August 27, 2014

It is always a joy when we have teams to come to Haiti but when we have another mission family come to visit we are truly blessed.  Franklin and Evelyn Turner with their daughter Mary and their son James from Costa Rica called and said they wanted to do a mission trip. The Turner kids have been raised in Costa Rica but James wanted to do a "mission trip".  Mary is a sophomore in college this year and it worked out where she could make the trip with her family. They couldn't have come at a better time.
  Hopeful Hearts ministry had visited us last year and wanted to do a VBS/Music Camp for an orphanage.  The team arrived with Tripp Pottinger at the head. It was a team of 6 but to do the ministry the Lord had put on their hearts they needed more hands.  GOD provided. Mary and Evelyn went with us for a couple of days while Franklin and James went with the well drilling crew to drill wells.  (another story). The orphanage has 34 children, they brought in 30 from their churches and 18 from the community. I think everyone was shocked at the level of understanding the kids  had of music. The team brought in 70 Recorders, several flutes, a couple of clarinets and some percussion instruments.  We had to divide the groups into 4 levels. The young ones learned to read notes and rhythm , two groups worked on the Recorders and the VERY advanced group worked on new tips with their  instruments.  Mary took a group of young people with Recorders and did a great job.  The last day everyone had a chance to show off what they had learn during the week.  It was fun for all!!!
At the start of each day the team shared a Bible story with crafts and lots of prayer. . They were so well prepared.
WELLS:
Our main Haitian well driller had a major stoke about 6 months ago and hasn't been able to return to work.  We were behind on the wells that needed to be drilled. Healing Hands ...a group out of Nashville...had had their well driller working out of our compound ever since the earthquake. The driller is in Haiti about 5 months each year.  They saw how much we needed to get our well drilling caught up so they offered to drill up in the mountains for us. David went up each day with the crew and the rotary rig. They drilled in 5 wells in 5 days...good water...poured the pump base and then 4 days later put the pump in. CAN YOU IMAGINE.??? 5 wells in five days in the mountains.  With our rig it could have taken us up to 10 weeks to accomplish this.  The last day David, Nicky and Curt decided to try an area where very few people have been with a vehicle much less a well rig and service trucks. STEEP...wasn't the word for it.  They made it up the mountain...set up and drilled 300 ft...all in a powder like limestone.  What a disappointment for them. DRY HOLE...but even more disappointment for the 10,000 who could have benefited from a good source of water. God was definitely with them as they came down the mountain  It started to rain.  The roads get very slick with a little water on them especially the very steep areas.
*One of the wells they drilled in they found water at 34ft....60 GALLON PER MINUTE OF ICE COLD WATER.  None of the drillers had ever seen anything like this. They drilled on to over 80ft and sealed the water off at 56ft.

August 20,2014

Still trying to play "catch up" on my blog. 
The month of June we had 2 teams, 1 conference for 200 and two couples guest housing as they worked with Healing Hands well drillers.
  We conducted the first of several VBS's at Blanquet church.  So much fun to see the 105 children  responding to the Word as well as crafts and outside play. There were two decisions for Christ.
July had 3 short term mission teams and a large youth retreat for 188 kids sponsored by an organization out of Ohio.  They also brought along 24 Americans to work with the children all week here on our campus. Thank you Bethany Morris for spending 2 weeks being the extra hands we needed.
The Mark Green and family came with the Wiggington family and a mother/daughter out of Louisville, KY.  What a blessing to see the crowds of people respond to Kim Wiggington's chalk talks and her husband Steve did basketball tricks as they both shared the Gospel. As always we had plenty of painting for the rest of the team.
Westport Rd Baptist Church arrived in late July with the first of their two teams coming this summer. This team was special for many reasons.....first of all our granddaughter Amanda was on the team and second they did two VBS's at Schekina....one in the morning for younger children and one in the afternoon for older youth.  Lots of singing, dancing, crafts and of course the Word.  Thirteen decisions for Christ. 
July 27th Rachel McClain and Anna Beth Riggs arrived to spend two weeks with GO missionaries helping out where ever they were needed.  Thanks ladies for taking your last two weeks before going to college to be with us.