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Haiti Mission Service living faith ministries / our working vision / community door The Church with Answers Teaching the uncompromised word,
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Haiti is a land of contrast. Still reeling from the
2010 earthquake that is estimated to have killed 250,000 to 300,000 people, political instabilities, abject poverty, and a lack of industry the Haitian people do not dwell in depression. |
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after landing at 4:50 pm, we went through customs easily with Pastor
Preval. Dropping off our suitcases at Preval’s house at 6:00 pm, we left for the 1 hour and 15 minute ride to the church at Bizoton (right), where we ministered three times during the week. The three hour service was comprised of singing and prayer. Debbie sang in Creole and Gordon spoke on Ephesians 2:19-22, “We are no longer strangers and foreigners of the Kingdom of God.”
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Bizotone Church Service, praying over four new converts.
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Saturday Pastor
Habakuk, Anali, and their son Eleazar from the Island of Curacao came to stay with Pastor
Preval. The Pastor has a Haitian church within a Haitian community on the island.
It seems there are Haitian communities almost everywhere! Haiti Mission Service
now has six or seven churches in the Dominican Republic! They also have churches in Haitian communities in Boston, New Jersey, Washington D.C., several cities in Florida in the U.S. They also have churches in France, (in St. Mark Gordon met a pastor from France), and several islands in the
Carribean. Both of the pickup trucks that Pastor Preval uses broke down while we were in Haiti. Praise the Lord that it was not the same day. New batteries and a renewed radiator solved the problems! |
| Sunday morning we returned to Bizoton for Sunday morning church service. Driving through Port-Au-Prince is, to say the least, an experience of dodging traffic and people. Turning off a main road, we traveled up a steep hill on a washed out single lane road. The picture to the left is the final turn into the Bizoton Church. The gate on the right goes into a small fenced in area of the church property. These shelters have been erected, next to existing homes, in the street itself! These people did not live in the area at the time of the earthquake, but in a crisis one does what one must. |
Here we are looking down the street from Bizotone Church where we had
just driven through. The blue tarp stretched across the road had to be
raised for us to drive under. The woman on the front left of the picture is
doing laundry. |
Bizotone Church Service. |
Sunday Church Service at Bizotone was from 10:30 am to 2:00 pm. Debbie sang, Gordon ministered on “Knowing the Name of
YHWH.” Leaving the church at Bizoton at 3:00 pm, as usual, the pickup bed was loaded with people we dropped off on our way back to Pastor
Preval’s. |
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Monday morning the red truck was sent to the radiator shop for repair. Monday afternoon we went to a small church in the Chanjmond area. We first visited this church in 2010, a month after Haiti’s earthquake. It took an hour and a half to reach
Chanjmond. We drove seeing not only the sights of Port-Au-Prince, but also the smell of Port-Au Prince. Garbage often fills the street (right) as there is little or no trash collection or clean up, and at times you have to drive or walk through it. In every church you can sense the faith of the believers as they stand against the tide of darkness that seems to be pervasive in Haiti that people in the U.S. cannot even imagine! Debbie sang, Gordon preached on living in the favor of God as opposed to hoping for a sporadic intervening act of God’s grace. |
Chanjmond Church Service. |
Delmas Church Service. |
Tuesday afternoon we left for Pastor Lionel’s church in Downtown Port-Au-Prince in the Delmas area. Pastor Lionel had just returned this
morning from Washington D.C. where he attended the funeral of Pastor Joseph’s wife. Pastor Joseph was one of the original founders of Haiti Mission Service. Their church was severely damaged in 2010, and has now been torn down. While they are preparing to rebuild they are now meeting under a tin and tarp covered brush arbor. The church has grown 1,000 people since the earthquake, from 3,000 to 4,000 people! There were about 1,000 people present. While Pastors Gordon and Debbie have ministered here for years, this may be the largest single crowd, except for a Sunday morning, they have seen. Debbie sang, Gordon ministered on favor and grace. The people received the word so well, Pastor Preval really encouraged the people in their exuberance! PTL! |
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Wednesday all of us, Pastor Preval and Tulle, Pastor Habakuk’s family, AND Pastor Leslie and two others, left for St. Mark, a coastal city. We were headed for a Haiti Mission Service Regional Conference with Brother Dave from North Carolina. Pastor Roger of St. Mark (right) had organized the meeting, set up the brush arbor, prepared and served food for 200-300 pastors and guests, quite an operation. After checking into a hotel, we left for the conference. Needless to say we were overwhelmed at the size! It was MORE than we anticipated. There were between 3,000-3,500 in attendance for the afternoon session! For the evening session there were 5,000 people! In a brush arbor! For lunch Gordon and Debbie were served their favorite Haitian dish of rice & beans! Also they had a cole slaw that was spicy hot - wow! Of course chicken was served.
