Second Cape May Baptist Returns Home from Haiti today...

Today, Second Cape May Baptist from Cape May, NJ travels from Les Cayes, Haiti to Port au Prince, Haiti to Philadelphia, PA.  Would you pray for them as they travel?  I have heard it went very well.  Pictures coming soon!

Rob

Haiti Creole Resource...

The following resource was suggested by Pastor Guy Glass from Calvary Baptist Church in Pemberton, NJ.

The following web site has some free downloadable tools, and some very affordable more robust options for learning Haitian Creole.  Check it out.  If you do, please let us know what you think!

Rob

Learn Haitian Creole

A glimpse into the Shoe's Soul

Many folks have asked us to include information on how our family is doing.  You can now get a little insight into the Shoe's Soul by going to www.theshoessoul.blogspot.com.  You can catch up on what is happening in our personal lives since we've moved to the states (and there's a lot!).  You may be amazed, you will laugh and hopefully be spurred to pray for us on our life journey as we continue to serve the Lord through RMI.  To whet your appetite, here are a few pictures:

Dan and I, the re-invented U.S. version!

Devon, 20, and Duke the Walmart shopping dog!

Dawn, 17, and a State Volleyball Championship!

A glimpse into the Shoe's Soul

Many folks have asked us to include information on how our family is doing.  You can now get a little insight into the Shoe's Soul by going to www.theshoessoul.blogspot.com.  You can catch up on what is happening in our personal lives since we've moved to the states (and there's a lot!).  You may be amazed, you will laugh and hopefully be spurred to pray for us on our life journey as we continue to serve the Lord through RMI.  To whet your appetite, here are a few pictures:

Dan and I, the re-invented U.S. version!

Devon, 20, and Duke the Walmart shopping dog!

Dawn, 17, and a State Volleyball Championship!

A recent visit to Abricot

Our trip to Abricot on January 10: We took pictures for Hope for Kids and looked at possible projects for New Church to consider for future visits. Last year the students had to walk about 5 miles to have their pictures take but this year we have a new road into Abricot. It's a beautiful part of Haiti and one is able to see the beauty even better on this road. But the true beauty is in Haiti's people. They are always happy to see us as we are them. Here is a slideshow for you!  Gary McLaughlin

A letter from your Sister Church

From: Abricot Church

To: New Church

I am very happy today for the great opportunity I have to write you this letter. How are you and your church activities doing over there? I hope you are doing great in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ. The reason I write this letter to you is to wish you all in New Church a Happy New Year of 2008.

Here in Abricot Baptist Church, we had a good year of 2007.  God took care of us here.  The only  problem we had last year was when we were preparing for your coming but unfortunately the team was cancel, after that everything was fine for us here in Haiti.  About the school everything is fine, we have more kids in the school this year but we don’t have enough class room.  This year, again, 20 kids are going to attend the official exams, I want you to pray for them, please.

Thank you very much for the generator that you sent for us. It is very helpful for us because we use it every evening when we have service. We started this year with a nice prayer service in the church where we had many people accept Jesus as their Savior.

Finally, we want to say thank you for the support you give to our kids here in Abricot. Thank you for helping our kids go to school. We really appreciate that and we are praying for you everyday and asking God to fill you with his blessing. All the church members and the deacons send their greeting to all of you.

May God bless you all in your church!

Pastor Yves Renous Mathurin

A letter from your sister church

From: Anse–a-Veau Baptist Church

To: Linwood Church

I greet you all in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ.  May the grace and the peace of God be with you in this New Year.  I wish you all a Happy New Year of 2008.

Here in Anse-a-Veau, we are doing very well thanks to God.  We praise the Lord we had a good year of 2007 spiritually, only some of our people in our church were facing the Hurricane problems. Thank you the help you sent for those with hurricane damage problems.  They really needed that help.  Our church is working very well here. We had a nice prayer service on the night of December 31^st where all the Christians met together for a worship and prayer service. We were happy to meet together; we heard a lot of testimonies from the members and after we all had a good time of discussion together and we drank coffee at the end.

