Friends of ENYNE District and of Haiti,
On January 12, Haiti experienced a devastating earthquake.
On January 18, a plan was birthed in the hearts and minds of a few people to send a Conex container filled with beans and rice. Preliminary research was done. It seemed they had the ‘know-how’ but where would the funding come from? Phone calls were made, partnerships formed, challenges passed on through our district churches.
By January 28, the first container was filled with food, medical supplies and tarps and loaded onto the ship along with fuel we would donate. The funds were pouring in so quickly, a second container was purchased and filled and loaded onto the same ship before it was able to depart.
On February 7, the ship arrived in St. Marc. Meanwhile funds continued flowing in and a third container was filled and awaiting departure—all this in less than a month from the day the earthquake struck.
On February 19, the food and fuel had finally had finally begun to be distributed and the second ship having arrived in St. Marc, was waiting to be off-loaded.
What’s next? Money from our district churches has slowed to a crawl, but God is apparently still interested in using us. Churches and organizations from around the country continue to contact us, somehow finding out about our project, and within the next couple of weeks we will probably be sending four more containers. This time there will be an emphasis on tents and tarps since the rainy season will begin shortly.
It’s been six weeks since the earthquake and many of us, though responsive in the beginning, have returned to life-as-usual and may go a whole day or more without a thought of the people in Haiti. That’s fairly normal, but the plea coming from Dan Irvine and the Haiti Team is, ‘Don’t let the people forget!’
Following is part of an update I received yesterday from Caleb Thompson challenging us not to give up or even slow down because the need is so great. Because we are our brother’s keeper, it is incumbent upon us to continue to do whatever we can. It’s clear that God is active in this project and has invited us to join Him in His work. I don’t know about you, but I’m not about to be left out! So, as I sign my check and make a pledge to myself and God to give until He tells me I can stop, may I invite you to continue in this work too. You may donate by sending a check through your local church, directly to the District Office, or by using the PayPal option on the blog--www.actuallyhelpinghaiti.blogspot.com (note that 2.3% of your donation goes to PayPal as a service fee).
Caleb writes… We did it! The food we've all been talking about for a month is in houses and bellies across La Gonave. I know this, I was there. Ninety thousand pounds of food is a meaningful amount, to be sure, but we need to keep at it. There are more hungry people - grateful, hopeful, but still hungry. This should not discourage us; it should spur us on. God's gift through us put a lot of food in a lot of kids’ bellies and if you saw any one of them, you'd be very glad to know you had a hand in it. We can and should do more, but we have already, by God's hand alone, done a lot toward giving hope to the church and easing the agony of the hungriest. Also, our larger, silent gift to the people of La Gonave will hopefully be to lower their food prices back to where they can afford at least some food on their own. Prices right now are 150-200% of pre- quake prices and that means people who were barely making it aren't. Our flood of free food should put the price down a bit, how much remains to be seen.
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Feb. 19 – Food Distribution Begins – Chris Thompson. The significance of these shipments cannot be overstated. While Port Au Prince and other areas close to the disaster have been a major focus for relief agencies, Anse-a-Galets (pronounced on’-say-ah’-gah-lay’) and most of La Gonave remain largely forgotten… Today pastors from all over the area brought their trucks to the Wesleyan church in town. After these trucks were filled and sent out the remaining food was distributed to a long line of people that had been waiting outside the gate. Rice was carried away in every form of container from water buckets to shirts that people had holding wide open… A fleet of over twenty trucks is set to show up tomorrow morning to start transporting the food to all of these key areas.
Feb 19 – Update from Dan Irvine. The first Sunday after the earthquake, the church was crowded—standing room only. The service ended with a string of testimonials. People who had been trapped under rubble or had lost family members came to the front and told stories of their new decision to turn back to God. Four weeks after the earthquake, the churches are still full. The benches have been removed so that, by sitting on the floor, more can fit, with the benches outside being used for overflow. Since the earthquake, we have seen 120 converts at the Wesleyan Church alone. Churches all over town are seeing a similar trend. Since the National Day of Prayer, many have begun to ask for Bibles.
Feb 21 – A Few Remarks by Caleb Thompson Following a Church Service. First, these people love the Lord…and in some significant ways, we could learn a lot from them. They pass on their collective thanks to the people in the U.S. where are praying for them and who have helped to send this food. Josh [Nerren] gave the sermon through an interpreter and expressed the fact that our heart is for sending food as God's love is poured out through us but even more that Christ's love be known through His death and resurrection.
Feb 21 – Remarks by Josh Nerren Following the Church Service. Going to the church service today only solidified my feelings. Again, it's hard for me to accept because so much of my motivation for coming down here was to bring the gospel to a people I assumed were largely unreached. This is not an unreached area. These people are physically poor, but spiritually rich. What can we teach them?
Church growth and outreach? - They were so full there weren't enough seats for the all the people.
Attracting new people? - There were tons of first time visitors that they made a point to welcome.
Worship? They sang louder than I've ever heard in an American church. They seemed to be worshiping with their whole heart, many lifting their hands and closing their eyes, kneeling, etc. Even the band, using crude instruments did a great job.
Prayer? They spent a good part of their 3-hour service praying.
Discipleship? Most of the congregation got to the church at 6:00am to start an hour of Sunday school before worship started, then they had each class of adults stand up and recite the memory verse of the day.
Leadership development? I've never seen so many lay-leaders in a church. Each part of the service was led by different capable people.
Bibles? Most of them had one with them, and were comfortable and competent finding scriptures as I taught.
Programs? They have a youth group run by volunteers, child care, a K-12 school, even mentioned cooking classes for the young people during the announcements.
Fellowship? Didn't seem to be lacking.
Giving? In their poverty they were tithing this morning.
Community Involvement? They are running the distribution of food for the entire island.
Working together with other churches? Pastor Keno met with church leaders from all over the island (All Haitians) to do the food distribution, including Catholics, Episcopal, Wesleyan, Baptist, and Nazarene churches.
Church Planting? They have planted other churches on the island including the one we drove an hour and a half up the mountain road in a 4 wheel drive vehicle to get to. The pastor rides a motorcycle 3 times a week to do services.
The church is healthy, vibrant, and growing daily.
I asked Pastor Keno how the American church could help the church in Haiti. He said, ‘We can no longer use our main school building to do classes so we have to do them outside until we can repair our buildings. If you could send some kind of large tent for our classes, that would really help’.
Feb 21 – Food Distribution Update – Josh Nerren. Good news. The major food distribution began today. We started off by joining the local pastor in charge of distribution to the churches for a meeting of 24 area pastors from the island. Pastor Keno (the guy in charge) talked to the other pastors about the logistics of the distribution and we had an opportunity to speak to the pastors and encourage them that many people in the U.S. helped to send the food and are praying for the churches and the people on the island and in other parts of Haiti. The pastors came from all sorts of backgrounds and denominations and were very thankful for the help they were receiving.
After the meeting, the pastor divided the rice and beans he had been given amongst the 24 pastors and they all took their portions back to their churches to do distribution amongst their congregation. Once the pastors left, Pastor Keno invited members of the community from the streets who had been gathering to see the food to come into the church and receive one scoop of rice per person. People scrambled to find something to put the rice in – an old garbage bag or plastic bag in the piles of trash in the street, a purse or backpack, some couldn’t find anything and opted to use their shirt to transport the rice home.
Videos of the distribution can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/user/HandsAndFeetForHaiti.
Where is our help going?
