Update From Haiti

We began our relief effort in Croix de Bouquet, a suburb of Port au Prince.

This is the first family I talked with, a family whose entire house and belongings were turned to rubble. I was so reluctant to talk with them as I knew I had few if any words of comfort. The despair around us was so intimidating but I smiled and said, "God bless you". They smiled and continued to stack pieces of block  and to cook breakfast on the ground. It was as if they had to do something to give life some structure and meaning.

We sent them food over from our work site and told them they were in our prayers. They waved and smiled again. Our efforts seemed so small.

Thousands of people were wandering around amidst the rubble of Port au Prince. Most had this dazed look in their eyes, traumatized by the fear and devastation. I thought of words like catastrophic and epic but nothing seemed to quite capture or express what we saw. We were just left speechless.

I kept thinking, "this is their capital city’ what if it had been Wash. D.C.? People were looking for food, water, shelter and I think some sense of reality again.

This little boy was with his mother and two brothers walking past our work site in Croix de Bouquet. I felt impressed by the Holy Spirit to talk with them. They told me how their house and fallen on them while their mother was at the local market. They had found little holes to crawl thru to get out and were so thankful to be alive. Many of their neighbors were gone but they did not know where. I asked when they had eaten. She said it had been a long time. I gave her money for food and water and put some antibiotic cream from our first aid kit on the children’s wounds.

We all prayed together and then went back to work on the broken well. I reminded myself, "that little is much when God is in it"  

These men worked hard to repair the wells – they are our heroes. In the picture they are Tcholo, Jose, pastor Rick Hutchinson, Gelin, Tfonfon and Tdoudou. Herbert is absent from the photo.