God is good

Haiti Day 3- 12-29-10

Happy Birthday Stephen! Today is stephen's 21st birthday and he celebrated in style in Haiti! We have a party scheduled for Sunday after church. It was a beautiful day in Haiti today. Our day started off early again. Up with the sun and out of the house not too far behind. We picked up 6 of the older boys and 2 ladies to take with us to Marotierre. The ladies prepared our lunch and the boys helped with the work. The walk to the school was really foggy and we could barely see 10 ft in front of us. When we got to the school we immediately got to work painting. Some of us continued To paint the ceiling while others started sanding the walls and then started cutting in the wall color. It was a long and tedious process but by the end of the day the hall and 8 classrooms were finished cutting in and 3.5 of them had been rolled with paint. Our arms are sore but we were very happy with the work that was accomplished. And we got to know some of the boys better. The highlight of the day was painting rooms and hearing the voices of Haitians and Americans singing praises as they worked. After we finished work we had to clean up. Cleaning rollers and brushes without running water is difficult. It truly makes us appreciate what we have been blessed with. All in all it had been a great day. We are ending the day by singing worship songs lead by clay. God is good and is being praised in this place! Please continue to pray.

Pray for rest and for our soreness. Pray for friday night as we get to celebrate the end of 40 days of prayer in our church here with 6+ hours of praise, worship, drama and preaching to ring in the new year.

God is good!

Walking through Clouds

Haiti Day 2- 12-28-10

Today has been a great day. We were up and started at 6:00am which is 5:00am Texas time, no daylight savings in Haiti... We had breakfast and left the house by 7:30am. We got in the tap tap, a Haitian means of transportation. Picture a box truck that has 3 wooden benches in the back with a few metal bars to hold on. we road the tap tap for 1.5 hours up the side of the mountain on unpaved roads. It was very bumpy ride but a true Haitian experience. We got to a point where we had to stop and walk the rest of the way, which was about a mile away. The village we are serving in is called Marotierre and it is beautiful. It is perched atop of one of the hatian mountains surrounded in lush greenery and gardens. When we got to Marotierre we started work on the school. We scraped paint, sanded walls, and began the process of painting. This school is a 10 classroom school that houses 300+ haitian children. Some of the kids helped us paint and work on the school as well. Day one of painting is done and hopefully we will finish the work in the next two days. The thing that has surprised most of us is the beauty of Haiti the land and people are some of the prettiest people in the world. Another great experience from today was walking through clouds. The clouds were rolling through the mountains and we got to be in them! It was alot of fun.

Praise- Sarah made it here safely and has begun learning new things about Haiti. Our team is now complete!

Pray for new friends we meet, for the work to go smoothly, and for everything we do to reflect Christ!

Crazy Travels

Haiti Day 1- 12-27-10

Today has been a crazy day. We all started out at about 3am to begin this crazy travel day. The airports were crazy and several of our flights were overbooked. When we got to Dallas we learned that the flight to ft. Lauderdale was way overbooked. Everyone was there with the exception of our team member Sarah whose flight from Abilene was delayed. She literally ran to the gate and they wouldn't let her on and gave her seat away. Although she got stranded she is safe and will join us tomorrow here in Haiti. Once we arrived in ft lauderdale we learned that they checked ryan's bag to ft lauderdale and not port au prince... So, with 15 minutes until boarding time Ryan and jeff ran to baggage claim and got his bag. Then, with the help of some airline personnel they were both put into wheelchairs and were allowed to go straight through security. It was craziness but they made it just in time. God is good. When we finally made it to Haiti everything went smoothly. We are learning new things. Tasting new foods (goat). And eager to see what god does this week.

Pray for-

Sarah as she travels to Haiti to join the team.

The team as we continue to learn new things about each other, and for unity to come amongst us.

Tomorrow we head to Marotierre where we will be painting and repairing on of the schools.

Praise- we learned that a witch doctor at guibert accepted and believes in Christ yesterday during their service! PTL

Stay tuned for more daily updates. And feel free to share these requests with everyone.

