Day 1

Greetings from Haiti! We arrived safely in Haiti yesterday around 11:40am and were warmly greeted at the airport by Barb ( seen on your left standing by the truck) and Darby's father. By God's grace, we arrived with all of our bags and nothing was damaged. Praise God, and thank you to everyone that prayed for this! We have already begun to feel the result of your prayers for us during this time.

We crammed all of our team (24 people plus the staff driving us, and around 100 peices of luggage of various sizes) into 2 trucks ( like the one seen with Barb on your left) and a car, along with all of the bags we brought with us, and drove a half our to the place we're staying at called "the crech" and unloaded all of our bags. We then drove over to Barbs place called "the village" and ate a nice lunch of spaghetti- O's. In true Barb style, she then put us right to work cleaning out her food room, that we called the food depot, and transferring everything over to the new food depot. God gave us the grace to not only serve joyfully with no sleep, but also the grace to encounter lots of large bug, spiders, and even a live mouse. We are all enjoying so much this experience of the bugs, dirt, and living conditions as it continues to stretch us.

Sarah also arrived at the airport on time and made contact with our team soon after we landed. Thank you to everyone who pray for her and her flight in!

We eventually went back to the crech (pronounced kresh) and settled in for a good nights rest and some good showers. (picture of the crech seen below)

This morning we returned to the village and are working some more on construction for some of the buildings inside the village, and helping some more with the food depot.

Also, this morning some of our medical team ( Rachel M., Sarah, and Pastor Steve) were able to visit a tent community to treat a man who was suffering from heart failure. I can tell you honestly, seeing their faces and hearing them tell our team the story of that visit to the tent village, that they were deeply moved by what they saw there. The devastation here from the earthquake is everywhere around us. The streets are made of the rubble from the destroyed buildings and cement blocks are everywhere. Nothing seems "whole" here as far as buildings go. Members of our team have already been moved to tears several times over this.

There are a few other teams down here helping in the village along with us and more coming last in the week. We are enjoying the extra company, and spending time with Barb very much. Barb is a character, and runs this place in a way that you would have to be here to experience. She is straight to the point, and works hard at what ever she does. She is a blessing to our team in many ways and I'm sure will continue to be a blessing to us as we continue our adventure here along with her.

Our teams schedule is still very much "up in the air", but our medical clinic is starting today at 1pm. Please pray for our team as we seek to best serve the people coming into the village to be treated, and for our teams hearts to stay strong as they prepare themselves for what they may see and encounter today. Also pray for Robin V., as the heat is starting to make her feel ill. She is being well taken care of by our clinic, but your prayers would be greatly appreciated along with our own.

We are planning to attend and help lead the church service tomorrow at Darby's Father's church ( he is a pastor here). Please pray for not only our team as we lead the service ( pastor Steve is teaching), but also for grace being it will need to be translated as he teaches, and the service is 3 hours long. Also, there has been some radio advertisements announcing our presence here and trying to get people to come to our clinic, VBS, and church service. Please pray for a great turn out for all these events, and grace to help us effectively provide for all of the people who come out.

We will try and update again as often as we can, so check back daily for more updates. Please comment on the blog if you want to tell us what you think, if you have any specific questions about the trip, or anything encouraging to share with the team. We as bloggers for the trip would love to have encouraging things to bring back to share with our entire team to build them up while we are here.

Haiti Blogger out! :)