We Leave for Haiti Thursday!
We are so excited about our upcoming trip to Haiti! We will be there from October 17 – 26 and we will get to spend a lot of time with our kids. I feel like we haven’t seen them in ages, and that is the most exciting thing for both of us about this trip…We get to see the kids that we have fallen in love with. With all of the work that goes into starting a ministry like All Things New, sometimes I forget about the greatest honor that GOD has given Jess and I…The honor and privilege of taking care of these 34 children! I can’t imagine a greater responsibility, a greater privilege, and a greater calling than this. I thank GOD that this is what He wants from my life because I just can’t think of anything better.
I want to share a very quick story with you that happened last week at Greenfield Elementary. I was speaking with some of the Kindergarten classes at Greenfield because it was “community helper” week there. With our connection to that school (it is where Jess used to teach and where I have spent a great deal of time over the past few years) some of the teachers asked me to speak as a community helper (I am a pastor right now at RiverTown Church). As I was speaking, I talked about a lot of things, and one of those things was All Things New and what we will do there to “help the community.” One of the students, her name is Patience (what a great name), raised her hand during the question time and said, “You know that is a gweat wesponsibility.” First of all, those words are not misspelled, she just had trouble with her “r’s,” and second of all, how awesome is that? It wasn’t a question, but she could see how great this responsibility is. In her 5-year-old mind, she could understand how important it is to take care of a group of children who do not have parents to help them. She could see that we have the responsibility of 34 young lives who need to be cared for, molded, shaped, and raised in a GODly manner. What a great responsibility, and what a great privilege to see these children in a couple of days! Please pray with me that we never forget this. Please pray that we never get so busy or so weighed down with what to do next that we forget about the responsibility that GOD has given us to be His body to these children. He is their Father, and He has chosen us to show them what that means…“What a gweat wesponsibility”
I also wanted you guys to know about 2 of the things that we hope to accomplish while we are there. As you read and pray about these 2 things, please understand that we would not be doing this without your help and you will never know how much we appreciate you. Thank you for your encouragement, your support, and most importantly your prayers. Here is what we hope to accomplish:
- We hope to purchase a truck. This is a great need for us as we need to be able to get back and forth from the orphanage while we are staying at Christianville, and we want to help the kids get to school and back on a daily basis while we are there. GOD brought us together with a wonderful donor who decided she could show the love of GOD to us in this way and this is a very important step in All Things New!
- We will hire a cook. This is another incredible opportunity for the kids and for Audancin and Rosie. With your support, we are now able to bring someone to the orphanage 2 times/day to cook breakfast and dinner for our kids, and that is incredible. She will be devoted to this task, and we know it will help ensure that our kids eat good and healthy meals each day. Thank you for helping us get to this point!
Please be in prayer for us about both of these things! If you are reading this and will commit to pray either “comment” on this post or “like” it on Facebook so we can know that you guys are committing in this way! It means a lot when we can see the involvement that you guys have with us.