Sunday was a Great Day

Morning came with a quick breakfast and off to join worship at Pastor Jeannot's church in Gonaives.The congregation welcomed us warmly as we worshipped with our Haitian brothers and sisters in Christ. I loved the passion for which Pastor Jeannot preached the gospel. The gentle man I have come to know and love raises his voice to preach with authority and the urgency of his message is felt throughout the neighborhood as I am sure those living near the church can hear the Good News being preached even if they are not present at the church.
From church in Gonaives we began our journey to church in Desire.Because of yesterday's challenge for the bus versus river, we used Pastor Jeannot's four wheel drive pick-up. But the interesting thing about the pick up is that Pastor Jeannot does not know yet how to drive it. Since Bertrand has to drive the team on the bus to the river, someone had to drive Jeannot's truck so that it could then be used to shuttle our team over the river and to Desire. I was the man for the job! I haven't driven in Haiti although I feel confident that I could find my way around having been here eight times now. So today was to be the day I got to drive in Haiti. And I'll admit it was fun! I got to dodge giant potholes, oncoming tap taps, moto-taxis, giant road construction trucks and a few goats.
So we made it to Desire to join about 175 kids and a handful of adults in worship late this morning- truly a blessing. The heat and humidity made sitting in the church (a tent) feel like an extreme sauna as sweat continuously poured down my face and my clothes soaked through. But the joy easily overwhelmed the heat as we lifted our praises to God. The exciting thing for me was to see so many kids from the community join us in worship.
We returned later in the afternoon to rejoin the kids at Desire. One of the highlights was having to walk part way to Desire from the river. Having traveled many times in the safety of a big white bus, our new circumstance afforded us the opportunity to take in the scenery of the countryside on foot and greet local people as we went.  We were warmly greeted in return.
The only bummer of the day was having to cut short our time this afternoon because of rain. The rain began to fall as soon as we arrived and we worked hard to push on with our program. But again, I was loving the adventure of walking in Haiti even while the rain was falling and looking forward to driving the truck back to the hotel from the river.
The team has been fantastic and I love getting to know the members better.  God has called a special group of people to minister with joy to so many kids- they don't even know the orphans from the community kids because they have all been together this whole time.  But maybe that's not important- what is important is that they are sharing the love of Jesus Christ with everybody they meet and encounter.  Today was a great day!