More pictures of South Africa

Rich with John Ortlip, the President of AIS Int'l.

We visited "Cape Point", where the Indian and Atalantic oceans meet.

Jon Ortlip grew up as a missionary kid in Haiti and that is the main reason he is so excited about what God is doing through us here.

Being in South Africa certainly gave me a world perspective on how God is using soccer ministry all over the world to reach everyone from prisoners in some of the worst prisons in the world to top professional players in the US, England and now Nairobi through the Nairobi City Stars, an international subsidiary of the Cleveland City Stars.

I've come back to Haiti encouraged and ready to see what God is going to do through us, and the team of Haitian leaders he has assembled for his glory here in Haiti!

Pictures of Rich's trip to South Africa

Rich with Peter from Nigeria and his Pastor Rich helped out with a coach's training on his first day in South Africa after travelling 36 hours!

Rich tries cricket for the first time and stays at bat for 5 minutes and about 20 runs!

Leaders from 12 out of the 15 countries that have Ambassadors in Sport ministries were represented at the International Leader's conference.

We had a great time discussing strategy and learning from each other.

I praise God for the opportunity I had to attend this conference!

Thanks for praying!

If you prayed for this, thank you! Joy was accepted at Eastern University's Templeton Honors College and was offered a good scholarship. She has been accepted at 3 colleges and now it seems that the decision is down to 2 of them. It's a relief for her to know that she's done with the applications and she has good possibilities.

Prayer request

Please pray for our daughter Joy -
1. for God's guidance about which college to attend, and
2. for her to be able to attend a CNA training program in June-July so that she can work as a CNA throughout her college years. It's going to be hard to get everything set up with us not being in PA because the Department on Aging has a lot of requirements. We're planning to get to PA around June 13th (and the program starts the 16th) because Joy graduates May 30th and she wants to do one last medical missions trip before spending most of her time in the US for a while.

Carol’s list of 25 random reasons why it’s good to be a missionary

Carol’s list of 25 random reasons why it’s good to be a missionary

1. You’re doing at least one thing God said to do.
2. If the liberals win the presidency, you have the consolation of the people in the country where you work being happy with the U.S.
3. You can appease your guilt right away because “the-starving-kids-in-Africa” are right next door.
4. You read more.
5. If your kid ever wants to be President someday, he or she can talk about how his different worldview gained while living overseas qualifies him for handling international affairs (that is, if being really conservative becomes politically correct)
6. You learn to appreciate things that are taken for granted sometimes.
7. You get automatic practice with learning patience and learning to trust God.
8. You get automatic help with your vow to not watch too much T.V.
9. You get less junk mail and hardly any sales calls. (Although I got one here in Haiti on my internet phone from a Fast Burn Weight Loss Farm. I didn’t have time to explain how I’m sort of already at one.)
10. Lots of people want to be your friend (so what if it’s because you’re a rich American who can take them to the U.S. where they can live happily ever after?)
11. You have a great excuse to spend time on facebook – keeping up w/ supporters
12. You get to play board games with your kids, because there’s not much else to do.
13. The people you live with say you’re really good at the language. (Unless you live in France.)
14. You tend to lose weight instead of gain because of withdrawal from American food addictions.
15. Women actually wish they had your hair.
16. You get more exercise than most Americans.
17. Instead of getting snow days off, which require you to shovel snow or pick at ice, you get political days off with no snow or ice.
18. You get to be around missionaries, who are really great people.
19. People think you’re better than you are because you’re a missionary.
20. You do things you never thought you could do.
21. Christmas is not too commercial anymore & it’s easier to avoid things like Halloween if you want to.
22. You’re likely to get to drive a truck and a motorcycle (unless your wife says no)
23. You learn by experience not to panic so much in scary situations.
24. You learn to be resourceful (in Creole, you learn to degaje)
25. You get frequent flyer miles and you pay less income tax.

Update on Richard's trip coming

Richard got back safely on Monday, excited about the trip, but quite sick with a stomach flu. There were urgent things to be done and now I'm sick. Today there is an AIS Haiti board meeting and then, hopefully we can post an update on the trip to South Africa.

Josh is doing great, thanks for the prayers

Yesterday we went to see Josh in the hospital and we amazed that he wasn't in his room! He had taken a walk with his mother to the terrace on the floor below. He was walking, talking and later using a laptop! He's in pain, a little groggy, but amazingly well! The last CAT scan showed no leakage of spinal fluid. Thank you for your prayers. He should be going home to Titayen today.

Here's a picture of the youth praise band leading worship on Youth Sunday at Quisqueya Chapel. Joy's leading, (in the middle) Josh Brumley is on the left with his red electric guitar. Ricky, is on drums to the left of Josh.

