It is about time that I blog about
everything that went on when Mom and Mark were here. The ten days were extremely busy, exhausting,
fun, encouraging, and so much more. I
loved having the Blue Grass team here.
It was so fun to serve along side Mom and Mark. I also loved watching the team love on the
people that I love.
My beautiful Haitian family with part of my American family
The week and a half with them
started out a bit different. I actually
left campus the day after the team got to campus. We had another team that was traveling to
their neighbors project communities, and I was able to tag along with
them. While I am in Haiti, I will be
traveling to all of our neighbors project communities to do a health evaluation
on them. It is the hope that we will be
able to identify their biggest needs and start working towards ways of meeting
these needs. I was able to travel to
Beauchamp and Mayette and meet with the pastors in these communities. This was such an affirmation to me that I am
doing what I need to do. The first
question I asked (before I really
explained who I was or what I was wanting to do) was “what do you think that
the biggest problem is in your community?”
In both of these communities, the pastors said that their biggest
problem was health. Both of these communities are currently fighting cholera
and high childhood mortality rates, but there is no clinic or health facility
within a two hour walk of them. I was
particularly inspired by the pastor in Beauchamp. Pastor Luke shared with me both the physical
struggles and the spiritual struggles of life in Beauchamp. The physical struggles included the fact that
the closest water source is a two and a
half hour walk (one way) away and the local school closed down. However, it was the spiritual struggles that
Pastor Luke was passionate about. He said that in the last survey, 275 habitats
were identified in Beauchamp. He also
said that he tried to count how many witch doctors were in Beauchamp, and he
had to stop counting at 42 because it was so discouraging. Beauchamp is a spiritual battlefield, but I
was inspired by Pastor Luke’s passion for this community.
Mayette, Haiti
After a couple days, I left
Beauchamp for La Baie. It was quite an
adventure to get there. My interpreter,
the moto driver, and I all climbed onto the motorcycle with our bags and
left. The ride was up and down these
little rocky dirt paths. I knew it was
not a good sign when my interpreter kept saying “this isn’t safe!” We may have gone the wrong direction twice,
but we made it! Though the trip was an
adventure, it was so cool to be able to pass by these remote villages and see
what everyday life looked like there.
Blue Grass met me in La Baie, and they never stopped. The first thing that we did was grocery
ministry. The group had bought groceries
while they were in Saint Louis, and we started hiking up the mountain with the
groceries and a creole Bible for each house.
There were a couple houses that we knew that we wanted to go to, and we
were able to stop at them. We once again
stopped by the house that the mother had died.
The daughter shared with us that it has been very hard for her since her
mom died because she really misses her.
I pray that our devotion brought her a little peace and that the Bible
that was left will continue to bring the family peace. While we were walking with the bags, I told
the group that we would go to whatever houses we felt like God led us to for
the remaining grocery bags. We nearly
passed one house, and Mark said that he felt like we should stop there. Mom told him to speak up, so he hollered at
the group to stop. We walked up this
hill to the house. The man who lived there
had a nasty wound on his leg. He had had
it for a long time, but he could not get it to go away. Mom was able to talk to him about it some,
and the next day she brought him everything he could need to take care of it
and clean it. She went through how he
should clean and wrap it, and he was very responsive and thankful. It was so neat to watch her in her element. The main thing that we wanted to do in La
Baie was a two day sports camp. We gave
out wrist bands so that we could keep track of how many people were there. The camp must have been pretty good because
this little boy made his own bracelet so that he could come!
He got to stay :)
We learned a lot the first day of
sports camp and were able to make the second day run great. I loved watching the integration between the
boys in our orphanage and the community.
It was also such a good opportunity for us to open our doors to the
community since we hosted the camp on the mission’s property. Everyone at the camp not only got to play
sports and do different activities, but each day they were also able to hear a
devotion and be prayed over. That was
our ultimate purpose. We were also able
to do a VBS for the children who could not attend our sports camp, which was so
much fun! At La Baie, I was also able to
do my community evaluation there. Mom
was able to join me for this, and I am very thankful for that. We went through the questions with the campus
director, and then we were able to hike to another town to meet with a lady who
runs a clinic there. This adventure
started out a little discouraging because I wanted to see the water source, but
no one knew where it was. We then got to
the clinic, but it was closed. I felt
like it had been a bit of a wasted trip, but then someone said they thought
they knew where the lady lived. We
walked to her house and were able to interview her there. At the end, we asked her about the water
source. It ended up being right behind
her house, and she took us to see it!
The group was also able to spend a lot of time with the orphan boys. They loved on them, and played hard. There were many soccer games, hugs, laughs,
and love.
Blue Grass with the orphan boys
After returning from La Baie, there
was still a lot of ministry to do! We
were able to do the bracelet boy bible study and once again pray over each boy
individually. Every afternoon before and
after La Baie, the group would visit different bracelet boys’ houses. At their houses, we were able to meet their
family, pray over them and their needs, and give them a Creole Bible. I loved watching the group invest even deeper
into the bracelet boys’ lives, and I loved watching the boys respond to
that. Leah was actually able to visit
Frankis’s house and pray over his family.
Frankis is the boy that she had been praying over for the last year
through the prayer ministry we started last year.
Leah with Frankis's family
The team was able to go to
Ansefalour to do a VBS and pray over the voodoo monument. That is a huge opportunity to be lights in
the midst of darkness. We were also able
to take the Miriam Center kids to the beach.
This was so fun to participate in.
For the last two years, I had been trying to get our team to go on a
trip with them, but it never worked out.
I am so glad it was able to work out this time. The ride there might have been the best part
though! It is hard enough to hold
yourself on a tap tap, but it is even harder when you have kids on your lap!
Mom with John Kerry and me with Wadly
There were so many more things that
the group was able to do from going to House of Hope to visiting families, to
hanging out with the gran moun (elderly people) and orphans. I am so thankful for their acts of service
and sacrifices that they made in order to get here. I am also thankful that I was able to join
their group and serve along side of them.
Thank you for your prayers while they were here, and for your continual
prayers after they leave.
