The Beauty within the Ugly

Their homes are just some sticks with tin sometimes thrown on as a roof and if they are lucky as siding, but if you look close while driving by some have beautiful mosaic tiles as a porch. The people here make and sell the expensive tile roofing sold in america. According to Wayne & Elaine (the missionaries we are staying with) the average salary here is between $60 to $100 a month. Trash is just thrown everywhere here. But in the all the ugly of the trash, poor living conditions and so on... sometimes there is a beautiful roof or tiled porch. What is everywhere here though, is beautiful trees and flowers beside those huts. Trees like lemon, coconut, avocado, palm trees, you name it...it is probably here. There is a verse in the bible that just came to mind in connection with this place and the fact that God is here.

"The poor and needy search for water but there is none; their tongues are parched with thirst. But I the Lord will answer them; I the God of Israel will not forsake them. I will make rivers flow on barren heights, and springs within the valleys. I will turn the desert into pools of water, and the parched ground into springs. I will put in the desert the cedar and the acacia, the myrtle and the olive. I will set pines in the wasteland, and the fir and the cypress together, so that my people may see and know, may consider and understand, that the hand of the Lord has done this, that the Holy One of Israel has created it." Isaiah 41:14-17