In the name of all the kids and the parents who are sponsored we say thank you for the money you sent this year again for the kids.  The parents were very happy to see their kids going to school and have their school paid for.  That’s a blessing for them. The kids and their parents are praying for you daily and asking God to bless you. Thank you for the motorcycle battery you sent for me.  I appreciate that. We are praying for your coming again this year and we are looking forward to meeting you all.

I send my greeting to all of you in Linwood Church especially to Pastor Rick and his family, to the deacons, the youth, Sister Betty, Brother Art and his wife, Sister Barbara, Brother Tom, Brother Tommy and to all the members.

Pastor Dieusseul Malbranche

A letter from your Sister Church

From:     The Committee of Dame-Marie Baptist Church

To:          To Pastor Guy Glass and Calvary Church

Object:    Information

Dear Pastor Glass,

May the grace and the peace of God be with you!  My family and I have a pleasure to greet you in the precious name and savior Jesus Christ.

We were very happy to receive you here in Dame-Marie 6 months ago.  It was for us a great privilege to meet some members from Calvary Baptist Church in New Jersey as our sister church here in Dame-Marie. I wish that everything will continue to work well for the glory of God. Praise the Lord; we are doing fine here in Dame-Marie spiritually. At the beginning of December we started our worship service at 6 a.m. and finish at 9 a.m.  We had a nice convention for the whole district at the end of the year for four days. It was a great success where 20 members were baptized. We also had a nice party with 250 people for those who attended the Sunday school. We have a big choir with eighty (80) people now in our church and we wish to participate in the convention that the MEBLH mission organizes every April.

In the name of all the Deacons and members of Dame-Marie Baptist church, in the name of my wife and my children, we join our voice together to wish you a happy new year of 2008. We hope to have you again this year in Dame-Marie, your sister church.

We love you all and May God in his power send his blessing to you and Calvary Church.

Pastor Evelt Mentor

A letter from your Sister Church

January 2008

From:     Ducis Baptist Church, Haiti

To:          Village church of Bartlett

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

We are very happy to write this letter to you just to give you some information about our church here in Ducis and also we want to take this advantage to wish you a happy new year of 2008. We are very happy for the good communion that God our Father established among us and allowed us to live as brothers and sisters for the glory of his ministry. This is by the same love he left behind his kingdom and came to the earth to die for us. That’s really a great love, isn’t it?

We say thank you to God the way he did take care of us for the year of 2007, even though we had insecurity problems in our country but God has take care of each family in our church. For this reason, from December 16^th to December 31^st of 2007 we had a nice prayer service in our church in Ducis where all the members in the church met together to praise him and thank him for his mercy. We had different speakers who would preach for us from Exodus 33:13.

Our purpose for this new year is to have more people baptized, teach more people the words of God and create a new strategy where all the family in the church can know the power of God better and seek more people for his kingdom.

This year again we want to start working with the plan we had a long time ago called “AWANA”.  We have already met with the responsible people and  they have approved it. I hope next time when I write I will give you more explanations about it.

We are praying for you everyday and we hope that you are going to do the same thing for us.

Once again I want to wish you all a happy new year of 2008 and May God send his blessing upon your church.

Your brother,

Pastor Anthony Moise

A letter from your Sister Church

From: Baradere Baptist Church

To: Creekside Church

I greet you in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ! How are your different activities doing?  I believe that everything is doing well for you.

Here in Baradere, we are doing well by the grace of God. God always stays beside us to protect us. We say thank you very much for the money you sent for the Christians here that were facing a difficult time after the hurricanes. 

For our spiritual activities, everything is working well now.  We have good worship services on Sunday morning, evangelism services Sunday night, Prayer services Tuesday night and Bible study every Thursday nights. We also have a meeting with the deacons; we have 9 classes for Sunday school. This year we have a meeting with each different group in the church to make an overall plan for the different projects we wish to realize.

This year we are going to have our Carnival (Mardi Gras) retreat for the youth in Gran Boukan’s area where 150 youth are going to participate. We want you please to pray for us so that God can give us a good time there because we are going to have evangelism service every evening. Please pray for me because in January 30^th, I am going to have surgery on my left eye.

I send my greetings to all the members in Creekside Church, especially to Pastor Richard and his wife, Brother Wes and Brother Don. We are praying God for you and asking him to bless you and your church.

Pastor Leon Bonhomme

A letter from your Sister Church

From: Port Salut Church.

