BPW_0373
Communications Director. Since joining the team in 2018, Morgan continues to find inspiration on a daily basis from the passion brought to the table by the entire Amigos familia, team, and communities we partner with. She feels lucky to play a role in the story God is writing through Amigos and loves connecting others to the heart and transformation behind it all.

What do we take to heaven?

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about the impact of our work at Amigos for Christ. To date, we’ve served alongside over 20,000+ individuals living in rural communities in Chinandega, Chinandega and hosted over 20,000 mission trip participants.

Behind those 40,000+ individuals are countless progress measures – 300+ wells, 32 water systems, 2,500+ modern bathrooms, 1,000+ clean air kitchens, thousands of dollars in microloans, 1,500+ scholarships.

But what has been our impact? What is it all for?

Earlier this year we had a panel of individuals whose communities recently graduated from our Plan 7 – our 7-year partnership and community development model. They came to share about the highs, the lows, and all the learnings and experiences in between.
These individuals are community leaders – people who have been pioneers since the beginning of their projects – helping to dig every ditch, promote healthy habit change, and pave the way of the vision of their community’s future. To put it in perspective they’ve probably received over a thousand touch points with our Amigos Team and Mission Trip Participants.
As we jumped into the conversation – they were asked the following question “What’s the most important thing you’ve learned over these last 7 years?”
I sat there so curious and almost overwhelmed for them on how they would answer. Plan 7 covers a lot of ground – we’re talking 5 goals with a healthy chunk of activities and programs that fall under each of those.
I wondered if they would talk about how clean water has completely changed the trajectory of their life, or how becoming a community leader has completely changed their confidence as a person and outlook on life, or that understanding how to manage their microloan and small business completely elevated their family’s economic situation. Honestly, there are a lot of things they could probably share.

But you want to know what they responded?

The most important thing they’ve learned over all these years is how to love and serve their neighbor.

Plain and simple.
Sometimes the days can feel long – and our work plates get filled with countless activities. Amigos is a revolving door of 200+ dedicated workers, and quite literally thousands of volunteers who are in and out on a daily basis going to build water systems, facilitate trainings, harvest organic crops, or teach the future generation of Nicaragua etc.

The most important thing that people have learned over these last 7 years wasn’t that Amigos was awesome at getting our checklists done – that we nailed the 86-page Plan 7 guide for project management.

The most important thing we did and can do is love and serve our neighbor.

As I sat there – deeply impacted by their response –I thought about heaven. What is the impact of our work at Amigos for Christ? Serving to make Christ more visible. At the end of the day – we’re not taking anything with us to heaven – not our leadership certificates, not our kitchen faucets, smoke-free stoves, or our increased income and savings. But what we can take with us is love – that does stay. Loving and serving our neighbor – that impact runs heart deep and is facilitated by the best Author and teacher of it all.

If you are interesting to know more about

our community development model

Share this story

Related Posts

Uncategorized
Morgan Coil

Clean water changes everything

You make this possible! This summer, our community came together in a powerful way, raising $230,000 to provide clean, running water to over 142 families

Read More »
Amigos Academy
Nic Herrmann

Youth Development Update

Hop on the bus to the great news We are exited to share with you all the amazing things that are happening in the Amigos

Read More »
Christ More Visible
Sabrina Bland

The real Juntos

The other day a farm worker’s mother died. She had the typical age problems- diabetes, high blood pressure. On paper, she was a 74-year-old woman

Read More »
Christ More Visible
Morgan Coil

How to Love the Long Way

In a lot of ways, our work at Amigos for Christ is designed with people and relationships in mind. We hope to model our work

Read More »
Amigos Story
Joey McGinn

Why Amigos for Christ

For our 25th anniversary, we asked our Amigos Family what they love about Amigos and why they keep coming back. Their answers remind us why

Read More »
Long-Term Volunteers
Guest Author

A Voice Outside Myself

Written by Joseph Donlin, a Long-Term Volunteer. Confirmation bias is defined as the tendency we as humans have to evaluate new data as confirmation or

Read More »