to 14, had come in their school uniforms. They had sang choruses of praise, recited Bible verses and as a finale the mothers had prepared supper for everyone. This was both a way of celebrating their children’s achievements as well as Christmas, which was just three days away. When the pastor only comes once a month, you have to celebrate lots of things in one worship service! Now we were on our way to the next small rural community where there was somewhat less dust; there we would be a part of another worship service in preparation for Christmas. As we rode along I thought about the families who live in these villages.

I had listened to some of their stories of struggling to eke out an existence on land they do not own.

I could see the poverty in the eyes of the mothers who long to do more for their children.

The dust that covered everything and everyone could easily become a blanket of despair. I could not imagine actually living here day after day. And then I saw the dancing colored lights—blue, red, yellow, green—strings of lights adorning the front doors or porches of a few homes. I thought of the Scripture passage we had read as a part of worship, words from the prophet Isaiah, "the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light." I am sure that Isaiah was not thinking of these dancing colored lights I saw from the back of the pickup truck, but for me these lights were a symbol of hope

Lights dancing in the rapidly approaching darkness
Dancing in spite of the poverty and death and fear that like the dust is everywhere
Dancing in the midst of a totally unknown future to say there is this tiny light
Dancing to defy a government that increases the military budget while decreasing funds for education and health

The people who live in this small rural communities on the southwest coast of Guatemala know what it is to walk in darkness. Many of them also know the light that Jesus Christ brings into their lives. A light symbolized for me in those dancing strings of colored lights that sparkle in spite of the darkness all around.

Ellen Dozier

The 2002 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 242