Progress!

Ahhh...5 am and my head is finally hitting the pillow after 24 hours. What a way to wrap up an incredible week in Haiti. My friend, Stacey and I covered quite a few square miles on this trip, and in typical fashion, there was never a dull moment. Visiting Pastor Val and the children at Val Children's Home Care, ended up being just a small part of the trip. There are many people sitting up and taking notice of Haiti right now, and we were in the midst of it. Every day was full of interesting and diverse experiences:

• Monday - travel day, awesome reunion with our hosts, with some Japanese curry for dinner. The children both gave up their rooms for us, so we each had our own bed; such a blessing.
• Tuesday - Met Jean Marc Zamor, Regent University PhD candidate and Haitian pastor. He took us to a beautiful spot near the Dominican border to see the 200 acres where he is building Haiti Providence University. The first building is well under way. It is very exciting to see such great faith; such a huge undertaking and funded largely by Haitian churches!
• Wednesday - I spoke at the chapel service at Quisqueya Christian School, telling them my story about the earthquake, and encouraging the teens to seek out their own relationship with Christ. There are many students there now that are not necessarily from Christian families. After, I took Stacey up to a lovely spot called Boutellier on a mountain overlooking Port au Prince, and then up to the Baptist Haiti Mission for lunch and some shopping. We met a two-month old whose mama was in the hospital with TB, and the missionary that brought them in from the mountains. Had dinner with Junior and Joyce and mapped out the rest of our week.
• Thursday - Off to the beach for a day. It's important to me to show people this wonderful side of Haiti. Stacey's commentary: "This would be a great place for a vacation!"
• Friday - We met with Anne, Miselene's aunt, in St. Marc and she led us to Hatte in the Artibonite Valley to see her village and meet her family. Miselene is the little girl that came to the US for treatment at a local hospital for cancer...she has recently passed away after a real battle for her life but we wanted to stay in contact with her family. This is the area where the heaviest concentration of cholera was. After a dusty hour-long ride through rice fields, we arrived at the most impoverished village I have ever seen: no one had shoes, filthy and sick children, no livestock, not even a chicken, etc. We gathered in a room with the patriarch, Anne's father, and his 11 children and grandchildren - about 60 people in all. As the day went on, we learned that some men had come and stolen their land and livestock last year, ran the local pastor and school headmaster out of town, and they are really vulnerable. We also discovered that the patriarch was the local witch doctor and our meeting was held in a voodoo temple! There was demon-possessed woman in our midst who became a little violent with a stick and a rock while we were praying for the children. They call her "Cholera." We gave some money to Anne to buy some food and to give them some ability to get started again. Junior will follow-up with them.
  
• Saturday - We met with Pastor Val and went to his orphanage outside of Leogane. The kids had a little program prepared and sang for us, and one of the songs was about preventing cholera! We hung out there for a few hours, painted fingernails again, played with matchbox cars and bubbles and then went back to the guest house. The little houses we bought are up and occupied, and life is returning to a new normal there. Everyone is happy and healthy...such a different atmosphere from the day before. Construction on a new dormitory and church are underway, and plans for a new school, a food depot, a bakery and other development work are moving along as well.
  

• Sunday - We attended the 4.5 hour church service at the orphanage, with about 75 people in attendance. All of us preached. We were encouraged to see people of all ages, both men and women and their children there. There were several young men in their twenties that Pastor Val is mentoring. They have even planted a church even farther up in the mountains, about a one-hour walk from Pastor Val's place. There was a man in the church who is 109 years old and has been with Pastor Val for over 40 years. His name is Constant (appropriate!) and when I asked him what the secret to a long life is, he said, "Keep God in your heart!" We hiked up the hills behind the site, and had a lovely day, heading back to PAP in the evening.

• 

• Monday - Before heading to the airport, we hooked up with a missionary that is working with a coop of coffee growers and got some unroasted beans to bring back. We are hoping to partner with these people to begin some coffee exportation, supporting the farmers of Haiti and creating much needed jobs. We also had an interesting conversation with a little boy who has been kidnapped twice! Very interesting story...We departed PAP at noon on Monday.
  

We also were able to talk with Pastor Val about some other plans for growing the local economy. We discussed a plan to provide grants for a motorcycle taxi business for the men in his church. (This is the most practical mode of transport in the rural areas, and is a growing opportunity for men who need to provide for their families.) We also discussed plans for a school building. He has 350 children attending school on his compound, but they are meeting under trees in makeshift tents and areas. He could take many more kids, if there was space. We saw a building that could be put together very quickly, very inexpensively that would accommodate so many, and he really liked it. So fundraising will begin for those two projects immediately. We need about $5K for the motorcycle endeavor (which will be reinvested in motorcycles over and over again) and approximately $60K for the school.

To top off the week, almost as if God wanted to show off, I struck up a conversation with a man in the PAP airport Monday morning who is a pastor in the US, but is part of the church on Delmas 9 that took care of us the night of the earthquake! He recognized people in my photos, and knows Pastor Val! It was amazing. God is amazing.

So thank you, thank you for your prayers and support. Stacey had a great time, we stayed safe and healthy, made some great connections, and serious progress on the things God has put on our plate. It is so exciting to see God at work; I feel like I'm sitting on the front row!

Love Hopes All Things

I'm going to confirm this next month when I'm actually in Haiti and can ask around...but I suspect there are lots of pastors caring for groups of children not their own. And not just in Haiti, but in other poor pockets of the world. It is a natural outgrowth of the life of Christ in a person, to take care of the fatherless and widowed.

We just happened upon this one. Although Pastor Val is an extraordinary man in our eyes, we have not met all the others.

I think this because I heard a Haitian friend tell me that yes, he's heard of a lot of pastors who do just what Pastor Val does. They seem to have the capacity to care for many.

Could I?
Could you?

And I heard about a large orphanage in Uganda, where a lady took in her grandchildren as one by one, her adult children died of AIDS. What started as a large family of Granny and the grandkids, turned into over 500 children 20 years later.

So here's a challenge: when we hear about a child or a teen that needs some extra help or care, do we ever think we should take them into our home? Do we even have opportunity to meet people in need like that, or do we live in comfortable suburbs with little or no interaction with the poor and needy? Actually, they may be in our backyard. I've heard many stories of teens who's parents have 'kicked them out' for one reason or another. More than likely, the teen was driving the parents to the brink, but would we be willing to put ourselves out there and take them in for a while? It could save a life.

But the risk is often a broken heart. In the movie, "The Blind Side," optimist Leigh Ann Tuohy takes in a young homeless athlete. The story has a happy ending; Michael finds love and acceptance in their home and goes on to succeed, choosing not to go back to the bad neighborhood. We didn't see Michael choosing the dysfunction, the gangs, the drugs, the crime, the dead-end track. We all probably had a warm fuzzy leaving the theater thinking, "I could do that!" "Surely a child from the hood would want to live in a nice house with all the trimmings."

But many times, the teen from a broken and dysfunctional background can't adapt to a somewhat normal lifestyle and doesn't make it. That is heartbreaking. You can lead a horse to water... It is so frustrating to want something so badly for a child, and have them come so close to achieving it, only to go back to the pattern that is familiar, though unhealthy.

So Christian, be on the lookout for those in need. Be willing to lay your heart on the line to be the one to save a life. Occasionally one will make it out, and make it in life. But we can't stop trying because we calculated the risk, and it doesn't look promising.

Love hopes all things.