31 Days reflecting on our lives in Haiti, Day 1

Day 1

The Lord has pressed on my heart for months...encouraging me to write, so today I begin to share with you...whoever you are, stories that we may never have shared. Before I dive into the depths I want to explain a few things that may help you understand why much of this was never shared. Some of the reasons I personally held back stories were; being a first time "oversees missionary" I allowed the idea that our lives had to look a certain way. Every struggle I should be praisin Jesus right through it, no problemo. A perfect family that ALL wanted to leave everything and everyone and live in a third world country. Someone who had no needs, because of course...we gave up almost everything...we shouldn't want anything! And the list of what I thought everyone thought we should be like went on and on....

Some of the other major reasons I didn't share much, was the struggle with what was good to share, that wouldn't damage the already damaged country of Haiti. We knew that some locals were aware that foreigners would come, take sad photos, and then exploit them...and sometimes it wasn't foreigners. It was one of their own who knew how to take sad photos and ask for money online. And the other struggle was sharing our struggles when we were the "very well-off" foreigners in our town. Imagine seeing desperate poverty every single day and knowing, every day, you had 3 meals a day for your family and a home, a bed, way too many clothes....on and on...and the children outside your walls and adults had maybe 1 meal...maybe.

There are lots of reasons we wrestled with sharing...didn't want to freak out family at home, didn't want to offend the locals, didn't want to seem less spiritual in our struggles, didn't want people to donate because of the poverty around us but the gospel going forth!!! Whew....So much!

So today

The greatness of His love and patience has brought me to this point where I will take you all into some stories of our lives when we lived in Haiti for 2 1/2 years. One of the realities of re-entering into our home country has been not having people who understand what we're going through. The truth is...very few will really understand what it's like to do this exact thing...to sell all, leave everyone you know, take your 4 tiny kids and live in a third world country. But I have seen how sharing my stories has healed my heart. It has brought validity to the doubts that try to come at me daily that we wasted those years or damaged our children. It has revealed the great work He did and is still doing in every single member of our family and the effect it has on the hearer is beautiful. So I am inviting you into the song of our lives. The music that crescendos to great heights and diminuendos in the valleys of deep struggles and pain. Sing with us! It is a beautiful thing when the words of someone are sung together and all come into agreement with the composer. You are all a part of this song....

Opus 1

This picture...oh how thankful I am for this. Now, if you asked me if I loved this picture 2 years ago I would say NO! What is not seen is what weighed so heavy on my heart. Less than 3 hours before this picture we had left our rental home in San Diego with piles of "who knows what" for our sweet family of Christ from Impact 195 left to get rid of or have it. We got to the airport with 13 suitcases and for 1 1/2 hours tried to figure out how to get the 13th bag accepted. We'd found out about Haiti's embargo and had to leave 1 bag behind. The kids were tired and unsure of what all was happening. The stress had finally hit me and I was so unsure of what I was doing. I finally got to the point where I grabbed one suitcase, knowing it had my violin and the Bible Aaron had proposed to me with in it and I knew I didn't have to have it right away. Hoping the next visiting team from our church would bring it out in a few months I left it. 

I was so grateful that an amazing group of brothers and sisters from Impact 195 were at the airport to see us off! See, we had 2 other team members who we had planned to fly with that would've been such a help with the kids. Well, turns out our flight payment never went through the night we all purchased them! So they flew together, and we journeyed as a family. At the time this made me struggle even more! Oh, how we longed for our team to be a part of our family and also to see how we could use a hand. And with all this going on I began to doubt. Right here in this photo there is a smirk on my face. This is why I love this. A dear brother in Christ, Dave Brown, began singing over the line of people "I'm no longer a slave to fear, for I am a child of God..." Everyone in the group began to sing it. For the rest of that very very long night I needed those words. I remember watching my tiny kiddo's frustrated and struggling dragging their backpacks threw the airports crying. They had packed every toy and memory they could in their bags because our suitcases had our immediate needs. And again I thought, "What have I done? What am I doing to my kids?" 

The struggle didn't end in the airport. Diarrhea hit immediately for three kids when we finally got to the hotel in Port Au Prince. Cleaning underwear in a not so nice toilet was fun! Then we finally arrived the next day to Jeremie, Haiti. We only had 4 suitcases because of the plane's weight restrictions, so our others were being driven in a few days to our town. 

The moment we opened the gate to our new home I truly don't remember what I really felt. But I was grateful for a concrete home! And some form of screens...to try to keep some bugs out! For the first 5 straight days we had no power from the city. Thankfully there was a missionary couple who offered us their generator temporarily until we figured out how to get one to our home...from the US...who knows how? Upon arrival we had beds that had been built to help us out. Thankfully we had some sheets in the suitcases we had!!! And then...we had no water! HA! In that house, our water is pumped from 1 inch PVC pipes that are above ground on the streets to a 400 gallon water tank on our roof. Well, the line had been broken in the streets. We had no idea! Thankfully the missionary couple who were on their way out of country blessed us with setting up beds, a stove, pots, plates, a folding table and chairs and a cook. Oh, yes....we hired a local woman to be in our home for 8 hours a day to cook 1 meal! Our lives were in a whirlwind! Those first weeks...lets say months, were so challenging! In exhaustion and with sour stomachs, we tried to figure out using our drinking water to wash dishes and then flush one toilet! 

To say that the beginning of this journey in Haiti started with a bang is an understatement! But the truth is, this was not the beginning of our journey. There was so much leading to this. Selling our home, leaving family, a 1 year discipleship school that rocked our entire family, changing our family atmosphere and breaking down strongholds, walking through unforgiveness and seeking reconciliation in our families before we left, creating a team to do this with, losing the first team...and then struggling to want to create one again! But we did....He did! What a journey! Although I cannot take you there physically to see, feel, smell and experience Haiti this entry is forever etched in my soul. I felt every emotion very deep. I struggled with thinking we made a huge mistake and were helpless and completely alone. Those thoughts would try to pervade our thoughts for the entire time we lived there and even coming back to the US they come in different ways! 

The reality is that the season we began in Haiti was just that. A season. A deeply stretching and forever life changing season. I am so grateful I can see His hand on every moment we had there. I can see Him sitting with me when I had no idea how to comfort my children because I needed to be comforted. I can see Him change my heart and my selfish ways over and over again. The beginning of this season seemed to be masked with frustration and crushing moments, but that is a mask. He is such an incredible composer of the most beautiful music. He decided that this movement, this opus, would be deep and challenging for every musician involved. Not one player would rest. Not one instrument would be waiting it's turn. Every part would be playing and it would be full of soul. Full of His love for His children. In this movement He was opening us to a greater work we had no idea we would experience. It was as if in the softest parts there was still every instrument barely holding on. As if the bow was barely touching the strings. And that's how we felt. But He was still playing. And I see the beauty now. I hear the melody now. I see what He was doing in my heart as a mother. To trust Him unconditionally with my children. To begin...just begin...to release every fear I had allowed in my life over them. To trust that He would and does love them more than I ever will! Do I believe that? ABSOLUTELY!