how I smell : it's a matter of life and death

As Lily, Doug and I walked to the furthest end of Saccanville yesterday to visit Jil, my mind kept swirling around 2 Corinthians 2, where the Lord had challenged my heart just that morning.

Thanks be to God,

Who always leads us in triumph through Christ

Picking our way around murky puddles and heaps of smoldering garbage, weaving past bearded goats and ribby cows, I was astounded once again by the majestic backdrop of mountains and vibrant palms... touched once again by the happy beauty of brilliant blue huts and old women snoozing in straw chairs, silver braids reaching out in all directions.

And manifests through us

the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place

"Bonswa, Good afternoon" to dozens of people as we pass, almost all of whom I recognize well, recalling as we pass the days that we had talked about Lily, talked about the Seminary, prayed together over sick children, dead husbands, empty pots...remembering the sweet moments when we talked about Jesus in each tiny dirt yard.

Jil's old house

For we are a fragrance of Christ to God

among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing

...dozens of children gather along the way to grin at "Lee-Lee", and it is SO easy to see in their wide smiles and eager eyes that they were formed by the hand of God, so easy to see that they are greatly loved by Jesus.

To the one, an aroma from death to death

To the other, an aroma from life to life.

I have long since stopped thinking about the stark contrast of my wavy blond locks, stopped worrying about the accent in my chatter, the unwavering stares towards the foreigner. In the midst of the banging pots and squawking chickens, clinking dominoes and shouting children, I am only one thing: the fragrance of Christ.

As I bounce Jil's bare-butt baby and marvel at their dry and strong new home, I worry, instead, about what I smell like to God. What about when I am selfish? judgmental? irritated? short? Am I the fragrance of Christ then?

Jil's NEW house!!!

No, I guess I am the fragrance of ME, then, which we all know is not the stench that God deserves or desires to be smelling.

But if God desires to be inhaling Jesus from this world, then I guess we each might just be the ONLY hope of Jesus fragrance where we are. I might be, you might be, the ONLY sweet aroma to God in our family/workplace/community/____________.

So many that I walked past with a greeting and a grin might be that death to death person. Their life on earth without Christ, lived in death, separation and darkness, and so...their eternity, lived the same. And to them: we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are perishing.

And a few cheeks I kissed along the way yesterday were warm with the lifeblood of Jesus, living true life-abundant on earth and with joy for an eternity of life to come with their Savior. And to them: we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved.

Yet there is no mention, here, of those going from death to life...a life lived in death and darkness can't spend eternity in His glorious light! This sweet aroma that we're called to ingest through relationship with Him and emit to the world around us won't be drawing others to Him once we are before His throne. It is NOW, on earth, that the transition from death into life must be made...and it is our precious gift to be able to play a role in that for others!

We are not like many, peddling the word of God,

but as that we are from God, with sincerity,

we speak in Christ in the sight of God.

As I prayed with Jil and Milove, Wedensis and Kendia, straddling the stream of open sewage lining their yard, it was in the sight of God. I pray that He breathed deeply in the moment, savoring the sweet smell of Jesus that so abundantly has covered the sewage reek that Stacey, without Christ, has to offer.

What a huge calling we have, family, just to BE.

To be Christ's scent.

To be holy as He is.

To be His possession and no one, nothing, else's.

Thanks be to God,

who ALWAYS leads us in TRIUMPH in Christ

and manifests THROUGH us the SWEET aroma

of the knowledge of HIM in EVERY place.

Amen (may it be so).

***"Got Power?" Update***

Thank you for your generator prayers. We have been blessed with many non-coincidental hours of EDH (city power) these last 24, with many prayers, and with lots of different ideas/options/decisions/offers of help, etc. Please continue to pray for a good, glorifying, effective, efficient option, and that we would clearly know what route to take. We are grateful that most students will be going home for the weekend this afternoon, making it much easier for 10 people to survive off little power and water than 70.

As that this ministry is one that we have received by His mercy for His glory, please pray that we would not lose heart, and that we will seek for it to be fixed in His way and time. Pray for clear direction.

Thank you so much for being a praying and helping and loving and encouraging and admonishing and sacrificial family, all that the Word asks us to be unto one another!

another concrete miracle...

Jil's house two weeks ago...

remnants...

...and today. Jil (front) and his children are all helping with his new two room house, built in the exact spot of their old home.

Lily loving on little Wendy...

Jil and Mimose's 3rd looks JUST like Mimose.

Lily hanging out with some of the neighbor kids...

