Working through the transition

Greetings to all,

   Well, again, I’m very late with updates.  I didn’t realize how involved things would get until we got settled into any kind of routine.  And, nope, not settled into it yet, but working on it.  I do have some news to share, both sad and happy news, it may take a bit.  Have patience with me on this, please.  The following (in blue) is a post by missionaries who live near Port au Prince, and were friends with President Jovenel.  It will give you an idea of how things are in that area of Haiti.

   First Lady Martine Moise was warmly received when she visited Haiti's earthquake affected S peninsula to encourage victims and demand justice for her husband, assassinated President Jovenel. Martine herself was shot 8 times and left for dead by hired Columbian assassins who brutally shot President Jovenel 18 times.  

   The assassination was an all out coup d'etat that began with manufactured protests before Jovenel was even elected; he went on to win 3 elections and fought corruption by refusing to award lucrative government contracts for millions in kickbacks.

   Joel and Yvonne are personal friends of the First Lady and often prayed for and advised President Jovenel who is now hailed as a hero of Haiti's poor. His wife Madame Moise promises to continue her husband's dream of developing Haiti with solar powered energy and water that is now denied over 97% of the population.

    Currently, Prime Minister is canceling Jovenel's decrees and replacing his cabinet with known criminals; this completes the coup d'etat..

    While US Embassy negotiates ransom for the release of 16 Americans and 1 Canadian missionary kidnapped two weeks ago, most roads are blocked by citizens fed up with rampant kidnapping and gang terrorism.

    The hostages include 5 children ages 8 months to 15 years. Recently kidnapped survivors report food and water are only administered once a day and hostages are beaten regularly. There are 12 adults in the Anabaptist group from Ohio, one is just 18 years old. All Christians here are fasting and praying for the next 3 days for release of hostages and disarmament of gangs.

    Militia gangs are controlling much of Port au Prince; 80 gangs were founded and funded by Opposition Oligarchs who orchestrated the presidential assassination and have lobbied the favor of US media and the DNC with trafficking and terrorism blood money. Years of Opposition lobbying yielded defamatory media coverage of President Jovenel and USDOS insistence Opposition leaders be included in government which caused the current destabilization and insecurity.

    We have been in touch with our “daughter”, Vero, in Cap Haitian.  Her news isn’t much better.  I’ll include a few of her statements, as well. 

   Today is better outside. But the streets are so black because of the smoke. Now to go in town you need to pay 50 gourds to go and 50 gourds to come back. But it’s not easy to find tap-tap. Motorcycle can ask you 500 gourds to go in town. Please continue to pray for Haiti. Now you can’t find gas anywhere. You can see a few cars in the road.   (An explanation here:  it used to be 5 gourds to go to town, and people had a hard time with that, now it’s 50.  With the current exchange rate, 10 gourds would equal about 10¢ American. And yet, for a Haitian this is overwhelming.)

   With all of this holding us back from making a trip to Haiti, we still have some good news, too.  We had left money in Haiti to buy more food for the Bucket Ministry.  But we did realize that finding food was going to be a problem.  Even if it was found, trying to get it back to our place, repacked and then taken out, would be a problem.  But Vero sent us a message.  She was able to go and get the food and get it back to our place to do between 80 and 100 buckets.  We had some reserve fuel there, as well, so they have some to use to deliver the buckets once they are repacked and ready to go.  That many families (80-100) will have food for about 2 weeks.  We are so thankful for that.  And we are praising the Lord for Vero, Marcot and their team for all the work they will be putting into this.  We wish we were there to help, but know the Lord has put the right people there to get it done.  Our job will be to work on this end to find the needed support to keep this going. 

   Something that I, personally, am encouraged with is our home church.  Yes, we are thankful they support our ministry in Haiti, and in several other countries as well.  But they are doing something that I wish ALL churches would work toward.  Start teaching and encouraging people inside the church to be that missionary that the Bible talks about, too.  Not necessarily to a foreign country.  The person who lives next door to you may be your mission field.  The person you work with, or how about a long time friend who doesn’t know Jesus personally.  We are ALL missionaries, just in different ways and in different areas.  But in these troubled times, those who don’t know Jesus, have no hope!!  I’m praying YOU are being that missionary that the Lord was talking about.  In Matthew 9: 35-38, Jesus is talking about the harvest time.  NOW is that harvest time, and He is calling YOU to have the compassion to reach out and share what the Lord has done and is doing for you!!!

   For now, I’ll close and pray for you.  If you have special prayer requests, we’d love to pray with you on them.  But we also want to praise the Lord for all He has done and IS doing.  Our work in Haiti will continue, thanks to the Lord and for His guidance in accomplishing things.  Do not doubt that we will be returning to Haiti as soon as the Lord and our “family” in Haiti advise us.  But we encourage you to go out into YOUR mission field, too.  Grasp hold of what the Lord is telling you and take that step of faith to share Him with others!!

In His Name and Service,

Don & Karen