Remembering Natalie

22 year old Natalie was too proud to come ask me for help. Unlike most people in the village she did not want to ask for a handout. Although she was young, she had become a leader among the women living down by the river doing whatever it took to get food to feed her two kids. But then when her father, a fisherman and leader in the community, died unexpectedly, she sought help and we were there. We were able to help her rent a house with a couple of the other women in our program and she started working in the feeding program preparing food for the elderly. Her little frame betrayed the size of her spunk. Her big smile and forthright nature endeared her to all of the Americans who came to visit. She was ambitious and constantly wanting to meet to talk about possible ways for her to provide for her family. She became the spokes person for the ladies group and often confronted me when they felt there was a problem. I had much time with her to share the truth of the gospel and her need for Jesus. We had a good relationship. As other programs began to pull me away from spending everyday in the fish village, God sent Kelsea, an intern from Colorado, who took over much of the work with the women. She became close friends with Natalie and kept me updated on things in the program. We were eventually able to start a house for Natalie and her family. But then she began to be sick. She missed many days of working. Many trips to the local government hospital did nothing to help her ailing condition. Then she started refusing to go back to the hospital and started losing weight. Against the prodding of friends she refused to go for AIDS testing. By the time she finally did, she was down to a shocking 67 pounds and barely able to walk. The tests came back positive and treatment was started but it was too late. She was dying. As we were visiting her the last time before our trip to the US, Joy and I were heart broken. She was lying on a mat on her little concrete porch. As we shooed away the flies she just smiled up at me and held my hand as tight as she could as we prayed with her and talked. She smiled as we told her we would bring her back a treat from America, all the time knowing she would never hold out that long. Just a week after we arrived home in late June she passed away. I pray she truly understand the commitment she made to Jesus and repented and gave her life to him. We pray her death will soften the hard hearts of the other ladies in the group and they will receive the gift of life. Natalie's two orphans tested HIV positive as well and we are working to figure out their future. Can there be a more "least of these" than an AIDS orphan in a slum of Haiti?

Summer Fun

We all made it safely to FL where we will start a time of refreshing and stateside work that will last until September. We will be in FL until July 11th at which time we go to NC. Before we leave FL, we will be helping Dr. Dennis get their car loaded onto he boat in Miami and shipped to Haiti. He will be returning to Haiti with his wife Sara on July 12th and will be working with Stephen and Autumn to handle hints while we are gone. I will be going back to Haiti at the end of July and then returning in August and staying until my daughter's wedding in September. We are really enjoying sharing time together with just our family while here in FL. We are working on getting Luke into college here starting in the fall. What a tough thing for Joy but we know Luke is ready and plans to go to Bible college to pursue a degree in Biblical studies as he seeks God for direction in ministry full time. He is a great missionary! Jacy, Josie, and Judah are in Bible school this week which has been great. Me and Joy have had Jaxon and Justice. We are trying to get supplies as well as make contacts here in FL for shipping into St. Marc. It has already been a successful trip. We can't wait to get to NC to see friends and family. We hope to get to a few churches to share and in a few cottage prayer meetings in friends' homes to give updates on the progress of God's work through New Vision Ministries Haiti. As always too, we do not use any ministry money to support our family while stateside so that all donations go directly to Haiti, so I may be finding a few days of work to help cover our expenses. Joy still needs teachers for Liberty Academy in the fall and need a Ford diesel mechanic willing to take a trip to Haiti to help me fix our truck. Walike also in the process of getting ready to build a new orphanage starting in the fall and need to schedule teams for all phases of building. We just had someone donate the funds for the well and are looking to start building the security walls as soon as we start getting donations. Finally, school sponsorship is starting again. We want to send 200 kids to school this coming year in Montrouis. We are doing it differently this year and need $225 per child to cover the year's expenses. I hope to work on those websites too in the coming days. Thank you for our support and we look forward to seeing many of you soon.