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St. Mark Haiti Mission Service Conference. |
Pastor Gordon at St. Mark Conference. |
Thursday we attended the morning session where Gordon was able to address the 3,500 person assembly sharing that we are one in Christ in whom we are knit together as one new man, breaking down the barriers that divide us! Gordon was able to meet many pastors here that we have known for several years,
including Pastors Lionel, Simeon, and Regala. |
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The evening service at St. Mark was filled to the max! 5,000
people are believed to have gathered in the brush arbor which was complete
with lights and a sound system. They were recording all the services and
displaying them live on TV's set up around the brush arbor. Pastors and
others were recording on their cell phones, I-pads, and
computers!
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St. Mark Haiti Mission Service Night Service. |
Ganthier Church Service. |
After lunch Pastor Preval and Tulle left at 4:30 pm, with Gordon and Debbie, for
Ganthier, Pastor Simeon’s church, a three hour drive. It rained hard before and during the service. We have had hard rain on several evenings as it is near the rainy season. Debbie sang, Gordon preached that we are created to reign. After the service we loaded up the truck and dropped people off on the way back to Port-Au-Prince.
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Friday evening we returned to
Bizoton. This night Debbie brought the Word. This is the first time Debbie has actually preached. In our first trips, beginning in 1988, Debbie would share regularly, before she started singing Creole, but never preached. Debbie shared about learning how to live receiving from God.
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Pastor Debbie Preaching at Bizotone. |
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Trench Dug to Stop Traffic to Pernal. This trench has been
partially filled allowing larger trucks to pass. We had to add some new rock
for our smaller pickup to be able to cross. |
Saturday
we waited for the all clear to see if we could go to
Pernal. This is the church Pastor Preval first founded. Friday the President of Haiti had traveled to the region because of unrest. Many, here and elsewhere, are very upset that the promises given by the President have not been fulfilled, specifically the promised road repairs. Although the roads have improved since the earthquake, many are left unrepaired from the damage during the heavy seasonal rains and have washed out! The President reassured the residents that the repairs would occur and that he ordered trucks Friday to come to the area. They didn’t leave till Saturday. The word came Saturday that indeed some trucks had made it through. Some local residents had dug trenches across the roads three feet wide and three feet deep. Above Pernal they had welded steel rods across a metal bridge to keep the transport trucks from getting through. As we traveled to Pernal, we passed one government truck with equipment, but did not see any others. When this truck reached Belladere they were turned back by the residents because they decided they didn’t want the road repaired, they wanted a new blacktopped road! |
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Pastors Gordon and Debbie are always glad to be at Pernal. It is like coming home. They know so many families and have many friends here. Over the years Pastor Preval has built the large church from which many other churches in the area were started. He has built and remodeled a school, a building for housing missionaries, for here is often the starting point for their work in medical missions and such, and now an orphanage
for 15 children is beginning to be built.
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New Orphanage Construction at Pernal. |
Julia, Carmen, her son (name unknown), and Chmieka. |
Carmen was one of two girls that cooked and did laundry for the first
mission teams from Living Faith. She now is married and has three children! Other friends are pictured below... |
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Sunday
morning was church at Pernal. Debbie sang, Gordon ministered on the YHWH who keeps covenant with His people! What a place and way to end our ministry for 2012! |
Pernal Church Service. |
Modeline's Baby Dedicated on Sunday. |
At Pernal's Sunday Service Pastors Gordon and Debbie
participated in Modeline's baby's
dedication. They have known Modeline since she was a small child.
Pastors Gordon and Debbie were able to minister in a variety of churches, rekindling relationships with precious Haitian Pastors, and spent time with precious friends.
Special new memories were made of the people and nation of Haiti.
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Haiti Mission Service is an organization of Haitian churches. Haiti Mission Service operates orphanages, schools, food programs, job training, and anything else you can imagine. But most importantly they preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ to a people trapped in voodoo. A board of native Haitian Pastors, with Pastor Preval as the President, oversees and coordinates the work of the various churches. Made up of hundreds of Pastors, Evangelists, and churches, HMS, in 2012, represents approximately 500,000 people in Haiti. Over the last few years HMS has established churches in the Dominican Republic, France, Caribbean Islands and in the United States among Haitian communities. Living Faith Ministries has been working with Pastor Preval and Haiti Mission Service since 1988.
If you would like to make a financial contribution to the rebuilding of Haiti through Haiti Mission Service, you may send your support, either one time or monthly, to: Living Faith Ministries
Write your checks to Living Faith Ministries. Please mark your gift for HMS. This is tax deductible. If you are interested in joining in a mission trip to Haiti contact us. There are a variety of opportunities to serve the people of Haiti through preaching missions, construction missions, and medical missions. We would be glad to connect you with a mission that will change your life!
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Pictures of Haiti Trip from March 23-April 2, 2012
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Pastor Preval |
Madam Tulle, Pastor Preval's Wife |
| If your church or
organization would like to have Pastor Gordon and/or Pastor Debbie share
about Haiti with your group you can contact them at Living Faith Ministries - 1-800-732-4841 |
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