Update: Harvest Field Ministries #17

The latest from Brian...

Monday I spent the majority of the morning at the UN Headquarters near the airport in Port au Prince. It was quite an experience. Lots of Europeans smoking cigarettes and talking with funny accents (this from the guy from Tennessee). I was amazed how big the operation is. Literally thousands of people in an army of mobile trailers and air conditioned tents. I guess it takes all that to coordinate all the efforts but I was definitely confused. We did get registered with them as a small NGO (non-governmental organization) which allows us to be considered to receive food and other support so we can in turn get it to the communities we serve. Lots of sitting in meetings, being sent from trailer to trailer, and paperwork, but hopefully it will pay off if we can help get the supplies people need. I have a follow up meeting Friday morning where we should learn more about the system they are putting in place to help get supplies to the small NGO's like us.

The rest of the day Monday was spent looking for, purchasing, and loading the trucks for the food distributions in Belloc, Coq Chante, and Camatin. God continues to reveal himself even through things as mundane as looking for beans (story too long to type now but short version is God provided a "bean miracle").

Tuesday we left at sunrise to head up to the mountains with a flatbed truck and 2 pickup trucks full of food. The pastors of the churches were so excited and appreciative. The amount we took seemed so big when you are loading a flatbed truck. But it seemed so small when you are looking at the sea of people coming to request a little bit of the food for their family. There is just never enough to help everyone we see.

I was really impressed at Belloc. There were several young men in the community starting the back-breaking work of demolishing the remnants of the collapsed church, school, and orphanage and busting the concrete into tiny pieces (with only small hand tools - no backhoes, no jack hammers, no electricity, no dump trucks) which they then moved to the road on a wheel barrow. They were turning a rocky muddy path into a decent gravel road. They came together and proposed me funding a community work program to continue doing this; to completely dismantle the rest of the school, church, and orphanage that collapsed, as well as, several other collapsed concrete buildings in the area - so they could make the road into Belloc a better road. Their proposal was to employee 30 men, working 5 days a week, for 2 months. The cost was $29,000 Haitian dollars (about $4,000 US dollars). I love that they were not asking for a handout. They just wanted an opportunity to work, help their community, better the road to their village, and support their own families. I'm praying the funds will come through so we could fund this program and employee these 30 men for 2 months. Many people over the years have heard about the 80% unemployment in Haiti and assume the Haitian people are lazy but this just isn't the case. They want to work. They want to provide for their children. But with no industry, no factories, no manufacturing, no tourism, there are just no jobs available. Hopefully, as Haiti rebuilds, that will change.

Keep praying
Brian

I received this update just a little while ago. As I read it I was amazed. Not at the tenacity of the Haitian people, I know how incredibly tough they are, I was amazed at God. Just a few hours ago I opened an envelope from a local church and found a stack of checks marked Belloc. Because of the obedience of these people, we are already halfway to reaching the $4000 to be able to funding the Belloc Community work program. How cool is God?? And a big THANK YOU to Crossings in Knoxville!!

Blessings,

Rachel, Brian's wife