Thank You for Pay Day

31 teachers 13 feeding program workers 13 domestic workers 9 pastors 3 translators 2 drivers 2 cooks 2 yard workers These are a few of the lives we get to invest in every month as we pay them to work in the schools, orphanage, fishing village, boys home, depot and other aspects of the mission. There are many others that we get to pay to do projects but these 75 people are like family. We get to invest in these people financially, personally, and spiritually. What a blessing for me each month! I am so thankful to God for the chance to see God work in changing me. In the past I got excited about payday because of what it put in my hand. Now I get excited on payday for what it puts in my heart. Thank you to everyone who gives to make it possible to support these families. I hope many more of you take the chance to come down and get to know some of the people whose lives you are changing. We need teachers for our American school next year. The main criterion is loving Jesus. Certified teachers are great but anyone willing to serve as a Jesus loving, gospel advancing, kingdom building missionary is qualified. Send me an email if interested. Have a great weekend.

Bella's Home

It has been so long since I posted here I almost decided to just forget it. But instead I decided to start fresh and get back into the habit. When we moved here in 2009 we lived in a little apartment above a boy's home. Our kids did not get to have a pet. So when we moved into the house at the ocean after the earthquake we went through several pets. We had a dog that was taken back because the person that gave it to us had stolen it. We had a wild cat that nearly ate Joy and then we suspect was eaten by the neighbors. We had two Haitian parrots that did not get their wings clipped often enough and one glorious day found freedom. Hundreds of crabs, hermit crabs, a baby mouse, fish thrown into the saltwater pool, even an octopus, and then Bella. Bella was a typical little Haitian mutt that became Josie's best friend. Anyone who knows Josie already knows that she is a fearless animal loving fanatic! You could hear the bellowing of the baby goat long before you could hear Josie's ecstatic laugh as she came around the corner at the mission one afternoon carrying a terrified baby goat and screaming "I got me a goat...I got me a goat!". Now she had Bella. She would carry Bella around the yard by the head. Bella would just hang there with a mixed grimace/smile on her face. But then the word came we had to move. The hotel we were moving into did not allow dogs and the mission already had a dog so Bella was doomed to living at the fish house in Calulan. A poor dog in an even poorer community. Broke Josie's heart. She would cry at night and get mad at me for not letting her see Bella. Then to top it all off, Bella was hit by a car and broke her rear hip. That made her not want to eat. She became the thinnest, ugliest, limping dog you have ever seen. One day Josie found a red ribbon and made me promise to take it and tie it around Bella's neck and because Josie loved her so much the fishermen and women at the fish house took an uncommon interest in Bella. They fed her and cared for her and only kicked her when she needed it. Bella became like the New Vision mascot in the fish village. Then after a year at the hotel, we moved out last week into a house. Yes a full blown house with doors and rooms and everything. We even have a kitchen with a stove. The house is closer to St. Marc so Joy and the kids are closer to the school. It is in a pretty safe and peaceful area. We are thankful for our time at Indigo and all the friends we made but we are glad God opened this new door. I am sitting on the front porch right now waiting on the tanks to fill on the roof so I can stop the pump. With new freedom comes old responsibilities but it is worth it. The biggest blessing is that Bella is back with us and all the kids love it. Little Justice keeps kissing her on the mouth but we are getting beyond that soon. I will post a blog with pics of the house soon. We spent today doing typical new home stuff like installing over 2000 feet of rolled razor wire on top of the wall around the house and running electrical wire high enough from one mango tree to the next that no one can easily steal it. We poured the roof on the clinic we are building in the fish village today. We have motor boats for the fishermen now and will be using them next week to go to the island of Lagonave for a week of clinics. Feeding programs, building programs, school sponsorship, fishing ministry, Liberty Academy, Celebration Children's Home, eye clinics, small business development, and our family and friends here are all doing well. We have some new friends, Dr. Dennis and Sarah Cowley from Indiana here making a huge difference with us now. Stephen and Autumn are starting a guest house for helping host some of the teams. And we are looking for a piece of property to buy to build the mission before our lease expires next year. More updates to come as I have a renewed desire to digitally vent and share.

Sight Restored

He was lead into our eye clinic by a daughter.  He was blind for almost 10 years.  It was quickly evident that he had very advanced cataracts.  I could not tell if there were other disease processes as well because the cataracts were too advanced to see past them.  We set him up to see an American group of surgeons that were coming to Haiti to do cataract surgeries just a few months later.  The patient had his surgery a week ago and came to the clinic for his post op check today.

