DAY 5 (January 6, 2012)

This morning we drove over to the soccer stadium.   Half of our team walked the streets nearby and promoted the festival that was going to take place tonight, tomorrow and Sunday.  While walking the streets we met a young gentleman by the name of Ricardo, a local of Port-au-Prince whose birthday just happened to be today.  He was so excited to meet us and help show us around the town.  He had learned English on his own, so he was also willing to help us translate as best as he could.  He was the most kind man-and once again we know only God could have brought Ricardo into our lives that day at that specific time as our regular translators were running later and we wouldn’t be able to promote the festival very well without someone to help us translate.  Meanwhile, as several of us walked the streets, many of the men headed over to the lumber store, which just so happened to be straight across from the soccer field-another God thing.  The men ordered the lumber supplies to build Jon’s bike ramp and they began to measure, cut and build the ramp.  While the men continued to build the ramp, Edward (the driver of our van) took several others of us into town to grab lunch for everyone to take back and eat at the stadium.  As we are eating, all of a sudden we heard a young boy crying loudly.  Some members from our team went over to the group of boys that were playing under the stage and we came to figure out that this young boy that was crying just had one of his sandals stolen by an older child who took off running.   We tried to comfort him and told him in would be ok and that we would get him some shoes.  A couple team members of ours walked up and down the street trying to find some sandals or shoes to buy from one of the vendors.  And sure enough not too much later, they had found a pair for him…they fit perfectly and he was so happy.  The majority of us then headed back to the hotel to freshen up before heading back for the first night of the festival.  We were about an hour and a half late to the festival tonight due to the CRAZY traffic, but all was well-we just jumped on stage set up our last minute sound pieces and instruments as the Haitian band was finishing up and we skipped sound checking and began our set.  The concert went well tonight.  There was a good turnout of people I felt and they seemed to really enjoy the music, Allan’s message and Jon’s bike tricks.  Although, Rachelle Hope had to cut her set a little short as 8:30 hit and the people left in flocks.  From what we understand it is not safe for the people to be out past 8:30.  So we game planned what we would do differently the next two nights.  Tonight at the festival we also had the opportunity to meet a young man named Zach and his wife Dede who Josh & Rachelle (our Life Light team leaders) met I believe it was a year ago.  When they were in Haiti previously, Zach attended one of their events, and while Josh was sharing, Zach stood up and asked what the purpose of the meeting was.  Josh was kind of taken by that, but Zach explained that he had traveled hours to the meeting as he was led by an “invisible hand”.  That night Josh asked Zach if he would like to accept the Lord as his personal Lord and Savior.  Surprisingly Zach said no.  Zach said he wanted to take the time to think about it and really commit to accepting Christ as a lifelong commitment.  That same night, Zach walked back to his home hours away and took his girlfriend at the time-now wife Dede to the meeting where they also shared the gospel with her.  Today Zach and Dede are both strong Christians and have accepted Christ into their lives and are ministering to the people of Haiti.  It was such a privilege to hear Zach’s testimony as he shared with the people at tonight’s festival.  We witnessed over a couple hundred Haitians give their lives to Christ tonight!  We then headed back to Coconut Village, shared devotions and debriefed before heading to bed.