Just a few yards over, these three houses are being built as well, all 4-room houses. I passed 13 others between our house and Jil's, all about at this same level of construction.

It is set in stone: God continues to work and move and to bring Hope to seemingly Hopeless situations. It shouldn't be overwhelming.

But it is.

out in Sakenville

SO TINY!

new baby Wendy and Mimose

Praise the Lord for the Renner's and their seemingly unfailing internet! Here's all the photos I've been wanting to show you for the past week...

Check out Lily's blog for some great new ones there...

new baby, visitors & finishing well!

Because our internet died simultaneously with the start of the World Cup, we’re pretty sure millions of people trying to watch matches through the internet is to blame. There is very little television and internet available here, so it seems that what is available is being maxed out!

So, photos might have to wait until after Brazil wins (at least, if Haiti has its way!)

However, I’ll try to at least keep getting text up, though this post alone has taken several days to get online.

Story for the girls out there: Mirlove Mimose (Jil’s wife) brought little baby Wendy for us to meet on Tuesday morning. Ah, she is just gorgeous! Mirlove, Wendy, and several of the other kids are living with Mirlove’s father until the house is done, as that their current little hut has been destroyed to make room for their new ti-kay (little house.)

They asked me to name the baby, who as of Tuesday was still title-less. I just plain refused, knowing that anything my American tongue picked would be Haitian-ugly. After a while, Mirlove gave in, and finally deemed the baby “Wend-leh-er-sees”…or at least that’s how her new name is pronounced.

She consented that I call the little one “Wendy” after I butchered “Wend-leh-er-sees” several times, and wow, am I smitten…she is just a GORGEOUS little girl, who looks just like her mother and is endowed with a beautiful head of soft curly locks…I NEVER remember Lily being so tiny and fragile! Just gorgeous… Lily and I came right home and dug into the closet, pulling out Lil’s littlest garments and packing them off to Jil.

All of the blocks for their new home are finished, and a foundation is in the works…I think it might take more than another few days to be finished, but we’ll see.

Meanwhile, Matt started teaching the LAST course of the school-year today: 1st Samuel. He’s teaching both the 2nd and 3rd year classes, and despite the ever-reoccurring pre-feeling that he does NOT have time to be teaching another course, today went wonderfully and he came home singing the same tune he always does, “I LOVE THIS!” Praise the Lord!

We have received final word that Aunt Lisa is coming to the rescue. These next two weeks of finishing the school-year, teaching, preparing for graduation, preparing for summer speaking, preparing to leave for 7 weeks and hosting 4 people for a week of seminary construction has our heads and days swimming.

Lisa is a teacher in inner-city Chicago, and will be done next week, and has then selflessly agreed to come and help out with all of the above, and with Lily, for our final week, flying out with us on July 3rd! I cannot WAIT.

Don’s daughter and friend from church will be joining us on the 23rd to help finish the second story of the men’s dorm, and to work on Lucner’s house. He will be getting married in November, Lord willing, and their little house needs a LOT of work.

Thank you for all of your continued prayers, especially as we finish out this school year. There have been many times this past year that we weren’t sure how the Lord was going to pull us through, and here we are at the end of the year, marveling at the perfection of His plan and timing.

a miracle worth it's wait

Jil's oldest son and middle daughter, standing in front of their home.

For what seems like the 100th time this year, I'm sitting here at my desk glowing...with joy and with sweat...downright delighted to share with you the miraculous movement of His hand.

In March, I first told you about Jil, beginning with these words: Sometimes it is just too much. Today was one of those times.

Since that distressing day, we've received countless beautiful emails and phone calls from many of you, echoing our same overwhelmed sentiment: "WE MUST HELP." We spoke to several of you about starting a housing project, about building a house for Jil, about your churches coming and building a home for them, about beds, school, food, health care, and brainstorming dozens of ways to help.

Last week, we even took Don of "Hulmes Construction" to visit Jil and to help us begin to organize a way to REALLY help. Don immediately understood our increasingly long list of problems...

How do you help Jil's family without causing community jealousy and more problems for Jil?

How do you even get supplies and materials back to where Jil's little house is? There isn't even a water source anywhere near his house!

How do you build a house on land that he is illegally squatting on?

What if the land owner saw the house and took it from them?

What should the house look like?

Who should build it?

What about all the OTHER families living nearby in equally dire situations?

For months we have struggled with not just how to help, but with the whole issue of extreme poverty.

How is it best helped?