To:  Abbeville Main Street UMC

My name is Jean Edert Pierre.  I am 45 years old.  I am the new Minister at Port Salut Baptist Church that you visited last summer. My wife’s name is Leonne Pierre, she is 45 years old too and she is a teacher. We have three boys: Renaud-Zicky, 12 years; Pherry, 11years old and Dinaud, 5 years.  Like my wife, I was born in a Christian family and our fathers were both Pastors in the same mission as well. I was ten years old when I took Jesus in my heart and since then I’ve been serving Him. I wanted to be a Doctor first and I started studies for that. But not a long time after I started, I heard a special message in my heart from the Lord telling me to heal souls for Him instead; and without contestation, I started my study in theology. Once graduated, I began my ministry.  That was in 1999.

I have a special ministry with the young people. We are praying for a spiritual and social expanding in the Port Salut church and we’d like you to pray with us about this. Our dream is to give assistance to our kids and give possibilities to our young Christians to help them avoid leaving the area to look for a trade or a job elsewhere. Leonne, my wife, is so active and has a special ministry with the ladies and the children’s association in our church. She wants to extend activities in the other churches connected to our pastoral district.

Thanks a lot for being our sister church. Let’s work together for the glory of the Lord. Like it is said in the book of Colossians 3:23, “let’s do everything we have to do not for men but the Lord.”

In the name of the whole congregation, we’re sending our love to each one of you.

May our Lord Jesus Christ richly bless you all!

Pastor:  Jean Edert Pierre and family

A letter from your Sister Church

From:  Cance Baptist Church

To:  Our Sister Church, Great Valley Presbyterian Church

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Jesus Christ,

May the Grace and the Peace of God be with you.

The Deacons of Cance Baptist Church congratulate you for the good work you did here in the church while Pastor Borel Geneste was here as Pastor of the church, and also they would like to take this opportunity to inform you that the church has a new Pastor.

My name is Pastor Maxilorme Moise, and my wife’s name is Nadine Herard Moise and she is a nurse. We have four boys and we live in the parsonage of the church with them.  My goal is to continue with the Ministry of the Lord in the Cance area.

The names of my boys are Max Herard Moise, Hendell Moise, Karl Eddy Moise and the youngest one is Lee Sebastien Moise. Please, we would like you to pray for me and my family so that God can guide us and help us to work better for his ministry.

We count on your collaboration and Cance Baptist Church is going to keep you in their prayers.

For the committee:

George Jean Stenio Laurejoie Marcelin

Maxelorme Moise Pastor.

A letter from your Sister Church

From: Picot Baptist Church

To: Trinity Bible Church

I am very happy to share with you some information about our family, church and activities. We are doing well here by the grace of the Lord. My wife who was very sick is doing better now, but she still needs your prayer. The church is working well too; the Christians always come to church to worship. We always have four services each week. Sunday morning we have the worship service, evangelism service on Sunday night, and prayer service on Tuesday night, and Bible study every Thursday.  We have a Caleb group which are the men in the church,.  They meet every Friday from 4 pm to 5 pm, and we also have the woman group that meet every Saturday morning from 8 am to 9:30 am, we have the youth group that meet every Sunday afternoon. We have one more choir in the church; it has 30 people and they meet every Saturday.

This year we did not have a good start with the school because we did face two big Hurricanes “Dean” and “Noel”.   The Christians lost their animals, their livestock and the rain damaged their houses.  Because of those problems they could not send their kids to school this year. We have only 269 students this year and last year we had 400 students.  That is a big difference.

This year we had three conventions for the members.  We had one in Picot, one in Laroche and the last one we had it in Les Rois. I want to inform you that my oldest daughter is going to get married on December 28^th, 2007 and she is going to marry a pastor’s son name Obed Jean Pierre. Now in our church, we are out of electricity because the company that used to provide energy in our area has some problems with their materials.  So our church has no electricity.  Please pray for us so that we can buy a generator for the church. And finally we had two members Desino and Mrs. Fleurimon that were paralyzed who died last month.

Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year in 2008.

Pastor Calixte Dorval

A letter from your Sister Church

From:  Baradere Church.

