Crossing the Atlantic

It's nearly three in the morning EST and we're flying at 32989 feet above sea level at 664 mph. Outside the plane it's minus 72 degrees. It's a little tough to sleep sitting up between two people. So I thought I would put a few thoughts on the IPad. I'm listening to the Barnard family singing. The picture of Bro and Sis. Barnard is from a few months ago at the church they pastor.

We're nearing the country of Spain, north west of Portugal. There's just a little over 4 hours to reach Tel-aviv, Israel. Thank The Lord for traveling mercy over the last 23 hours! The picture of the map shows where our plane is at the moment, though I won't be able to publish this post until I can get wi-fi...perhaps at the Tel-Aviv airport. It will be thrilling to walk where Jesus walked and I hope to publish some IPad photos from there.

We've made it to JFK. Our lunches were a little squashed! Still good. We attended church at the Brooklyn Tabernacle. Heard a very good message - Snapshots of Christ. By Pastor Jim Cymbala.
We're supposed to g o through another security check soon and board around 8:15 to fly to Israel.

We've made it as far as Charlotte, North Carolina! Waiting at the airport for our flight to JFK in New York.

Planning Return Trip to Haiti

We're hoping and planning to take a team to Haiti during the month of May to do some rebuilding and repair. Hopefully we'll be able to take in some supplies for orphans, etc. Some of the things that we're working on right now are: 1-Help for Genese Pompee, the earthquake victim that we transported to the American hospital near Port-au-Prince. We're looking for help to get prosthetics and physical therapy for her, possibly here in the U.S. 2-We plan to ship 100 tents (the funds have been donated for those tents) to Haiti right away to give relief to some of our Haitian families who are having to stay outside their homes. 3-I'm talking with a couple of different businessmen who may be able to provide us with a large tent for the main church in Port. One of them has promised to give us a tent 40' X 60'. 4-We're continuing to raise funds so that when our team(s) goes there we'll have funds to be able to purchase needed supplies. Part of the team will be hiking up to Bwa-Dom with Pastor Pierre and the rest will be working in Port and tenting at night at Pastor Simon's. Pray for direction for our work teams. We need some skilled masonry workers, carpenters, and laborers, etc. Pray that we will have all of the skills needed for the work we'll be doing.

Haiti Trip Day Five

*Sunday morning (2/7/10) it was rise and shine. The Laguerre family prepared a delicious breakfast for us of eggs with vegetables cooked in them, bread, etc. Around 7:30 a.m. we left for the Sunday morning service at the main church in Port-Au-Prince. The building is not safe for worship so they have draped a “Greenhouse cloth” over poles and are worshipping outside. There was a choir there from the church at Di-Riviere (I’m not sure about that name or spelling.) They did an excellent job of singing. The service was good, the people rejoiced, and Mike Weaver brought a very encouraging message from Psalm 46:1-5. It was a very appropriate and touching message for this people following the tragedy. I brought greetings from Bro. Perry and the ICHA family and tried to give some encouragement and admonitions for prayer. I had brought along a copy of Bro. Darrell Miller’s email about the church in South Africa taking up $280.00 for Haiti. This was a real blessing to the people.

One of the greatest needs of this church, at the moment, is to have a large tent to be set up on the new Mais Gate’ property. There is not enough room to set up a tent where the old church is. There are 100 - 200 people living on the new church property at the moment. Many of them would have to relocate in order for us to erect this tent for church.

We left this church, which is the Mais Gate’ church, and traveled to where Pastor Jacque is planting a new church in the city. This was under tarps and tents. I think there were about 40 - 50 people in attendance. We were only able to stay a little while because of the schedule that day. Back at Pastor Simon’s house we enjoyed a delicious lunch of rice and peas, goat, plantain cakes, and sauce. We had a food distribution to a number of our people brought in on an old bus. Then we began our journey back toward Santo Domingo. Pastor Simon and Bro. Weaver were relaxing nicely on our journey until I hit a Haitian speed bump. They’re like our speed bumps on steroids. Wow! What a jolt!

Our Dominican driver, who spoke only Spanish, met us at the border again. He was a young, 24 year old fellow who loved speed! However these were not interstate highways. I looked over at least twice when the speedometer was up to 130 kilometers per hour! I think that is about 83 -85 mph. Bro. Weaver kept me laughing with his jokes, which was a good tonic for the nerves when traveling at those speeds on those roads. I was also praying and hoping to make it home alive! Thankfully we pulled into Santo Domingo safely, though we went by someone so close you could feel a little bump!