What is the real problem?

How can you help without hurting?

How do you involve the community?

Ever since going with Don, we have barely spoken about it, all overwhelmed with the reality of the situation and the feelings of helplessness, trying to trust the Lord to show us how and when.

Last night, Julie, Hannah and Don watched Lily while we went to eat in town for our anniversary. On our way there, we were quite surprised to see small mountains of sand dumped quite sporadically all along the side of the road. "Wow!" Matt said, "Someone must finally be fixing the road!"

But further down, we saw piles and piles of freshly made cement blocks, again, all quite randomly sprawled across a 3 or 4 block area. Hmmmmm....

This morning, Matt headed to a church about 30 minutes from here as the guest speaker of an Evangelism Seminar. On his way there, he stopped to chat with Jil, already drenched in sweat and working aggressively in the road, patching holes as always. When he saw Matt, he was overjoyed, and Matt assumed it was because of the beds and mattresses Abel had dropped off a few days earlier. Not so...

"My friend!" Jil exclaimed, "Mirlove had our baby! She is a little girl!"

"Wonderful! Congratulations!"

"And my friend!" Jil exlaimed, "In 10 days, we will have a new house!"

WHAT?

The mountains of sand. The blocks. Food for the Poor.

Beginning on Monday, Food for the Poor, "serving the poorest of the poor", an organization who has a branch located about 30 minutes from here, is building Jil a new house. And not just Jil. LOTS of new houses.

Apparently, Jil's area has caught their eye over the past few years as a zone especially impoverished. This is how their program works: If you have no cement foundation, and no blocks, no cement in your house, and if you have NO foundation or start of a new house, and if they select your zone, and IF you agree to feed 6 workers 2 meals a day for 10 days...You can move into one of their new houses.

They are all built identically, with a strong foundation and cement block, painted vivid colors, each long house split into two "apartments" and shared by two families. Front doors. Small porches. Solid roofs. One qualified "Food for the Poor" boss comes in for each home, hires laborers from Saccanville, and builds each house. They have bought a patch of land right next to Jil's zone, and everyone in Jil's zone who meets the above requirements will have a new house waiting for them by the end of JUNE.

FOR MONTHS we have fretted, worried, thought, planned, talked, cried and prayed. And it was already taken care of. Not just sufficiently, but WELL. Perfectly.

It is already done. For the price of 10 days of rice and oil, Jil will have a new house. Young men in Saccanville will have work. Young men in Saccanville will get fed. The poorest families in the zone will have dry places to sleep, strong walls to protect them.

AND I DIDN'T DO IT.

Just as the smallest homely sparrow falling from the heavens isn't lost before our infinite Father, neither is Jil. Neither is Jil. Neither is his brand new precoius baby, conceived out of violence and violation and darkness. Neither are his dear children, hungry and dirty and happy.

Neither is Jil. (Neither is YOU).

All along, God was Jil's Father. God had a perfect plan in the works for the perfect time in His perfect way....and swept the miracle in, knocking me humbly to the ground, reminding me of three things:

1- I am NOT the only way God works.

He can choose to use me or He can choose to accomplish His will through someone else. Me, my plans, my money, my talents...all just tiny specks before Him...NONE of which He NEEDS in order to take care of His creation, to bring people to Himself.

2- We must keep working with what God gave us.

God has clearly brought Matt and I to Haiti to help train His children to bring Haiti to Christ. We don't know how to build a birdhouse next to a Lowe's store, much less stake out to construct a new Saccanville. Does this mean that He doesn't sometimes ask us to do things out of our comfort zone, personalities, talents or giftings? Heavens no!

But it does mean that before I pick up a new "rock for my cart" that we have to spend a lot of time making sure that God is indeed calling us to do something totally outside of the ministry He has made us for...trusting that if He's NOT asking US to do it, and yet desires it to be done, that He WILL PROVIDE.

3- WAIT.

Why does the Bible talk so much about "Waiting on the Lord" and then I am always anxious to make stuff happen? Does God not know infinitely more about Jil's situation and Jil's solution than I ever have or ever will? Has He not followed Jil every day of his life? Heard every cry of his heart? Known every need that he has? DO I NOT TRUST HIM?

Again, this is not to say that we should say in the midst of heartbreaking situations, "Well, trust God. Have a nice day!" May it never be!! But this whole time that I have been fretting for Jil, in the SAME WAY that I was hopeless for Pehpay, it never occurred to me that GOD COULD TAKE CARE OF IT. Without me. With awesomeness.