The beginning of our journey

Our team of seven left Dallas on Thursday, July 22nd and arrived in Port-au-Prince around 3:30pm. After a brief orientation and prayer time, we turned in for some eagerly awaited rest.

On Friday we constructed a roof on house #23 of our first 30 homes replacing those destroyed by the earthquake of Jan 12th.

On Saturday we built door frames for ten doors which will be complete on Monday while some of the homes are being painted.

On Sunday we all went to church. Stuart and Angela Platt, Megan Hennig, Amanda Merrell, and Steve and Jake Utley went to church in Guibert with Jean Alix Paul and his family. Dan went to church with Junior Paul in the tiny village of Madam Belizaire. Belizaire is on the large salt lake "Azuei" and has a population of about 250 souls. It is heavily steeped in voodoo and slow to respond to the gospel. About 30 adults attended this church service. The message preached was about the TRUTH that sets us free. There was a positive response by those who attended.

At our evening meetings we have shared the ways God is speaking to each of us and how He wants us to be responsible for what we are observing. We have also determined that we can't get bogged down looking at the huge picture of destruction here but we need to understand that our response will be most effective if exercised "one at a time". We continue to be amazed at the energy and commitment of our Haitian brothers and sisters in Christ who are volunteering their time. Please pray for their strength to continue to assist those in desperate need here.

Final day was a success but goodbyes were hard

Today was a great finish to a wonderful week encounter with God.  We left this morning and headed back to Marothiere to finish our last house of the week. During the exhaustingly long walk down the mountain, through cornfields, we could look across to the surrounding mountains and see all of the other homes we finished this week.

When we got to the home, we quickly got to work. Ermisteal, his wife, and 4 children were going to live in the house that we were about to finish. The work went by so quickly and before I knew it, we were all inside, praying for this family in their newly finished home! I think it might have taken longer for us to walk there and back than it did to finish the house. 

We walked up to the school to eat lunch and all of the kids were outside! We got to play all sorts of kids games with them and had a blast! 

A few hours later, Jean Alix took us to Guibert to finish up a last minute inventory of all of our supplies. When that was finished, we got to play with the kids one last time. We brought suckers and bubbles and all had a wonderful time. Our smallest family member, Mackenlay, was going crazy with the bubbles and was so excited when he got to blow and pop them himself. When our driver arrived, we had to say our goodbyes and leave. It was hard to leave our new friends, but we are happy that we had met them all. As we came back to the house, we had dinner, and our team had our last meeting and we are now heading to bed. 

Things to pray for:
- our traveling safety tomorrow, both in Haiti and in the States
- our hearts as we process this experience
- us as we try to acclimate back into American culture

Easy Like Sunday Morning

Today was amazing! Worshipping with our Haitian brothers and sisters is always one of the highlights of my time here in Haiti. Being able to sit in a room full of people who are whole heartedly worshipping our Lord is almost overwhelming. Even though we didn't understand any of the songs, we could feel the spirit of the Lord among us. As a special treat, Jeff preached the sermon, so we were actually able to understand that part of the service! He did an awesome job of teaching us about the love of Christ. It was beautiful to see that the same truths that God has for us are the same truths that He has for our friends here in Haiti.

After church, we got to give the boys their shoes and backpacks. It was such a precious time! We had a translator this time, so we were able to tell the boys exactly what we wanted to. We let them know how much we love them and how blessed they are to be living in our home. They were very appreciative when we let them know that these gifts don't just appear, but that they are coming from people, who love them and the Lord. There were many hugs, kisses, and I love yous when all of the gifts were given out.

After we got back to the house for the afternoon, Jeff grilled for an 8 yr old's bday party. It was really fun. There were hotdogs, hamburgers, chicken, goat, and of course, rice.

Please pray for us as tomorrow is our last day here. It has rained most of the day today, so the mud could put a damper on our plans for tomorrow. Pray that as we say our goodbyes to new friends, that the memories would be sweet and lasting.