the ayars affairs: an evangelist transformed by family

Greetings from Northern Haiti!

I want to introduce you to Mania, a second year student here at Emmaus Biblical Seminary.

Her upbringing would never lead you to believe that God had a plan or a promise for her life. Claiming that she wasn't truly his child, her father and siblings abandoned Mania and her mother when Mania was still very small. They moved to Cap-Haitian, but when Mania was 16, her mother died. "I know of my father and my brothers and sisters, but they all say that I am not one of them, that I am not their family. It was all the heartbreak of losing my mom and truly having no one that brought me to Jesus, and becoming a Christian only caused them to reject me further."

She gave her life to Christ at alumni Pastor Migueleson's church, and rented a small room from the church. Not long after, a student from Emmaus Biblical Seminary who was also attending Migueleson's church noticed that she truly had no one to help her, and took her under his wing. All day she worked odd jobs for rent and food, and in the evenings, Ezechiel paid for her to take high school classes.

In 2009, Ezechiel graduated from Emmaus and started doing evangelism in the remote mountain village he had grown up in, Baron. "He asked me to start helping him share the Gospel there, and so as I finished school, I often joined him and several others in sharing the Gospel all over the mountain top. In 2010, I helped him plant a church in Baron, and that is still where I work today."

"I live at Emmaus all week," Mania tells me. "I do my homework every evening, and every Saturday morning at 8 am, I leave for Baron. I take public transportation to Cap-Haitian, take a motorcycle to the city of Baron, ford the river, and hike for three hours to reach the church, usually by around 2 pm. I work with the kids' club every Saturday afternoon and lead a Bible study for the elderly in the evening. Sunday morning I teach Sunday school and lead the services with Ezechiel preaching, and Sunday afternoon at 2, I head back to Emmaus."

In the summers and on Easter and Christmas vacations, Mania lives on that mountain top in a stick hut in the church yard, helping Ezechiel, leading Vacation Bible School, working with the elderly, and participating in her favorite ministry, evangelism.

"I came to Emmaus because I want to be a missionary, all out. I love sharing the Gospel, and when you finally get to the mountain top at Baron, you see a dozen other mountain tops further in, further away. I want to share the Gospel there, I want to reach those further zones, where the Gospel still hasn't been."

When I ask her what class has been the most transforming for her so far at Emmaus, Mania tells me it hasn't been a course.

"When God sent me Pastor Ezechiel, for the first time in my life I had a father. But when I came to Emmaus, I found a family. The stress of my life has been having no family, and when I'm here, I'm finally home. My Emmaus family loves me and helps me, prays with me and teaches me, feeds me and shelters me, and I've never had that in my life. This family is what has transformed me."

To help missionaries like Mania continue to be equipped and cared for through EBS Haiti, please give online here now or send checks payable to Emmaus Biblical Seminary (memo line: Student Scholarships) to 1022 Main Street, Sabetha, KS 66534.

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