By Lee Davis
Jessica Compton could have done a lot of things over spring break.
The Vestavia Hills senior might have gone to the beach or to a lake. Or she could have stayed home and enjoyed playing endless hours of pick-up basketball games at the local gym. She could have earned some extra spending money by taking a part-time job.
Instead, Compton, along with a group of other girls from the Over the Mountain area, chose to help those in desperate need.
The former Lady Rebel basketball star spent last week in the Central American nation of Honduras as part of a team sent by the Forgotten Children’s Ministry to work with the impoverished youth of that country.
“I can always go to the beach,” Compton said, when reached via phone from Honduras last week. “For my senior year, I wanted to do something more memorable, help children and at the same time spread the message of Jesus Christ.”
Compton and her companions were settled into an agricultural community near the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa. They visited youth homes that were separated by age and gender. The FCM team also ventured out into the neighborhood, carrying the message of Jesus literally door to door to the small houses in the area.
“The people were so receptive to prayer and to hearing the Good News,” Compton said. “Many were already saved but so thrilled to greet us. We just knocked on the door and said, ‘We’d love to pray with you.’ We would ask them if they had a relationship with God. It was interesting to me that it is easier to talk about God in areas that have a lot of poverty than it is in more affluent places.”
Appropriately, the FCM group’s first full day in Honduras was Easter Sunday, and Compton had the opportunity to speak at a local church. “I don’t speak Spanish, but we had a good interpreter,” she said. “I was nervous and got pretty emotional while I was talking. It was such a privilege to be able to do that. I trusted God to put the right words in my mouth.”
The group also ministered to an area a few miles away called “The Dump.” It’s literally a garbage dump where poor Hondurans search for food and discarded items. Some even live in The Dump. Others lived in one room shacks near The Dump, with only a sheet as a door. Some of the shacks housed as many as seven people, according to Compton.
In addition to preaching the gospel, the FCM team offered hot food and basic living staples such as toothbrushes, toothpaste, T-shirts, wash rags and baby diapers.
Compton was deeply moved by much of what she saw.
“Even when you see such poverty with your own eyes, it’s hard to imagine,” she said. “One of the young mothers had to put the same dirty diaper on her baby because it was the only diaper she had. She couldn’t just go down to the local supermarket and buy more. The experience makes you realize how much we take for granted at home.”
The temperature in Honduras tended to be in the comfortable 70s, but Compton said she and her companions were so active that they stayed hot much of the time.
“There was concern about the Zika virus so we sometimes wore medical scrubs,” she said. “We were sweating a lot.”
Other Over the Mountain girls who participated in the trip included Taylor Cahoon, Ashlyn Lovell, Emily Anderson, Emma King, Meghan Levant, Grace Sandavol, Caroline Trott, Hannah George, Lillie Kate Prather, Frances Wheeler, Haley Hauk and Cameron Hauk.
Compton said all the girls were motivated by a desire to spread the word of Christ.
“Only 5 percent of the world will venture to tell people about Jesus,” she said. “We all wanted to be part of that 5 percent.”
The idea of going on a mission trip had been on Compton’s mind for a long time before finally committing to the journey to Honduras.
“All through school, my summers were so busy with basketball and other things,” she said. “So I decided I wanted to spend the spring break of my senior year on a trip like this one.” She expects to tell the story of her experience to her home congregation at Liberty Park Baptist Church soon.
Compton will be attending the University of Alabama next fall and said that the fast pace of college life won’t prevent her from returning to Honduras.
“This was so much better than another beach trip,” she said. “I’m definitely going back.”
Jessica Compton and her friends could have spent spring break riding waves or making money. And there’s nothing wrong with doing either. Instead, they chose to help feed hungry stomachs and save souls – and there’s everything right about doing that.