To: Creekside Community Church

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Creekside Community Church,

May the grace and the peace of Lord Jesus Christ be with you all!

Today I am very happy today for having this chance to write you this letter. How are you doing?  The activities you have in your church, how is it going for you in Gainesville? I hope you had a good and safe trip back to the US. Even though you had a lot of rain when you were on your way back to Les Cayes, God did take care of you and allowed you to have a good trip. I want to inform you that we had two big Hurricanes in Haiti after you left; it was “Dean” and “Noel”. Even though it was raining we had good worship services where we had two more people accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior. We had good Sunday school every morning. We also have another brother in the church; he is here to help us with difference activities.

From October 19^th to November 6^th, the village of Baradere was flooded under water. We had many problems here, The Christians lost everything they had, we have 20 houses that were totally destroyed, and 30 in need of repair. We had a lady in the church who died due to the hurricanes. Please pray for the people in this town because now they are in need. We believe by prayer God can do miracles for the people in Baradere. We count on your prayers and we are going to do the same thing for you here.

In the name of all the Christians at Baradere Baptist Church, we wish you all a Merry Christmas and have a Happy New Year in 2008.

Pastor Leon Bonhomme  

A letter from your Sister Church

From       : Les Irois Baptist Church

To           : Harper EFC Church

Subject    : Greeting and Information

Dear Brothers and Sisters.

I greet you in the name of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I am very happy today for the great opportunity that I have to write you and share with you some information about my church here in Les Irois. Before going further, I would like to ask you, how are you doing in your church? I hope you are doing great by the precious name of Jesus Christ. In the name of all the members of Les Irois’s Baptist church I would like to say thank you for the team that you sent here during the summer. It was a blessing for us here in the church, especially for all the people in Les Irois. I want you to keep that in mind that the Les Irois Baptist Church is praying for you every day so that God will bless you and take good care of your family.

Thank you very much for helping us last year with the kids, we are so happy to see how you are care about our kids here in les Irois. This year again we begin the school with 235 students and we still count on your prayer and your help for the year of 2008 and 2009. Also pray for the carnival retreat we will have in February where all of the youth will be in another place to worship, eat and play together.

I want to inform you that, we did face two big Hurricanes for the last two months, “Dean” and “Noel”. The Christians lost all their gardens, their animals, some of them lost their houses. We had 8 houses that were destroyed totally and 20 of them need to be repaired, especially the Pastor’s house in Mandou which was totally destroyed during the hurricanes.  As a big request, please pray for all the people because they are in needed now, they do need your prayer.

We are waiting for your coming next in 2008 for the Seminar and we hope that God will send his blessing upon you and allow you to have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year in 2008.

May God bless you and protect you all!

Pastor Jean Sainpreval

A letter from your Sister Church

From:        Lievre Baptist Church

To:            Lakeline Church

Subject:    Information

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

May the grace and the peace of God be with you all!  And we greet you in the precious name of Jesus Christ.

I am very happy today to inform you about our activities here in Lievre, and also talk to you about the school. This year we started the school with 200 students and they were very happy to be back in school because this is one of the best place the kids can be to prepare for their future. We are so grateful for the way you helped us last year and we want to let you know that your help was very important for us here.  We are going to pray God for you so that you can be able to help us again this year. May God bless you for that!

About the activities we had during the year, they were successful by the power of the Holy Ghost. We had a convention for the members at the Dolet Church; we also had another convention for our members of Lievre Baptist Church. We will also have some programs at the end of this year. We will have a meeting with all the ladies and we are going to have a week of service in the church just to celebrate the coming of the New Year.

As information, we did face two big hurricanes here in Haiti in the last two months. The Christians lost everything they had, like animals, gardens and houses; we have a side of the church that was destroyed too by the hurricanes.

I will pray God for your church so that He can send His blessing upon you. Also I have to take this advantage of this opportunity to wish you all a Merry Christmas and have a Happy New Year.

For the committee:  Pastor Philistin Dyedilem.