It was so fun to hear him talk about how he could see everything for the first time in a decade.  He told me that the only problem is that people from all around his village keep coming to his house to see if it was true that he could really see.  With the help of Medical Ministry International we were able to make an immeasurable difference in a person's life.  What a great opportunity!

These experiences are what keep us going down here.  When it seems that the pressure is just overwhelming and the thoughts of a "normal" life in America and practicing optometry in an air conditioned office with people who can talk about sports and "the news" begin to tempt me to wonder what I am doing here, God sends one of those moments that helps to remind me of the special opportunity He has awarded to us.

UPDATE:
We have a container in customs that has 3 boats and motors that we will be using in the fishing ministry for the guys to be able to catch more fish.  I pray we can get it out tomorrow.

Michelet had his brain surgery for hydrocephaly.  He has had a few minor complications but is doing well now.  We are anxious to see how much he is able to develop now that the pressure on his brain has been relieved.  Keep him in your prayers as he is still susceptible to infection and other complications for some time to come.  

Our SUV has major electrical/mechanical problems and is broken down at a mission near Port Au Prince.  We will tow it back to Montrouis as soon as we get the truck fixed... a Ford diesel mechanic with a few days to spare should would be helpful!

We will be in the US for 3 weeks in December visiting family thanks to the generous donation of plane tickets for our entire family!  We are trying to get a visa for Justice and Jean Patrick but they have not come through yet.

Liberty Academy- our American school in St. Marc is going well.  We are starting to talk to teachers for next year if anyone is looking for such an opportunity.  Joy is loving the school and is doing an amazing  job of running  everything and teaching kindergarten.

The child sponsorship  program is still struggling to find sponsors for the kids in school but we have most of them in school anyway.  You can sponsor a child by visiting http://celebrationchildrenshome.ning.com/group/CKC

We are in the process of opening a boy's transition home for teenage boys that don't have anywhere to go.  It will be housed upstairs in the property we rented to store the boxes of food and supplies that we use in our feeding programs.

The school feeding program is going well with almost 1500 kids being fed daily and teachers being paid a salary through the same program.  We are also starting a separate feeding program for the school in the fish village.  The huge cooking pots are being made right now.  It is a cool process as they use old aluminum pieces from junked vehicles to make the pots.

The elderly feeding program is also going well with the ladies in our women's ministry preparing the food three days per week. 

The fishing is good right now and we are buying hundreds of pounds of fish per week to use in our programs and we start transporting to other ministries starting tomorrow.

The kids at the children's home are doing great.  We have them in a new school this year and they are loving it.  Several of our kids are going  to school for the first time in their lives and that has been a wonderful change for them. You should see Daniel and Sonson in their little uniforms!

Wesner's house is getting the roof put on and windows and doors are being built right now.  His wedding next month is going to be a big celebration for everyone and we have several people coming down from the US for the shindig.

All of our children including Logan who is here for a couple of months are doing great.  School in St. Marc has definitely made that better and an answer to prayers.

We have a group from Operation Hope coming down again next month to do surgeries and we have been very busy with teams for the last several months.  Our 8 interns leave this week for a Christmas break.  We will miss them as they have been such a huge help to us at the school and the mission.

Justice's adoption is still a mystery and frustration but is apparently moving along.  Our creche license is still sitting in the office of social services waiting on approval.

Anson, the 13 year old boy that was electrocuted in our yard a few weeks ago is doing much better.  We had started letting him come into the mission some to help around and play with the kids.  Some local adults had talked him into throwing a wire over the government electrical main where it comes into the transformer in our yard so they could steal the electricity.  As he did the government electricity was on and it almost killed him.  He spent a couple of weeks in the hospital and will have scars for life.  Had he died, I would have been charged even though I was not there at the time.  We thank God for His continual protection.  Anson is now in our school sponsorship program and will live in the boy's home.  He said that a lot of the local people are mad at him because he won't steal anything for them from our home.  What a shame for a 13 year old to be put into that kind of position but it is a great chance for us to minister to him and rescue him from a delinquent life.

The small business program we set up for the earthquake refugees is going well.  We still need a few more business ideas to put a couple of the women into but overall it is going great.