We slept at Pastor Francis’ apartment that night and rose early the next morning leaving for the airport before 5:00 a.m. What an eventful trip! It was a real eye-opening experience and I thank God that the ICHA family was able to provide some substantial help to several. Thank you for giving and praying! Continue to pray for direction that we’ll know what to do in helping with the rebuilding of the two damaged/destroyed churches. Keith Ledford

Haiti, Day Four

*Saturday – (Feb. 6, 2010) This morning after a breakfast of Haitian coffee, Haitian peanut butter, and local bread, along with grapefruit rind jelly, we left for the return trip to Port-Au-Prince. Pastor Pierre led us to the House of Hope orphanage first where we visited with Sister Merilane and the children. I was able to record the orphans singing under the direction of Sister Merilane. We then left to meet Pastor Simon at a city called Cabaret. Upon arrival, Bro. Weaver and I ate lunch at a Haitian restaurant along with some of the other Haitians. We had goat with sauce, rice with bean soup, plantain and a bottled fruit drink. Pastor Simon wanted to show us some of the earthquake damage in the area of Port-Au-Prince so we spent some time driving around, surveying the damage, and taking pictures. The scope of the destruction was incredible. We went by the Palace and other national buildings. It was as if a giant hand had squashed and broken building after building. He took us to one six floor building near a large church that had many people inside of it. It had collapsed till it was no more than 20 feet tall approximately. The emotional toll on the people of Haiti is enormous! Many have lost family, friends, or acquaintances. Most in Port-Au-Prince are not sleeping in their houses because they are afraid that their dwelling will collapse because of damage or that another quake will bring it down. We viewed and photographed the ruins of the main Catholic church in the country of Haiti. There are many tent cities around the capital. Many of those tents are just blankets, or pieces of cloth on poles designed to shade them from the sun and give some privacy, etc. If the rain sets in many of these people will be flooded out of their tents. That is an imminent danger for thousands! One American doctor that I talked with said that Port-au-Prince looked like carpet bombing in Europe during World War II. No wonder the people are traumatized! We stopped back by the new Mais Gate’ property and took pictures of the 600 gallon water tank that the ICHA had purchased to provide water for the families living on the church property. It was set up with a piece of ¾ inch (approx.) PVC and a valve for opening up and shutting off the water flow. Pastor Simon is going to try to get the government to fill the tank on a daily basis. Later Saturday afternoon we arrived at Pastor Simon’s dwelling and visited with the orphans and Pastor Simon’s family. Bro. Mike Weaver entertained the children for quite a while doing funny things. There was one little orphan that was a Mike Weaver in the making. He and Bro. Weaver hit it off right away. We slept in the tent again on Saturday night. There was an ambitious rooster that roosted about 15 feet from where we were sleeping and he started sounding off about 2:30 a.m. He managed to keep it up the rest of the night on an intermittent basis. Mike Weaver threatened him with death, which would have been a blessing for us! Pastor Simon had been working during the night bagging up rice, beans, and oil to be distributed to some of our Haitian people. We had given a large offering from the ICHA to help him purchase food.

Haiti, Day Three

*Friday – (Feb. 5, 2010) Pastor Simon took us to see different camps where some of our people are staying. At the camp on the new church property in Mais Gate’ we bought a 600 gallon water tank because the people are having a difficult time getting water. We stopped and ate a sandwich for breakfast at a gas station. While we were there Bro. Weaver said something about us having many tents, which a Haitian overheard who spoke English. This Haitian gentleman, who looked well to do, asked Pastor Simon if he could have a tent. He said he didn’t have one to sleep in. Pastor Simon agreed to bring him one. We had brought a total of 14 between the two of us. When Pastor Simon brought him the tent the man told him that he had worked for USAD for 20 years and would help us to get food for our needy people! After we left the gas station we traveled to the House of Hope Orphanage in Trou Baguette and met Pastor Pierre and one of his local church board members. We visited with Sis. Merilane and the orphans for a while. She has some cracks in the dorm building and is having the children to sleep outside now. She would like for an engineer to evaluate the dorm building to see if it is safe. We gave her money to help with food especially because she has extra children now because of the earthquake. She went from approximately 20 children to 45! Sister Merilane desperately needs a mature, single, godly lady who could be financially self-sustaining to come and help her in this tremendous ministry. There is opportunity for wonderful results in a long-term labor of love. After leaving House of Hope we traveled on to St. Marc, stopping along the way to visit with a church that has affiliated with us recently. We had a late lunch at Pastor Pierre’s house of plantain cakes, goat and sauce. Then we left to visit a church that is feeding displaced people from the earthquake. We gave some funds to help with their food needs. Then our group traveled to the hospital in St. Marc which had 70 earthquake victims there at that time. A Canadian nurse practitioner who was coordinating the volunteer work there at the hospital said they had treated over 300. Pastor Pierre and their church board discussed bringing in meals to help the victims. Hospitals there are far different than ours. There was a lady (not in the earthquake wards) there that looked to be pregnant who was crying out in pain. A Haitian nurse said that she had a tumor and they had done everything they could to help her. This poor lady pulled up her top to show us her distended abdomen in a desperate plea for help. She had no family or friends to be with her. Her memory haunts my mind. Later we went to an abandoned hotel that had been turned into a place for displaced people from the earthquake. The man who was running it was a Haitian who had lived in the U.S. for several years. They were keeping 120 people there in the hotel. I asked if there was something we could do for them. He said they needed many things but one thing that weighed on him was the need for mattresses for babies. There were little babies sleeping on blankets on concrete floors. I gave him some Haitian money right then for fuel and we told him we would see what we could do. We left Pastor Pierre with a good offering from the ICHA to minister to the needs of earthquake victims around St. Marc.