                              Deacon Michel

                              Director of the school:  Tony Bonifas   

A letter from your Sister Church

From     : Baraderes Baptist Church

    To         : Creekside Community Church

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

May the Grace and the peace of God be with you! I greet you in the name of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We are very happy to write you this letter just to let you how we were happy to receive the team here in Baraderes. Before going further, I would like to say hello to Pastor Richard, Pastor Toby, and Pastor James and especially to all the members in Creekside Community Church in Florida. I send a lot of greeting from my church here in Baraderes and they say thank you for everything you did for them. Thank you again for the team that your church sent here in October to visit us. We feel blessed by them while they were here in different activities they did such as Dr. Clint and the animal clinic, the evangelism services, and especially the good work that Doctor John did here while he was in Baraderes. Thank you very much for the way your church is motivated to help our kids in the program, because I do realize without you it will be hard for them to attend school.

Thank you very much again for the sound system and new generator that you sent for us. We really appreciate everything that Creekside Church did for us. We do know that we don’t have anything to give you back but we want to let you know that you are in our thoughts and our prayers everyday.

Once again thank you very much for everything that you did for us. May God send his blessings upon each of you abundantly!

Pastor Leon Bonhomme

Rob and Becky's November Slice Available...

See it here.

More Southern Haiti Flooding Info

Dan is in Haiti and sent the following report:  "The palm trees are swaying in the tropical breeze but it's RAINING BUCKETS!  Again!  Southern Haiti has had almost steady rain for more than a month and a half.  Tropical Storm Noel contributed quite a bit of rain and there is more disturbed weather in the Caribbean coming this way.  All this rain has created incredible hardships on a people that are already struggling for their day to day existence.  Most crops have been lost - especially tough since the Les Cayes plain area is the "breadbasket" of Haiti.  Animals have been swept away.  Commerce in the outlaying areas has ground to a halt because supplies cannot be brought from the capital to Cayes and then trucks cannot get out to the areas they service.  Everything people own is soaking wet, water is inside their flimsy homes (some homes have actually been swept away or are covered in water), sickness is increasing and there is much hunger.  Pray for the people!"

Dan went in Wed. Oct. 31 to help prepare for a team from Arlington Heights Evangelical Free Church (Chicago area) who were to go in today.  Their Sister Church, Astruc, is very remote.  It is in the mountains in the middle of the southern peninsula.  The Sister Church pastor sent word that the river they must cross to get there is completely impassable.  It's way over people's heads.  Also, the road leading to the river has been washed away in 3 places.   The trip to this church is usually pretty tough in dry conditions.  Rain turns the road to a muddy clay mixture that is truly difficult to get through. 

After consulting with Dan, the US team decided to cancel the trip.  It was clear that they wouldn't be able to get to the church.  We are all very disappointed needless to say, but it is a wise decision.  They have rescheduled their trip for January.  Things should be dried out by then!

Rob was to go in with the team too.  Of course, he is not going now, but may still go to Haiti next week to work on the bookkeeping system.  We'll keep you up to date on that once his plans are clear.

At this point, we have no word from any of the other sister churches.  They will work at that once things dry out and navigation is possible.

Here are some photos that Jenn Rogan (RMI missionary) took 2 weeks ago as they traveled back from a Sister Church.

This is a road!  They had to manually build a new section to get around the boulders!

Well, it WAS a road!

RMI staff checking to see if that part of the road was passable.

 

Jenn, Dan and some RMI staff took these pictures yesterday:

  

The river in Les Cayes, near the mission center, called La Ravine.

Notice the wet high water mark on the house!

  

A couple of missionary friends (not RMI) also sent information and photos.  Where one of them live, at the top of the mountains in the middle of Haiti's southern peninsula, they personally recorded over 19 inches of rain and 70 mph winds.  Here are the pictures they sent:

To go, or not to go, Pray for Haiti...

The flooding persists.  TS Noel has come and gone, but the rain has not.  I may or may not be going to Haiti today as planned.  A decision will be made in the next couple of hours.  So sad if I and the team from Chicago can't go!  Up to this point, the road to the village I would be visiting is impassable due to a raging river that we need to cross (there is no bridge. so the water levels must decrease, and the mud must dry out enough so that our 4 wheel drive vehicles can navigate across).

Here is a picture from 2 days ago with the kind of destruction that is so common due to the rains.  This is not the road I was to take, but it gives you an idea as to what the rains have done.  This is a very, and I mean very typical sight.

Rob