After just an exhausting few days full of tons of questions, meetings, setting up interviews, airport runs, committee meals, and an extraordinary amount of time and notes and thoughts and counsel...today our administration sat down with the CITA committee before they begin to head home.
They are such an experienced group, all working and leading seminaries and accreditation processes for years throughout the Caribbean, and they were SO full and free with SO. MUCH. good advice and counsel. They had ideas we've never even THOUGHT of, concerns we never even realized, encouragements we never even thought to try, wisdom from lessons we haven't had to learn the hard way.
We are so. so. thankful. we have been pursing this accreditation, no matter how difficult and time-consuming and LONG it has been. Not only has it made us a far healthier institution, but it has given us access to the help and wisdom and expertise of years of men and women who are IN this field, IN these Caribbean countries, IN this work and ministry.
That doesn't mean it's easy or lovely or comfy...but nothing really has been yet, so we're grateful for more difficult, more challenge, more stretch, more growth, for more GOOD.
The committee today gave us 11 Commendations, things that really impressed them or that they believe we are doing really well, 11 Suggestions, things we don't have to do but they think it would improve us, and 12 Recommendations, things CITA would require we do. They will now submit these items to the CITA Association at large, who has been reading through our massive Self-Study book and will go through their recommendations and notes, and then make the decision whether we are not currently able to be accredited, whether we could be accredited after attending to the recommendations, or whether we can be accredited and continue to work on the recommendations. So we wait!
But today was enough.
The recommendations and suggestions were that we get more things more formal...They appreciated all of our relational and conversational methods, but encouraged more review policies, an IT director, a qualified professional counselor on staff for staff and students, a qualified librarian and to arrange the library in a more user-friendly way, that we develop a formal process for board orientation and evaluation, find a degreed finance person, get together a quality manual, develop a curriculum review committee, develop measurable instruments for staff and student satisfaction, prepare the campus for hearing impaired or visually impaired students, and get smoke detectors (which will be a joy in the middle of SO much smoking charcoal and burning trash!) and exit signs for the doors.
But can I share with you the commendations? Because there is SO MUCH glory to God in it that we've gotta just pause again and celebrate that with you...with you who have prayed and come and built and taught and helped and supported and loved and emailed and followed and sent and sponsored and BEEN a part of Emmaus, TODAY.
First, we laughed when they noted that they are entirely amazed and impressed that Emmaus is still alive, alive and WELL. "All of our nations, the WORLD," Pat said, "Has a certain perspective of Haiti, how things are of Haiti. Just the drive from the airport to here had us fearing what we would find. And when we read in our self study that you were once a vocational school ministry, and have worked to become an independent, strong, Biblical Seminary...well...that is a transition that almost ALWAYS leads in the death of the institution. We are so happy you are still alive, and it is truly a testimony of God's great power and help."
They noted that our student-friendly tuition is really impressive and making it possible for men and women in Haiti to follow God's calling on their lives despite social standing, despite the poverty Haiti is known for, and noted that they have NEVER seen nor heard of a work-study program that allows
students to work 10 hours a week for all they are receiving. THANK YOU for the students you are and have supported, making this possible!
They complimented our "excellent facilities" and called Emmaus an "oasis in the dessert." THANK YOU to the MANY of you who have built, paved, painted, designed, and supported Emmaus.
They complimented our huge emphasis on the students educational and spiritual development and were amazed at how EBS is working sacrificially to greatly improve the education of our faculty and staff.
They noted that EBS's mission to develop Christ-like leaders for Haiti and the World "comes alive through the all the day-to-day activities and interaction on campus" and noted that they were shocked to realize that Matt knew the names of every student, had true relationships with our staff and faculty, and that therefore the focus of all of his team has been on relational ministry.
Finally, they talked of their experiences in the United States, in Jamaica, in Turks and Caicos, the Dominican, in Haiti, in Cuba, in Trinidad, and noted that each of them had been deeply impressed and continually returned to the conviction that Emmaus Biblical Seminary is truly a labor of much love and a light to the Nations.
"If God uses ONE man from Emmaus," Pat said passionately, "if He uses even just ONE woman to change the world for His glory, all of this, all of it, it has not been in vain."
I was crying then and I'm crying, now, because I'm ok with the library needing work, and I'm ok with job searching some more talented people for our staff, and I'm ok with needing to develop more documentation. Matt and Claudin and Lucner and Jodenel and Leme and Giselaine and Phil and Simeon and Fanfan and all of us started working on those things today and will and will and will, God give us good courage and perseverance.
But our prayer, from that day in our first apartment in Wilmore to today, has been that Emmaus might be HIS light to the nations...that the mission of Emmaus, to develop Christ-like leaders for His transformation of Haiti and the world, might be OUR mission, might be real and true and deep, might BE.
And to be poked and prodded and explored and twisted inside out and to have THAT be the takeaway...that is an answer to prayers of the decades.
Praise the Lord.
Matt, with three of the members of the evaluation team this afternoon (two members left this morning at 6 am!)
To have a decade old prayer answered truly is a beautiful thing to experience. Thank you, Lord.
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