AH, I have a ways to go, don't I? I feel so incredibly small in light of His beauty and perfect plan and His abounding grace today. Incredibly and happily small.

Humbled and overjoyed by the reminder that HE is on the throne, orchestrating His will, uninhibited by where we live or poverty or the powers that be, government, the economy, hatred, violence, sin, selfishness, culture, language, land ownership, bank accounts, water shortages, location, and beautifully uninhibited by the best-intentioned-yet-skeptic-in-the-hands-of-an-All-Powerful-God ME.

PRAISE THE LORD.

Still wanna help? Interested in helping the poorest of the poor with some of their pressing physical needs? Check out Food for the Poor.

Pictures of Jil's newest little one and the project coming soon...

golf, beds and being part of His plan

Finally, a group shot of our students joining us from Port-au-Prince. They've now been with Emmaus for over four months, and have become a beautiful, passionate, intelligent and driven part of the student body. Please continue to pray for this group of Our Family, as they continue to heal, continue to have great concern for their siblings, parents and friends still living in tents in Port-au-Prince, and as they continue to seek the Lord's will for their futures.

THANK YOU to the many of you that have made their presence, transformation, growth and care at EBS possible...
We don't have enough English speakers this week to do our normal Wednesday night "English Conversation" Night, so last night Don and Matt did a special "Sports of the World in English" seminar for interested students. Here, Don is trying to explain the world of baseball, and later, Matt introduced them to an entirely new sport: golf.

The fact that someone could make a million dollars in just a few hours for playing ANY sport was just overwhelming to the first year class (and albeit, to me!), but ESPECIALLY for hitting a little white ball in a little hole. They had a really good time, and asked this morning if we could replace the daily 5:00-5:30 soccer match with whiffle ball, golf, or frisbee instruction some days. Now THAT would be fun...

However, the World Cup starts tomorrow, so it is still soccer that is capturing everyone's attention. My Saturday English class even requested its' first cancellation due to the Saturday morning match! As always, Brazil is Haiti's favored team, especially since Haiti won't be represented this World Cup.

Yesterday, Abel purchased and delivered more than mattresses to Jil's family, but metal bed frames, too. While we hated to miss out on seeing Jil's reaction, we try to stay "behind" giving as much as possible, so just took Abel's word for it that they were THRILLED. Looking out into the night sky last night, I felt SUCH joy and praise KNOWING that tonight, for the first time, Jil and his wife and their children all were sleeping two feet above the mud and on clean, soft beds. Thank you SO much to the many of you that helped to make this possible.

What a gift, huh, that He uses us! What a gift, family, that He has chosen to use each of us to be His hands and feet to the World...giving a glass of water to the thirsty, beds for the weary, medicine for the sick, clothes for the naked, freedom for the prisoners, and BEST, HOPE for the hopeless, light for the darkness, new life for the dying. Maybe we'll never know how He uses each prayer, each dollar, each sacrifice, each work, each act...

....But we know that He has chosen to use those things to pursue His creation, to adopt His children, and THAT is beautiful enough for me. Thanks for being a part of that with us!

beach, jil, community, beauty and heart-ache

What a weekend!

Finally got to watch Julie and Julia (which made me want to blog more) and Matt finally got to see Avatar (which made me wonder how much THAT must have cost :), went to the beach on Saturday, visited Jil's family and several other friends on Friday, went to a church right outside of Sakanville on Sunday, put up screen doors (Lily helping Don as much as she could :), taught Saturday morning in the church, and peeled, pitted, chopped and froze dozens and dozens of mangoes. Sakanville is so overflowing with mangoes that we can't even get all of ours given away!

Saturday was just a gorgeous day to be at the beach...It feels so far away from the realities of life in Haiti, and it was so good to have a day together as a family without email, errands, laundry, cooking, phone calls and seemingly endless things to attend to.

"You just traumatized me for life," Don said on our walk home from Jil's on Friday. It didn't seem possible, but all of the rains recently have made Jil's little mud house significantly worse. His wife is waiting to have her baby any day now, and was laying on her little cot in the dark hut right where we left her weeks ago. Her earnest joy is just beautiful, and we had a good visit, talking about the coming days and how the kids did in school. They are out now for the summer.

I brought them a bag of mangoes, thinking it would bless them, but this morning she sent me a pineapple, anxious to return the gift. How heart-wrenching, to receive a gift from a family that I can't stop thinking about their poverty. Matt and I spoke about having the family over for supper one evening, but the painful truth is this...

