Getting Ready to Come Home

Well today marks our last day in Haiti as we get ready to fly out this afternoon.  It's been a great trip with the first ever student mission team.  This group of students have really given completely of themselves to the task at hand.  Last night as we shared our highs and lows, the most common low was of course leaving the children of Desire.  At the same time, it was also encouraging to our team because they know that even if they never return to Haiti, our goodbyes were temporary in the sense that one day we will see each other in the presence of our Lord.

The team also felt the highs of acceptance from the children after spending the last several days with the kids.  The Desire children were very emotional as we were saying our goodbyes- which to the team was validation of their love and work for the children.

Please pray for us as we begin our journey home to rejoin our families.  And thank you for praying for us all this past week!

Connections

On every trip with every team we always celebrate the moments when connections happen.  For some teams it's a break through in communication by mutually sharing each others' language; for some it's been when the Haitian children grasp English for the first time and use it in a complete sentence; still another time is when the children show us who their siblings are because they see whole families coming to serve.  All these connections are major victories in building relationships with the children and people from the community.

Today I saw another one if those connections.  I'll back up because it actually started last night.  A handful of our students are a part of the Rocky high school music program and earlier this spring they performed a Haitian song in the Creole language.  It was fantastic.  This same group shared it with our translator Volcy (who is himself quite gifted musically) last night at dinner.  Volcy recorded it on his iPod.  This morning after being a bit frustrated by the challenge of teaching music on instruments, the team decided to teach the kids this song that they had learned and performed.  I think the children were first surprised that these Americans were singing in Creole and then had fun learning the song with the help of Volcy as he translated.

Then I saw a couple of other things happen.  The mamas who provide full time care for the kids came in and I noticed that they knew this song and were singing along.  Pastor Jeannot came in after the kids had been working on it and his jaw dropped when he noticed that it was our team members teaching and singing in Creole.  Finally, the older girls who are sometimes hard to get close to pulled a couple of the girls who were teaching over to their homes and began singing again.

I can't stress enough that these little breakthroughs are actually earth-shaking in the formation of relationships.  Our teams put a lot of time in preparation only to feel like things didn't go well or they didn't go as planned.  Yet by being flexible and open to God's work, moments like these come along and make all the work seem worth it.

Pray for the team as some members are struggling with not feeling well.  And especially tomorrow as we say goodbye to our Desire children.

Hanging with God

My report today is a little different because I didn't get to go to church to worship.  We've had a few team members battling some stomach issues and while everyone is doing better, some of them needed to hang out at the hotel to recover.  I stayed back for them in case they needed anything.  It's important to me that those who are here for the first time to really take in every cultural experience so I got to spend some great quiet times with God today.  Man, I did not know how badly I needed that!  I was blessed today by taking in the extra time to read and pray.

I was also reminded how nice it is to have a place in Haiti that allows us to stay safe and comfortably so that we can do our "job" ministering to the children of Desire.  That's why I am including some photos of my day.  Although as I am typing this the power has gone out for a record amount of times since I've been here.  But that too is reminder of the things that we so easily take for granted.

The team is doing great as a unit and our discussions are great- I love it when people discover why God has called them to a trip like this.  Many team members are already looking ahead to Tuesday when we say goodbye.  It's hard not to think about how hard it will be.  So we can sure use your prayers for that time as it approaches.

I want to say thanks to Carol, Ken and Steve for all their hard work and leadership!  It's been a blast to spend time with this leadership team.

Photos from Saturday

Here are some more highlights from Saturday.

A Full Day in Desire

Today was a full day of ministry in Desire with the orphans and community children.  The team held a first ever music workshop in the morning and discovered the concept of staying flexible when it doesn't quite go as planned.  They did great.  This afternoon included putting handprints on a sheet- see the pictures.  The team is doing awesome.

Arrival in Desire

It's been a long day for our team after an overnight flight from Denver to Miami and then a quick connection to Port au Prince Haiti.  Many of us barely got any sleep on the flight to Miami, followed by a two hour flight to Haiti, and then we had a three hour bus ride to the city of Gonaives where we are staying at our hotel.  After checking in, the team mustered up reserve energy to jump back on the bus to go meet the kids in Desire.  And was it worth the long journey?  Absolutely!  Many team members met new friends as many of the younger children jumped into the arms of team members.  And some of the team members rekindled friendships that began a year ago and earlier this year.

I am amazed at how much the project property in Desire has transformed in the past two years and most dramatically this past year.  It is amazing to see God provide for these children and Pastor Jeannot in ways that have at times been unexpected.

Tomorrow we have a full day planned with music in the morning- teaching guitar and ukulele and working at forming a choir; and an afternoon filled with art workshops and games.  Please continue praying for the team.  We are a bit weary and a couple of team members are struggling with motion sickness from the bus ride (and for those of you who have come to Haiti and experienced our bus rides, you can sympathize).  

I will have photos tomorrow.

A New Adventure

Well, tomorrow is a new chapter in our partnership with the Desire orphan project and local church- we are sending our first student mission team.  We begin our journey Thursday night as we fly to Miami and then on to Port au Prince followed by a long bus ride to the city of Gonaives.  This student team will be running workshops in music and art.  We have an incredibly gifted team of musicians as well as artists.  So we thought it would be fun to hold workshops for the kids.  In the summertime when school is out, Pastor Jeannot looks for ideas to engage kids in activities- things like cooking, woodworking, music, construction just to name a few.  Our team is going to teach music and art techniques for the kids as well as playing a lot of games during our time there.

Please pray for our team as we go.  And stay tuned for updates as the days go by.