Difficult Day at Fort Jacques

Yesterday (Sunday) afternoon we went up to Fort Jacques for the final match in the tournament up there and to show the film "Le Combat." Things started out very well. We had bought a new cable for the speaker and we were playing lively Christian (Haitian) music while people were filling the stands.







The game got started a bit later than we had planned on, but it was off to a good start. Claudy, our contact from the local church was there. He kept his suit on from church, we guessed because he was in a hurry. His church had had a harvest festival which ended at 3 p.m. Now I wonder if there are other reasons he would wear the suit. Young people in the neighborhood respect and listen to him, and we found out that that is very important.




Marken was there as comentator (he had helped out in this way earlier in the week, too.). He's good at it and knows the names of most of the players.

During half time Celestin, a STEP Seminary Student presented the gospel and other STEP students gave out cards for people to sign up for a drawing and indicate if they were interested in trusting Christ, being in a Bible study, etc.
Sadly, after halftime people started getting angry and a spectator threw a rock at a player. Then lots of people started throwing rocks at each other. It's such a shame when a few people ruin a nice thing for everyone. Many people in the stands came running towards us to get behind the community center. I (Carol) went inside with the computer I was using to play music. The comentator tried his best to calm things down, as well as Claudy and others. Our group got together in the Community Center to pray while others continued to try to calm things down and convince the players to finish the game. People stopped throwing rocks, but were still angry, so the game had to end. So that the crowd would not get angrier, the trophy was given to the winning team.
We prayed and talked about whether we should still show the film. Our friend, Mme. Levy and I were the only ladies and we said we weren't too afraid, so we decided to try to show the movie.
When the kids and teenagers came into the community center they were loud and rowdy. They would not calm down enough for us to do the drawing--most people couldn't hear us, so we started the movie and they quieted down. We even had problems with the computer freezing up for a few seconds many times during the second half of the movie. Everyone laughed when a man who was being baptized was held under the water by the pastor and the picture froze like that. I couldn't help laughing. But the movie came back on after several seconds. Celestin did a good job staying cool (as did all of our Haitian volunteers) and at one point when I was trying to get the computer the stop freezing up, he talked a bit more about the gospel and the point of the film.
Then, it was very late when we finally did the drawing and many peoples' names were called who had left by this time. We kept drawing names until we had winners who were present.
When we packed up and started heading down the mountain, it was late. We ended up driving some of our volunteers home and one had to stay overnight with us because he lives further away. We got home exhausted and very aware of how hard the work is sometimes and how we need God's wisdom to reach tough kids. Please pray for them and for us to be able to reach out in ways that are effective according to God's plan. It doesn't have to be according to our plan, but we want people, especially young people, to hear and understand God's message of love.

One without hope in Haiti

Nothing focuses us more on life than death.

On Tuesday, July 8th I took some of my former Lemuel Soccer team players and the coach of College Evangelique Maranatha up to scenic Ft. Jacques to help me with an evangelistic soccer tournament we were organizing.

Ft. Jacques is a fort that was build in the early 1800's to defend PAP against the impending invasion of the French after Haiti won it's independence in 1804. It has a spectacular view of the city and is a favorite place for young couples to meet and find a secluded corner to snuggle in.

The young men who went with me had never visited Ft. Jacques before and there was a break in the action, so I said they could go on a tour of the fort. They started to enjoy the view with the binoculars I had lent them when they heard a commotion behind them. They turned around to see a group of people standing around a hefty young man who was dressed nicely and had new sneakers on his feet. But this young man was flat on his back and his new jeans had bleach stains all over them – you see he had tried to commit suicide by drinking clorox bleach and was writhing in pain and convulsions. This young man, obviously not a poor young man, had lost all hope and had tried to take his life.

Since I was the only one around who had a car, the coach ran to get me and I quickly backed the car up to a place they could carry him to. However, the people there said I should contact the police first because if he died in my car on the way to the hospital, I could be held liable. Fortunately, this had already been done by a “good samaritan” and we were able to lay him in the back seat of the car, wreaking of clorox and vomit.

As we drove him down to the hospital, we prayed that God would save his life and give him another chance. It also caused me to reflect on life in this country of Haiti, and why I am here. I honestly wonder why there aren't more suicides here because without Christ, I don't see much hope for the people socially or economically. But I know God loves the people of Haiti, because he is still sending Christians here to minister to the rich and the poor, the families and the orphans.

This past week I had the opportunity to lead many people to Christ, as over 120 people indicated they trusted Christ for salvation. On Tuesday, I had the opportunity to perhaps physically save the life of this young man who was without hope. Naturally, I would rather talk to people about Christ before they become hopeless and try to take their own lives. But on Tuesday, it was clear that I was at Ft. Jacques “for such a time as this”.

The last thing I heard about the young man was he was transferred to the public hospital. Please pray for his physical and spiritual healing.

Maybe God won't call you to physically save a life today, but you can always encourage others with a smile, kind deed, prayer or act of generosity – just like Christ did when he was on earth. Who knows, you may give hope to the hopeless.

Teams, Tournaments, even one for girls!

On Saturday, July 5th Ian Moore, Jonathan Bryant, Steven Gassaway from the US and Frantz and Jean Paul, our Haitian helpers all arrived safely back in Port-au-Prince. God protected us in many ways on this two-week trip around Haiti. No one got seriously sick, the truck did not break down, there were no accidents, nothing of great value was stolen, and we did not run out of money. We drove over 500 miles on some of the roughest roads of Haiti. The roads were so rough that my metal cage around the back of my truck came un-welded in several places and by the time we reached home every seam was cracked. Thankfully, this happened on the last day as we were entering Port-au-Prince, otherwise we would have had major packing problems!

Another AACH team arrived in Port-au-Prince on Saturday as well. Opal Golden and three High School students from the school she teaches at in New York state arrived and we all had a grand reunion at our house. Altogether, 13 people ate and slept at our house on Saturday night – a record for sure. Four of the guys slept on our roof to escape the heat and humidity in our house.

This team was headed to Les Cayes in southern Haiti to run a U-15 tournament for boys from July 7-13th and the first ever girl's tournament from July 14-20th.

Thanks to the generosity of another ministry, we now have another truck for the AACH/AIS soccer ministries to share. It is a big 'ol Chevy pick up, army vintage with a diesel engine that has benches and lots of room for stuff.

We packed up the team heading off to Les Cayes on early Sunday morning and sent them on their way. They have been having a great time helping with the tournament there and have been working hard to build relationships with local churches so that those who trust Christ through the many outreaches during the tournament can be followed up with.

Just before we left we posed in front of the big truck for a picture. (Hopefully we'll be able to upload that soon) It's neat to think that just about two years ago Carol and I returned to Haiti with a vision for using soccer as a tool for evangelism not knowing anyone else who had the same vision. Now through our partnership with AACH, we have hosted two teams from the US and now work with about 100 Haitian leaders in 8 out of the 11 departments (like states) in Haiti.