I couldn't stand for them to see where I live. It would crush me to watch them sit on our couch, see our toilet, see our running water, run their hands over the solid walls. I couldn't stand it.

I can't hardly stand to see it myself after spending 30 minutes perched on Mirlove's rickety "bed", piled with plastic bags and cardboard for cushioning, wide-eyed children grinning all around, no food or even clean water in site, eyes adjusting to the the darkness, my gag reflex adjusting to the smells, my mind fighting to understand why Lily sleeps in a clean crib with a fan overhead...why I was born into a middle-class family in Ohio and Mirlove was born into a mud shanty in the poorest home of one of the poorest villages in one of the poorest countries in the world.

Going to Jil's breaks your heart. Coming home from Jil's breaks your heart. One small horrific reality in a world full of them...I'm SO grateful that this world is not all that there is...and that He dwells in the midst of His people, whatever their "midst" looks like.

This week the small cots and mattresses several of you have helped pay for will be delivered to Jil's home...It may not be a big thing, but his children sleeping out of the mud and sewage will make such an unbelievable difference.

Sunday we walked about 20 minutes to the very edge of Sakanville to attend Maxi's church. The overwhelming June heat made us happy to see an open-air church, and we celebrated the Lord's mighty hand for several hours with brothers and sisters known and unknown. During the opening prayer, the pastor asked Matt if he would please preach, giving him a good hour to prepare a sermon :)

Several members of the church had just been baptized, so Matt spoke about being full of the Spirit...not just "converting", not just repenting or having remorse or being forgiven, not just being born of water, but about being born of the Spirit. He spoke about what the difference between all those things are, and about what it is to truly have our relationship with God dominate what we do and think and say, not sin....what it truly is to embrace the Spirit of Life that He is offering and allow God to put our Spirit of Death to death.

It was GREAT, but Matt and I were still quite shocked and humbled to see five people, in such a small church, come forward at the end of the service, confessing that while they have said they are "Christians," that they have never really asked Him to dwell in them, to overcome their sin natures, have never asked for the Holy Spirit, have never asked Him to transform them... It was a beautiful moment, to pray with these five brothers and sisters, all in their 20's and 30's, and to seek Sakanville change...yet again.

Lately, it feels like we are just holding on for dear life... There has been SO much change, SO much to do, SO many emotions, SO much transformation, SO many miracles, SO much suffering and joy and the Lord has been SO actively at work in our hearts and family and seminary and community that we just keep praying that we might be faithful and holy and have the courage to remain right in the middle of His plan. Praying the same for you today!

friends...

We both felt the Lord give us His joy today, and it was truly a good day of relationships. Maxi, our good friend and neighbor, turned 33 today. He is a sincere, earnest and joyful man who loves the Lord. It was our joy to celebrate with him and his family. Kerline, his wife, is just as joyful and intelligent, but is sassy, too :) This family has been such an encouragement to us both since the day we moved in, despite the many difficulties they have faced just in the last 6 months.

They are each other's unwavering best friend, and it is a joy to see them ACT like best friends in a culture where most couples keep the appearance of being quite distant. Lily LOVES hanging out at their house, chasing "Poul" (chickens), their poor cat, and eating lollipops they consistently give her.

There is NO one, however, that she loves more than her friends Jacob and Josephine. She will twist out of my arms to go to Josephine, something she does for NO one else. They are fantastic to her, and she clearly thinks of them as big brother and sister. Their family is only here a few months a year, and we're already dreading their upcoming departure. What a joy it can be to be in the body of Christ!


We also have three visiting professors on campus right now, Pam, Miss Betty, and David D. They've been joyful and encouraging company, and tonight after dinner we all enjoyed (or suffered through, depending who you talk to) Robert Redford's "Jeremiah Johnson." I will never forgive Gord for introducing Matt to this depressing man-movie.

Tomorrow morning I'm teaching about Ishmael and God's covenant with Abraham at the church across the street....will be an interesting exploration of God's plan vs. Our plan and His faithfulness and grace, whichever we follow. Please be praying for that precious time as we explore who He is and why we need Him tomorrow morning from 8-10 in this dark, dark area.

Jil update...after some talk and prayer, we decided to send Jil's four oldest children to school for the rest of the year at the school associated with the church here in Sakenville...getting them a guaranteed one good meal per day and getting them out of the house. Still praying about what else to do, but know they have been on your hearts and wanted you to know they'll be starting in school Monday!