Pastor Cesar and the other pastors are doing well.  I preached at Buas Nerf for their big harvest service yesterday and everyone was there.  We had a good 4 hour service and they gave me a pineapple and a gallon of fresh cow's milk.

I think that is a wrap of what's going on right now.  Thanks to everyone that has come to visit and sent support the last couple of months.  It has been a tough last couple of months but we are looking forward to seeing friends and family next month.  Pray we can get those visas for our two Haitian kids so Joy will be able to actually relax a little while in the states.  If Justice is stuck here I don't think Joy will have the same experience as she would have if Justice gets to go.  The Lord is in charge!

I love it when a plan comes together...

Situation #1-  She lost her husband and the father of 5 kids in the earthquake in 2010.  He was crushed under their house as it collapsed in the earthquake.  She had nowhere to go after the quake and ended up in the refugee camp in Montrouis.  Through a bad relationship in the refugee camp she found herself pregnant.  I met her in the camp but did not really know her until the day she was to deliver the baby.  We were on our way to the hospital and we were told she was trying to have her baby but it was breach.  She needed to go the hospital but did not have the money.  We took her to the hospital and she had her baby boy.  As time progressed and the camp closed she really began to struggle.  In her mid 40's, a widow, a new mom,  a refugee, an earthquake survivor, homeless, and unemployed in a community where she new no one and had no where to go.

We were blessed to be able to help madame Charles find a house to live in and rent it for  her but she still had no way to provide for her family.  Her baby became sick.  She contracted malaria.  When I went to visit her the despair in her eyes was hard to look at even though I see despair on a daily basis.  She was slow to complain or seem ungrateful for past help, but she let me know that she did not know how her family was going to make it.  I took her a week's supply of rice but decided we had to come up with a way for her to make some money.

Situation #2-  She lived in a small house by the river.  In June of 2009 she lost her home for the second time in two years.  In September 2008 Hurricane Hanna washed her little rented block home away.  She rebuilt a small place for her and her 3 children in the same place by the river but on that rainy day in June, it too was washed away.  She found herself living in a Haiti Red Cross donated 3 person Coleman tent in that same little place by the river.   Forced to drop out of school in sixth grade, Mary had her first child as a teenager.  For the last 10 years she believed using her body was the only way to find food for her small family.  Eight months after the flood, the tent shredded and providing little protection for the elements, she was desperate for a change- she humbly asked if there was any way we could help her find a place to live. She tells me how 2 days ago her 10 year old son found a bread fruit- a local starchy fruit prepared like a potato, and she was able to cook it for the family but for the last two days she has not had anything to feed them.

Situation #3-  She had 3 little girls by the same man.  Not a picture book marriage but she felt he took care of them as best he could.  But his other wife did not feel the same way.  She felt that the Paulette's kids were practically taking food off of her kid's plates.  In a deranged, evil state of mind one hot evening, this second wife savagely murdered two of Paulette's daughters.  It was more than she could emotionally handle.  Over the coming months, Paulette slowly lost her mind.  In a country with limited medical care of any kind, mental health facilities are all but none existent.  I first met Paulette as she bathed in the middle of the street one sunny afternoon.  I later learned she was not bathing.  She is just fond of clothes.  She doesn't always remember all of our encounters but she never forgets my name.  She can't tell me her story but I learn it from neighbors.  Paulette just tells me how hungry she is and how no one ever wants to help her.  She is not able to take care of herself and I often find her sick and she is very malnourished.  She needs someone to help.


God seems to love to work in these types of situations.  Not necessarily in this order, this is how God helped His precious child in each of the above situations.  We were just luck enough to be along for the ride.

We rented Mary a house.  In exchange for her rent she had to join our work program and ladies development program.  Her work assignment is cook food for 30 elderly shut-ins and others in the community like Paulette who cannot take care of themselves.  The food is delivered hot and fresh to Paulette three days per week.  We are working to add a daily vitamin and healthy juice to help maintain a healthy diet.  There are 13 women that were in Mary's situation.  They now all have houses for themselves and their kids and jobs to help them see that they can make a difference.  They are paid with vouchers.  The vouchers are redeemable for groceries at 4 local road side stands.  Madame Charles and 3 other refugee widows are the owners of the stands.  We helped them set up businesses where they sell rice, beans, oil, and other provisions to the community but specifically to the women in the feeding program.  When they receive the vouchers, they bring them to me to buy more product at a reduced wholesale price.  We help them understand business principles necessary to be able to keep their businesses viable.

