Burn Baby Burn (St. Pierre)
GOOOOOODMOOOOORNING HAITI!! Today we awoke to the sweet call of the Haitian roosters and set off to fill our bellies with a delicious creamy porridge. Little did we know our day would be filled with work, exhaustion, sweat, wasps, and lots of laughter. Half of us assembled the 325 water filters that we brought down with us and installed them on pails we bought locally. Meanwhile, the other half of the team had the privilege of painting Haiti Arise’s medical centre. To our dismay, we discovered how horrendous the Haitian sun, as well as the Haitian wasps can truly be. Few of us were left standing to see the job done. One quickly discovers how many layers of sunscreen it takes to combat the relentless rays of the Haitian sun.
In preparation for the upcoming Youth Conference, a local cow was dismantled and prepared for the many mouths that will soon join us within the compound. Also in preparation for the youth conference, we practiced skits and testimonies, we also set up benches and cleaned in the church, while others of us assembled the Conference schedule pamphlets. This conference is definitely going to be a massive initiative; it’s a way bigger deal than we were originally anticipating. We have no idea what to expect, but apparently we’ll be quite involved, and there are church leaders and young people coming from all across the country! This is the first time Haiti Arise has had a mission’s team involved in one of their conferences (their last youth conference was around this time a year ago).
Soccer has served as a really good icebreaker for our group to interact with the Haitian youth. Let’s just say we didn’t bother counting points for the “Canada vs Haiti” games. Tomorrow we’ll challenge them to a game of hockey.
As dusk fell upon us, we made our way to the rooftop lounge with some Albertans who joined us at the compound. We listened to the testimony and history of Haiti Arise through its founders- Marc and Lisa Honorat. They have an amazing testimony of God’s grace and provision. They truly live in the realm of the miraculous and have seen God move powerfully through their willingness to serve him. As Lisa said, “All God asks is for you to be willing,” He’ll take care of the impossible.