Last week I blogged a little about
Haitian church, but I did not really go into anything about my time here. It has been a longer adjustment than I
thought, but I have loved my time here so far.
I love seeing positive changes in the way things are working on
campus. There is a new room for the
Miriam Center, which was much needed. I
am so excited to see how God uses that room to bring visibility to some of the
children who are often left out this summer.
It has also been so good to reconnect with old friends and make some new
ones. It adds so much to the
relationship when you are able to say that you are staying longer than the
typical ten days.
An "old friend," Jacob
A new friend, Wadly
For the past week or so, we have
had a surgery team here. It has been
pretty cool to watch them in action. I
have spent a lot of time in the surgery wing trying to help make sure things
are running smoothly. I have found that
my time there has been filled with extremes on both ends. There are happy moments when the surgeons are
able to change people’s lives. After one
of the surgeries, the man who was operated on said “Thank you so much. Now I can go to church, I can go to the
market, I can go to town.” One small operation was able to completely change
his life. However, there are also
difficult times. One boy came in for a
surgery and the doctors found a mass.
They think that it could be cancerous, and they are taking it back for
biopsies in the States. We were able to
find a place that could treat him if it is cancer; however, that place is in
Port-au-Prince. He lives on Tortuga
Island. If it is cancer, it is likely
that he will not be able to get the treatment that he needs. Though this has been and could be really
hard, I am so thankful that we were able to build a connection with this
family. I have really enjoyed getting to
know Pastor St. Verdi, the pastor of the mission church more this week. He has such a heart for this community, and
he has really demonstrated that heart.
He has prayed with every patient prior to them going into surgery and is
planning follow up visits to check in on some of them. Not only does this build a connection between
the church and the patients, but it has also been an opportunity to share the
peace that our Lord and Savior brings.
As I was doing my quiet time this
morning, I asked God to remind my why I am in Haiti. Wow, what a reminder he gave me. This morning I went into surgery wing, and
the first patient was a little boy whose fifth birthday was today. As he went back, Pastor St. Verdi went to
pray with his grandmother who had brought him.
I noticed that she was crying, and something told me that I needed to
try to comfort her a little. I sat with
her and hugged her, patted her back, and tried to bring a little sliver of
comfort as the surgery went on. (Surgery
is a very scary thing for Haitians, as it is not common/typically does not have
high success rates.) I went to check on
the boy, and I came out and told her that the surgery was finished and he did
very good. She immediately started
saying “Thank you Jesus. Thank you
Savior.” As we walked arm in arm to see
her grandson, she was singing praises the whole time. As we were sitting with the boy, she started
to share with me their story. She said
that the boy’s father told her he would kill her if anything happened to his
boy. She told us how the boy’s mother
left the father, so the father did bad things to the boy to try to make the
mother suffer. She said that she tried
to take care of the boy, but she could not send him to school or anything. She then asked if the mission could take the
boy. The love that this grandmother has
for her grandson is extremely evident. I
cannot imagine what it took for her to get to the point of asking someone else
to take her grandson. I knew that taking
the boy was not the answer, so I went to get Pastor St. Verdi. He was also impacted by their story, so we
went to talk to the people in charge of Northwest’s programs. Long story short, we were able to get him
into a program and registered for school next year! His grandmother told him that today was the
best birthday for him because he will be able to go to school next year. It was so awesome to play a little part in
this, and it was definitely that moment I had asked God for. At northwest, we say that we are about people
not projects. This was a perfect example
of this.
Me, Rolson, and his grandmother before we registered for school
Overall, though there have been
hard things to see this week, I am so thankful for the relationships that have
been built and the lives that have been changed for the better. I am looking forward to more of these as this
next week is also full of surgery. Thank
you so much for all of your prayers, support, and encouragement. I cannot wait to see what all God does while
I am here. He has already been evident
in so many ways.
