gracious love: Haiti Part 2

Bonswa! (good afternoon) 7 days later and I still find myself wanting to use my favorite creole phrases. If only WSU offered a class in crole in the fall, I would drop my core classes in a heart beat ;)

I have concluded that Haiti will forever be a part of my heart and thinking. I think that's how missions are intended to work. They challenge your strength, your thinking, and your thoughts of the world, turn them topsy-turving, and then leave you to process the conclusions, with God waiting with great anticipation to reveal truths to you. One huge teaching apparent in Haiti is the importance of flexability. You can't predict that everyday will be the same...that would be very dangerous. Monday we painted a home, but we were planned to venture into a village. Tuesday we planned on doing a work project, yet once 1 p.m. rolled around, we were being loaded up into a canter (open safari-looking truck) to go to Levec, a village where a deaf community is located, to cheer on a soccer game. You just have to go with it. Because both of those days, at the end, our hearts were filled with so much joy. And flexability is also willing to laugh when you fly in a pile of mud on the floor when your canter abruptly gets stuck in a trench going uphill on a extremely steep incline. Yep this happened to me. I have yet to still achieve the shiny brightness in my white shirt after two washings. But that's ok, because everytime I see that shirt I immediatly chuckle as I remember the entire truck cheering on the driver and praying to Jesus that he would get us up that hill and then once achieving the daunting task, we watched a school bus do the samething behind us....those stubborn Haitian drivers.

I don't know if I will ever be called back to Haiti, but I do pray that God will call me to other countries; to continue to see the world and how my brothers and sisters throughout worship, live, play, eat, and perceive the world.

Lesson #2: be intential with all. Everyone needs love and to be told they are loved. I had women in Haiti demand I give them my waterbottle or watch, but instead I asked what I could pray for them about. We don't need things, like a fancy watch; we need love and faith.

now feast your eyes on more of Haiti :)