like a drink offering

Our friends from Cornerstone Church have made it safely back to Bear, DE following an awesome week here in Haiti! We were blessed to have them and were touched by their observations and the ways the Lord and the people of Haiti worked in their hearts. Rick, Ed, Sam, Zach, Vicki, Richard, Randy, Diane, Bob and Kim, THANKS FOR COMING!

One of the things that the whole team cited as having an impact was church on Sunday. And it wasn't just them! Matt and I were still talking about some of the things shared during the service last weekend whenever the pastor of this church stopped by our house Friday morning.

I've told you before of this church independently developing a feeding/clothing/provision program for the orphans and widows that go to his church or that live in the area. A portion of the tithe collected each Sunday goes towards this weekly ministry. In such a poor country, and in such a poor area, I am always surprised how they are able to support their orphans and widows on top of paying for their land and building.

And yet the pastor had announced on Sunday that the program is expanding. Inscription at the church's school begins next week. After announcing the prices, he challenged the entire church to collect the orphans they have living with or near them, and bring them to inscription (enrollment) as well...but for only $10 Haitian ($1.25 US), offering many orphans in this area their first ever chance of education.

"We have many orphans in the church," he explained to me, "who are 10, 12 years old, and have never been in one day of school."

"How are you guys paying for this?" I asked, never having heard of such a thing.

"When we first started our building project," he told me, "I wasn't sure how we would pay for it. I knew we couldn't afford the labor, and every single step of the way, the people in the church have stepped up and done the labor. For free. I tell them, 'We are a family. Helping each other is the only way.' And I set up the project as a 6 month project, asking everyone to give all that they could, every Sunday, from January until June. Every week, we bought all the materials we could, building, building, so that every Sunday, everyone could SEE that what they were giving was going towards what they were giving it to, not being pocketed...integrity. Once people saw the improvements they were making, they began to give.

"We," he told me, almost still surprised himself, "We have between $900 and $1000 H given to the project every single Sunday ($115-125 US...this is huge, by the way), about $30,000 H ($3750) this year so far. Now people are used to giving, and have begun giving to this!"

"The church is in such a very poor area. Many, many people going to church there live on the coast in terrible, terrible conditions. We have to help them" he said.

Thinking just about what I have seen of the shanties built on the water, I shuddered just imagining what life must be like living in one.

"The families there, the water is in their homes twice a day with the tide. They live in the water and the garbage. They buy a few cement blocks, and sleep right on top of them, so that they are not sleeping in the ocean water, garbage and sewage. Their conditions are very, very awful," he shared, clearly shaken as he outlined the size of a cement block bed on my seemingly gigantic tiled dry floor.

I felt stupid, but had to ask.

"Why in the world would someone choose to live there? I mean, there have to be other places."

He then explained to me something I did not know: that there are 2 free places in Haiti to live. In the mountains, or on the sea-line. Most of the families living in these sea shacks once lived in the mountains, only moving into town when their crops, the only source of food or income in the mountains, failed due to drought or hurricanes, their families starving.

Land costs money, apartments cost money, building houses cost money...So these families have constructed lean-to structures for free out of everyone else's garbage and survive one day at a time, selling knick-knacks or begging. It welled up in me again: that strong desire to give everything surrounding me away, or to drive to the sea-front, pile as many people as possible in the truck and move them into my dry, clean and abundant home.

It is true that we believe Christ, not money, to be the hope of Haiti and the answer for all men. But is is so difficult to live among the homeless, the starving, the sick and be able to do so very little about it.

And yet later, after several nightmares and a brimming handful of dreams were shared, I watched this dear friend leave (with a huge box of school supplies from the team for the program!), knowing that the Lord is working miracles in Haiti because of his obedience. He is pouring himself out, doing everything he can, to be Christ in a dry and weary land...

We are blessed by his example.