Now Mary's kids eat every day.  She can speak some English and has gotten me to help her start a little side business with her sister and friend selling various clothing and supplies needed for the kids that are starting school.

Paulette is currently sick and can't get out of the bed.  I took her to the hospital but after several rounds of antibiotics we are sure what the infection is coming from.  She is still getting her food and we even try to keep her dressed.  She is not healthy mentally or physically, but she has people there to help her meet her needs.

This past week madame Charles came to buy more rice and supplies.  She came with both a stack of vouchers and a handful of cash.  I looked at madame Charles and asked her how things were going.  As she held the stack of New Vision Ministry food voucher cards she smiled and told me her life had never been better.  Now how does it get any better than that?

The Power of Belonging

I was met at the back of the bare concrete block church by a sea of lime green shirts. Our fishermen and the women in our women's group all had on their New Vision Ministry T-shirts and black jeans we had helped them get. They were also all wearing white latex gloves Roger had found in our medical supply box at the fish house. It made them look strangely official. They were all serving as ushers. In the front of the church was Marcus' coffin...draped with his lime green T-shirt.

I was called in the middle of the night to tell me Marcus had had a stroke. Stephen and Autumn took him to the hospital where he died the next morning not long after I visited. He was one of our guys. He left behind two precious girls and a wife.

I gave the family strong encouragement to immediately take the body to the public morgue in St. Marc. I told them I would help with the funeral but I would not cover the cost of a private morgue. I thought they took my advice.

Two days later the family comes to me to say that a private morgue picked up the body from the hospital and had assured them they would do the funeral for cheap. Now the director of the funeral home was demanding $20,000 Haitian or about $2500 usd for the funeral. This was from a family worth about $200.

I helped the family with the money I would have paid for the simple funeral and then bought Marcus's bwafouye (canoe) from the family to do a memorial for him at the fish house. The family continued to come to plead for more money for two weeks while they sold everything they owned and borrowed money from everyone they could find to pay the morgue. I hate that system.

Finally they got $15,000 Haitian and the funeral home agreed to bury him. That is where the funeral picked up. They had a big wake the night before in which everyone present gets to drink and party at the expense of the mourning family. If the crowd feels the family did not produce enough liquor, beer, and sodas, the crowd starts throwing rocks at the family and the house. It is a very stressful time for an already stressed out family.

The funeral service was preached by a Christian pastor to an uninterested crowd. Everyone just stood and talked until he finished at which time the funeral home workers came forward to get the coffin. That is when the show began. Before anyone touched anything all of our women and guys posed in front of the coffin for a picture with their official uniforms.

As soon as the coffin was touched, dozens of women began to scream at the top of their lungs and wail. Four of our girls took the T-shirt off of the coffin and carried it one at each corner at the front of the funeral procession right behind the marching band as we went down the road in the pouring rain.

The procession lasted about half an hour until we reached the family's house. The criers cried and screamed the whole way. But now they turned it up a notch. Women began falling onto the ground and rolling in the mud screaming. One girl in particular kicked and screamed so much that the funeral officials who are responsible for getting them could not pick her up. She hit and kicked until she finally rolled off of the mud path into the water filled ditch in her best white dress. I don't understand all of that but everyone else acted like it was normal and since I was the non-Haitian in the whole processional I acted like I was used to it too.

We finally got to the tomb that had been the tomb in which Marcus' mom, aunt, and cousin were buried. They just pushed the remains of the old coffins to the side and shoved him in. Then a mason was there and ready to seal it up.

All of our group was then gathered together for a photo in front of the tomb with their matching shirts. My first group photo at a burial site.

We then visited the widow as she sat in the floor of the family mud house and each one of us passed through and kissed her. Everyone then was offered one more beer and it was over. All the crying and screaming ended as soon as the coffin was in the tomb.

It was so evident that our women and the fishermen were in a position of respect just because they were part of our group and had a T-shirt. They had a whole new self esteem. I can't wait to see how they respond when they realize they are a part of the family of the one true God.