Packing my suitcase with possibilities

I'm packing a suitcase this week, but the truth is, I am not a packer. Correction: I am a terrible packer. My wife Becky has, on more than one occasion, stood over my open suitcase and said something like, "Norris, you cannot bring seven pairs of khakis." She is right, of course. She is almost always right. I have found it useful, over 40 years of marriage, to begin agreeing with that sentence early and often. But today, I am actually getting ready to fly to San Pedro Sula, Honduras, with the Chispa Project, the nonprofit my daughter Sara founded to put libraries in public elementary schools. "Chispa" – pronounced cheez-pah – is a Spanish word that describes someone with spark and drive. If you've ever met Sara, you understand the name perfectly. Here is what Chispa does, in plain English: In Honduras, most public elementary schools have no library to speak of. No shelves. No books. No place for a child to pull a story off a wall and disappear into it for an afternoon. Chispa goes into these schools and works with local leaders and teachers to design, fund and establish libraries that school staff will run themselves. They raise a portion of their own funding. They volunteer their own labor. They own it, in every sense of the word. I've been on enough of these trips to tell you what the morning of June 1 will look like: We arrive at the school before the children do. Volunteers assemble in teams. The mural team takes over the classroom, drawing colorful murals of giraffes and elephants reading books beneath a backdrop of fluffy clouds. I step away from this crew – not out of lack of enthusiasm but out of a healthy respect for my own artistic limitations. I once drew a lamb for a Vacation Bible School banner that a 7-year-old told me looked like a potato with ears. I've stayed in my lane since. I join the bookshelf-building team, or the backpack team loading bags with school supplies. And then just as the classrooms begin to smell like possibility, the children arrive. They come in clusters, all smiles, sneaking looks at us from the doorway. They know maybe six words of English: "hello," "yes" and "what is your name?" They use all six of them, repeatedly, and with remarkable confidence. By the end of the day, I usually find someone on my lap demanding that I read a picture book aloud in a language neither of us fully shares. And I do. And somehow it works. That is Chispa's spark. Not our effort – their joy. Now, here is where I am going to be uncharacteristically direct about money. We still have a school library to fully fund – this trip's school – and we need your help to get there. So I am asking you to do three things: First, tell somebody. Forward this column to a friend, a Sunday school class, a book club, a neighbor who has never heard of Honduras but has a generous heart. The word needs to spread wider than my readership alone can carry it. Second, get your people involved. Churches, family reunions, community groups – Chispa welcomes them all. A congregation that decides together to fund a library has done something that will outlast every committee meeting they'll ever hold. Third, if you're able, give something yourself. You don't have to be on that plane with me to do good. Sometimes, the most faithful thing you can do is fund someone else's going. Donate at www.chispaproject.org/familylibrary - or send a check payable to "Chispa Project" to 10556 Combie Road, Suite 6643, Auburn, CA 95602. Our latest library is only half funded. If you say yes to giving now, I promise to bring back stories. I always do. I may also bring those seven pairs of khakis. Becky won't know until we're airborne. Norris Burkes is a syndicated columnist and retired Air Force chaplain. Read more columns at www.thechaplain.net. Send comments to comment@thechaplain.net or call 843-608-9715.