Covenant Church

After a long day of travel, we are finally here! Haiti is a big, beautiful and (quite) warm country! Upon arrival we hopped on the bus and drove 4+ hours to the village here in Les Cayes, Haiti. We were greeted with a host of new faces eagerly awaiting our arrival! We took some time to settle in to our lodging on the beach and then ate a wonderful meal of beef stew, bread and fresh juice. Now its time to get some rest and prepare for tomorrow! We are excited to begin our work here in Grambouchi, Haiti. Be in prayer for us as we show the love of Christ to this community this week!

Bonswa from Haiti! Today was a day full of excitment, prayer and vision. We woke up to the sound of the waves crashing on the shore and stepped outside of our cabins to see the beach in the daylight for the first time. What a beautiful sight! After breakfast we went to church at Grace Community Church which is within walking distance from our lodging. We loved getting to worship our Lord and Savior with the Haitian people! We shared testimonies, led worship and Kyler preached an excellent sermon on living a life through Christ's power. It was an experience that we will never forget. After church and lunch, we began our first walk through the village. We met many of the people in the village and began buildings relationships throughout as well. We even spent quite a bit of time at our ministry location praying over the site and the people there. It was incredible to feel the energy and excitement of the Haitian as well as the team for the upcoming week. (Picture below) Later we began setting up for our movie night at Eden-Haiti, a garden that is ran and kept up by Jean Delcy. We watched The Chronicles of Narnia (in French) and had over 200 people show up! How encouraging! Please keep us in your prayers as we begin the work of building the home tomorrow. We are so excited to be in Haiti!

Spending time in prayer over the ministry site.

Today was our first full day of ministry! We started the day off by watching the village children come into the school in their pink and green uniforms, officially kicking off school ministry for this week. We sangs songs, taught the story of Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt through a skit and made bracelets with the kids. The smiles on their faces were priceless! After school ministry we walked to our construction site and began sifting sand and unloading blocks for the house! What hard work! We were blown away by the willingness of the Haitian people to work alongside us. (Picture above) We then had lunch and split up into three teams. One for prayer walking and community outreach, one for kids ministry on the beach and one for continued construction on the house. It was absolutely awesome to think about how God's love was interspersed throughout the community! Continue to keep us in your prayers as we work on the house for Admise and her family. All glory to God!

This is a picture of our group as a whole! We are standing on the foundation of Admise's house. We cannot wait to see what the outcome is that God has in store!

Wow, what a day! We began the day with school ministry, teaching the kids the story of the battle at Jericho. They loved our skit where they got to scream and yell to bring the wall down! We even learned a few songs in Creole last night and surprised them. They were so excited and sang so loud! We then got back to work on the house and spent all morning there. We moved over 400 blocks and completed almost all of the walls in the house! We were amazed at the help we received from the community to finish the house for Admise. All of the men and women donating their time and labor free of charge, what an incredible blessing! We are looking forward to completing most of the house tomorrow! After lunch we split up into groups, some of us doing door to door and community visits while others helped with kids ministry on the beach. Today alone during community visits we had 7 people commit their lives to Christ! Praise the Lord! They will be connecting with our host pastor to get involved in church and learn more about Christ as their faith grows. After four long hours of hard work and play, we ended beach ministry and community visits. We ate some supper and began setting up for our second movie night! The crowd was even bigger than on Sunday night and we watched Facing the Giants. We loved hearing the Haitian children call out our names as they saw us, wanting to sit next to us for the movie. For many of us, it is these moments that we will hold in our hearts forever. Keep us in your prayers, the Lord is showing up in mighty ways on this trip! To Him be the praise!

Today was an incredible day full of ministry! We are proud to report that our portion of the house is complete! We finished the windows (made of decorative heart-shaped blocks) and sifted all the sand for the moldings and front porch. We even finished digging the latrine, which we decided was about 1 Dirk, or 6 ft deep. What a workout! We are also proud to report that through donations, the house project is fully funded and will be under construction after we leave! Praise the Lord! We will be returning tomorrow for a group picture and prayer with Admise over her new home. We spent quite a bit of today connecting with the people of Grambouchi. Five more people accepted Christ as their Savior and Lord of their life! It is incredible to watch how the Lord is working. After beach ministry and playing with the kids, we went to a youth service at church. Wow! What a difference from our services in the States! We were amazed at the joy and energy in that church and the desire that the youth had to praise the Lord. We ask that you pray for us as we head out for a day of recreation tomorrow. Pray for safety and rejuvination.

This is a picture of our whole team at the house! We completed all of the walls and there were many men continuing to work even as we left. Praise the Lord for a great week of construction!

After ministry, we took some time to enjoy ourselves and see a little bit of the hidden treasures of Haiti. We traveled to a hidden waterfall set back in the mountains. We got to jump off a cliff into the waterfall and then down into the pool at the bottom. It was so beautiful!

As we leave our beloved Grambouchi today, we took time to say goodbye to those who we connected with throughout the week. We spent time with each of our "special" kids and got to say our final goodbyes.