Taza de Gozo (Cup of Joy) has been a dream of mine for years. Perhaps not all of the specifics and details, but the general idea of using coffee to do ministry at least. I’ve always loved (and I mean LOVED) everything coffee, ever since I was really little. It only intensified when I started working at a coffee shop and became a barista and learned how to roast coffee, and just being in that world was something I immediately fell in love with. In 2017, a hope began to grow in my heart to someday have a space where I could welcome people in from all different walks and seasons of life, and that they would feel loved… that they would encounter Jesus. I began to daydream constantly about someday having my own café where people would gather and be encouraged and find rest and joy and peace. I was always imagining what it would be like to be able to impact someone’s life by buying coffee from their small farm in a third-world country, training someone to roast the coffee and therefore provide employment, and eventually import it and have it in my own café, so that anytime anyone drank a cup of coffee, they would be supporting not only a local business, but changing people’s lives around the world. And that dream hasn’t changed. It’s still something I imagine and get excited about and want to work toward, but the reality is, I have to recognize that every big dream starts with a small step…
In January of 2020, Mario and I got barista training (he had no experience in any of that but immediately caught on and he loves it! And despite my job at a coffee shop, I was never fully trained in the science aspect of it all). It was so good and so equipping! Then later that month I came up to Wyoming and my family organized a coffee-themed fundraiser called the Brewhaha. All of the money would go toward opening our coffee shop. My sister found a small espresso machine that we borrowed and I spent a cold Sunday afternoon at a church in Powell making coffee for friends and family. The event was so fun and ended up being a success! I was very encouraged by all of it.
We had hopes of finding property and opening a local coffee shop in the village where we live, La Venta, Honduras, later that year. As we were looking for land, covid hit, and everything shut down. Our plans were put on hold, and even in our day-to-day ministry we had to slow down a lot. As things began to open again months later, we continued to look for land with no success. Finally one day in December, we were sitting at Mario’s mom’s house and it just hit me: we needed to start small. So small. We had considered just doing delivery from our house (we’re a bit further out and no one would want to go to our house just for coffee with it being a ways away) but even with the house we’re renting we don’t have full freedom to do those things anyway. However, Mario’s mom lives right on the main road of La Venta and kind of in the middle of everything. She had a little space just outside the house, so we got to work. We leveled the area, brought gravel in, bought some rustic tables and chairs, built a little roof over it for weather, found a small espresso machine, and opened on Christmas Day. Almost all of the initial expenses were paid for by what had been raised at the Brewhaha earlier that year— what a blessing! Honestly, this little coffee shop was so far from what I had been imagining for years, but it was ours and we were choosing to be faithful in the little. It has no walls. Our work space is very small and unprotected. We have to pack up everything at the end of the day, haul it inside, and when we open, it’s a lot of work to clean the space and take everything out and get it all set up. But we’re taking one step at a time to work towards the big-picture vision.
January was great for business and we were so encouraged! February slowed down some, and in March, we had to close for a while due to Mario’s sister’s health getting much worse and she eventually passed away (a very long story…). As we’ve tried to get back into the swing of things in April, it’s just been hard. We currently feel like we’re in a bit of a transition period, but our hearts are still wanting to have that space where people can enter in and find that Jesus’ yoke is easy and His burden is light. I’m not really sure what that will look like honestly. I don’t know if we’ll continue right where we’re at or not. We’re currently discussing pursuing that vision, but doing it out on the highway so we would at least be able to build the business enough to be able to hire more help, which is a big reason for me to want to have a local café too— providing opportunities for those who may not usually have them. We ask for prayers in all of that and just that we would be open-handed and sensitive to the Lord’s leading in all of it. We just want to be faithful and obedient to Him, whatever that may look like.
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My family put together the second annual Brewhaha fundraiser again in May of 2021, and it was a party! Some friends of ours generously offered to let us use their beautiful home for the event and it was the perfect venue. My very talented cousin was passing through town and she played some songs on her fiddle and her guitar, my sister and her daughter did a little Irish dance to the music, and the beautiful house where we did the event was full of people chatting and laughing. I made coffee for about three hours straight and enjoyed every minute of it. The afternoon was bubbling with life and joy and fun! Things like that really are what encourage me and motivate me and continue to give me vision for what I hope to someday cultivate.
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*Update as of February 1st, 2022: After the most recent Brewhaha in May of 2021, we had hoped to open the café again after I got back to Honduras from being in the States for a bit, but shortly after I headed back south, we went up to Guatemala for a few weeks. Upon returning to Honduras from that trip, construction began on Mario’s mom’s house where we had our café so we were unable to use the space during that project. While that project was underway, I came up to the States to have our baby, Vienne, and I have been here ever since. So in terms of activity with our café, there’s not a lot to report. There is, however, exciting news for moving forward with it this year of 2022! I hope to head back to Honduras soon and once I get back, Mario and I will be closing on a house! We will have enough property now to eventually build a real coffeehouse building, but even for now we’ll have the space to make do just selling directly from our house. We’ll have enough space in the kitchen to have the espresso machine and crepe iron for now, and there is a large covered porch space on two sides of the house where we can have seating and be able to have our movie/game nights, Bible studies, and worship nights. Praise Jesus for this open door! In the meantime, to try to keep the name Taza de Gozo in people’s minds in La Venta, Mario has been selling granitas and delivering them around the village. It’s a simple way to continue to work on the café without him being overwhelmed with feeling like he also needs to be making and selling coffee and crepes on his own. The rustic tables and chairs we bought when we first opened Taza de Gozo sadly did not hold up, so on the top of our list for needs right now is to get sturdy, long-term seating, so that is likely what the majority of the Brewhaha funds will go toward when I get back to Honduras. I also have been dreaming lately of using our outdoor porch as a space to host dinners and practice fellowship in ways similar to the early church (if you’re interested in listening to a sermon that has been an inspiration to me in that desire, go listen to Dining Room Table Christianity by Bridgetown Church. It’s part of a series called Eating and Drinking and I also love especially Part 1: Radically Ordinary Hospitality and Part 7: The Meal. The whole series, really, is so good!).
I can’t wait to see what God has in store for us and the ways He will use this ministry. It’s all for His glory!
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