DAY 4 (January 5, 2012)

Today we woke up and ate breakfast, had team devotions, loaded up into the vehicles and headed out to a village in the country about an hour and a half outside of Port-au-Prince.  Just before we arrived into the village we stopped and ate some PB&J sandwiches and chips for lunch real quick and used the “outdoor restrooms” behind the biggest bush we could find before driving into the village.  The drive into the village was very bumpy and in some spots very wet.  I am surprise Kansas was able to keep that baby in after all those bumps, and I think Charlie felt at home as we drove through those big mud puddles.  As we drove into the village children would turn and start running to the road as they were waving with big smiles on their face and yelling-Blanc (white people).  It was as if they never saw anyone outside of their village, especially white people, and probably very rarely did they have visitors.  Most of the children were fully clothed, but there were a few that were half clothed or completely naked.  There was so much to see as we drove…homes that didn’t look like anything compared to ours, streams where the people bathed, donkeys, goats, turkeys, chickens, rosters, and dogs just roaming around, men in the fields working entirely by hand-which we would now consider old fashioned, and children running around playing.  As we got quite away into the village we eventually stopped at a church that pastor Luc explained God called him to plant in this village 20 years ago.  Pastor Luc did not know where God was calling him right away or what He wanted Him to do, but once he was lead there, God revealed to him His plan and he was faithful.  He then explained to us that he also helped put a well in the village 18 years ago.  You could see a smile on his face as he explained these things to us.  What a man of God!  Once we unloaded the vehicles, we stepped inside the church where there were rows and rows of children singing.  We were invited to the front where we shared our name, age and where we are from.  Next our leaders asked who would be willing to share the “Wordless Books” with the children.  I quickly offered, but little did I know she meant stand up in front of everyone and share, not just split up into little groups and explain.  Who knew what I was volunteering for?  Charlie & I shared with the children what these “Wordless Books” were all about.  These books are small felt colored pages that were sewn into a book.  They do not have any pictures or words, it is just the colored felt pages.  These books were used to explain the gospel in simple terms.  The pages are yellow-to explain God’s glory and the streets in heaven, black-to explain that we are sinful by nature and because of that we cannot live with Christ, red-to explain that Christ died for our sins so that we can someday live with him eternally, white-to explain that in Christ we are pure and white as the clouds, and green to represent everlasting life and our growth in Christ when we accept Him.  Charlie explained the different colors and what they meant and I shared a bible passage to go with each page.  He did a great job of putting things in simple terms for the children.  After sharing the story and distributing a book to each child, we then helped distribute bowls of what looked like rice and some type of pasta to the children.  Pastor Luc explained to us that he comes to this church in the village twice a week to feed the children.  I was pretty impressed that the children were as well behaved as they were waiting for their food to come being that they only ate possibly those two times a week.  They would all grab for the bowl and somewhat fight over who got it first, but it wasn’t too bad and can be expected.  We got about half the bowls distributed and then the ladies dishing up just quit and didn’t give us anymore bowls to pass out.  We suddenly got this crappy feeling in our stomachs as we thought only half of the children were going to be fed.  Then as soon as several of the children were finished they told us to collect the bowls and silverware and bring them back.  Phew…they just didn’t have enough bowls and spoons for everyone, so they had to feed the children in shifts.  It was just crazy to see that too though, as soon as gathered  the bowls and spoons that the children were finished with we just brought them back and food was dished right back in.  Nothing was washed before passing it on to the next child.  Anyway, children as little as 3 years old sat there and quickly downed every grain of rice in that bowl.  This really kind of put things into perspective when we in American so often order too much food or put too much on our plates that we end up throwing half of our food away; or to go beyond that…we often complain about what we are given to eat or complain that we are starving.  I don’t think there was quite enough food to go around for every child that day, but it got awfully close if it didn’t.    It was fun to be able to praise our Savior together in the same language.  After singing we passed out a couple pieces of candy to each child that we took along.   Boy were they excited.   It was kind of a mad house passing out candy as everyone wanted the whole handful, but it worked.  We then split the children up into groups and had sections of arts and crafts outside the church for the children to do.  Charlie, Kelsie and I had a group of young children that we did “scratch boards” with and also helped a few put together salvation bracelets that had the “wordless book” colors on it that allowed us the opportunity to share the gospel at the same time.  The children did pretty well with the crafts, but really they didn’t even care too much about actually doing the crafts as they did just receiving something.  We quickly found out that it would probably have been best to put away the watches that we wore into the village as well as sunglasses and baseball caps.  Many of the children would point to these items that we were wearing and say, “Sir Blanc…give me.”  As much as we would have loved to give them these items, we were instructed not to as they would fight and not every child would receive something.  After crafts and each child getting to participate in making something, our team split up into groups and each group was paired up with a translator.  We then ventured off into the village going home to home speaking with the parents in the homes.  Our group consisted of myself, Charlie, our brother Jeff, sister Kasondra, and another team member-Sara.  Our wonderful translators-Carols & Michelle would ask them for us what their greatest need was, if they knew Christ, if they had accepted Him as their Lord and Savior and if they hadn’t if they would like to do so.  We made it to several homes that day and prayed over many individuals.  Two of the homes we prayed in, the individuals stated that they did know Jesus but that they hadn’t accepted Him yet and would like to do so.  I had the honor of walking one young expecting mother through the gospel and led her through a prayer to accept Christ into her life that day.  This was very much a God moment for me and as we left her home, Charlie & I both hugged her and she kissed me on the cheek.  Kasondra also had the privilege of doing the same with another mother that we spoke with.  In addition to these women, an older woman in the village invited us into her home and was more than excited about us praying with her and over her home.  She seemed very proud as she invited us in and immediately kneeled on the cement floor in the middle or her home and began to pour out her heart.  She explained that her husband had passed away and that her son had just recently lost his job.  She asked that we pray for her daily strength and that God would provide for their needs in and through everything.  Once again I almost felt shame as I saw this old women drop to her knees before the Lord on the cement floor of her home as we prayed with her.  How often do I drop to my knees and pray humbly before the Lord I thought?  I have to say a huge thank you to the translators in our group that lead us from home to home today and assisted us in sharing the message with the people.  Michelle and Carlos you did an amazing job and truly are being the hands and feet of Jesus.  After each group had some time to go from home to home praying with the people in the village, we loaded back up into our vehicles and headed out of the village.  Children would run after us as we headed out of the village and would jump onto the truck to try and follow us out.  It was hard, but we literally had to peel some of them off the truck to keep them there.  Once out of the village we headed back into Port-au-Prince to our hotel, showed, relaxed a bit, had supper and debriefed.  Tonight we stayed up for awhile longer and sang some praise and worship songs by the pool as Danny and Art played acoustic guitar and we also took some time to let Charlie’s family back at home know that we made it safely and were have an amazing time.  I was pretty shot after today as I remember falling asleep several times in the truck on the way back to the hotel and hitting my head on the cage in front of me, so I was pretty ready for bed tonight.  So far this was my favorite day of the trip!