Pray for Josh, MK who fell from a roof (22 feet)

Please pray with us for Josh Brumley, the son of missionaries here in Haiti who fell from the top of a building (22 feet) Sunday night. Ricky & Joy are friends with him through their youth group and through Worship teams for both youth & Sunday AM. Ricky & he have spent the night over each others' houses to get together because he lives about 40 minutes from us. Sunday morning Joy was just saying how much she appreciates him because of his commitment to the Lord and great attitude. She was considering him as the best one to take over the leadership of the worship team when she graduates even though he's Ricky's age.
I think it's amazing how well he's doing considering what happened, but I don't think he's out of the woods yet. He has 2 fractures in his skull and one in his nasal cavity. Here's an email from his parents to explain where he is at this point.
"Just a note to tell you that Josh had a good night last night and if he continues to improve, they will take his catheter out and let him get up a little. he still is having headaches (may for awhile), but they are not as severe as they were for a time and we are thankful for that. He is very sore all over and has bruises everywhere. His fall was about 22 feet and he landed on his shoulders and back of his head as far as our intern who was with him saw. It is pretty miraculous that he has no other broken bones. There is a chance he may have some hairline fractures in his back or ribs, but it wouldn't show up on an xray for awhile if he does.Thank you , thank you for all of your prayers and e-mails and offers of help. Thanks for putting him on prayer chains-he has been prayed for everywhere (all over the world) and we are overwhelmed with that.It means so much that you are all standing with us. We pray we are past having to airlift him and it won't be necessary-we still are watching him for a cerebral spinal fluid leak because of the fractured ethmoid sinus, but so far so good and every day that goes by lessens that chance. We are also watching for any signs of seizures-that can happen after a head injury. He has shown no signs of that and at this point the doctors don't think we have to put him on medication, but we need to have it at home in case it should happen.We will repeat the CAT scan tomorrow morning and if it looks okay, we hope to go home Saturday! Josh has wanted to go home since he got here and it's hard for him that we are here day after day, but we have no choice and we are encouraging him to hang in there.We will write more as we have internet (the hospital helped us get on their network-they have been very kind and accommodating and we are very appreciative).We love you all, Chris and Sheryl

Our neighbors

Please pray for our outreach in our neighborhood. I've been getting to know Sophia, who is only 16, but the mother of a 2 year old (Sophonie). She and 2 other families live in an unfinished, abandoned house down the street from us. Several children from that "house" come to visit us...James, Katie-Fleur, Katie Belle-Branche, Dodline and others. Please pray for wisdom in knowing how to react to their physical needs and how to connect with them about their spiritual needs. Hopefully I'll be able to post a picture of some of these cute, smiley faces soon.

Safe arrival in Capetown

Richard made it to Capetown! Here's what he said in an email to me:

"It is beautiful here – our guesthouse is right on the wide sandy beach of the Souther most tip of Africa – Cape Town. I am looking out at the sea and can hear the waves as I am typing this.

I arrived in Cape Town about 6 AM local time. Right now it is 8:30 AM Haitian time [3:30 pm in South Africa] and I have not been able to get into my room and sleep yet – this means I have been up for over 44 hours with only about 3-4 hours of fitful sleep on the way over the Atlantic on Sunday night. I could not sleep at all on the 12 hour flight down to South Africa from Munich, Germany because of the narrow seats....more later..."

Richard is on his way to AIS's International Leaders' Conference in South Africa

Richard got on his way yesterday to New York, then Amsterdam, then Munich, and finally Capetown...but that will be tomorrow morning! I didn't realize it would be two nights in airplanes! Pray that he won't be too exhausted when he arrives.
And...we're still praising God that he provided for Richard to be able to be there! How exciting.

Pray for Joy on a Medical Missions Trip

Joy was thrilled to be invited to go on a medical missions trip to Ile A Vache, an island off the coast of southern Haiti. Our school has a requirement for community service, so this kind can be approved depending on the circumstances. She had a ton of books to bring with her, but she's so excited to be going on this trip, it's fine.
One great thing about it is that she is the only teenager in the group--she's with Physician's Assistants, a Pediatric Nurse Practitioner, etc. So she'll probably learn a lot from them and maybe have a chance to hear about their careers, too.
I should have posted this before when I was praying for their safety driving down, etc. But it's not to late to join me. In spite of a flat tire, they made it down to Les Cayes just fine and the boat ride was fine too.
They actually get to stay in a nice hotel (with air conditioning!--I know "where can I sign up?" right?)
We really appreciate Ed Amos giving her this opportunity.
So...pray with us this week for the safety of the whole group, and for the patients they will see. She comes home Friday.

Share your dream

One of the participants in Jen(a)biz started up a retaurant (Le Bon Choix) about a month ago. It's been going pretty well with the main challenge being the shortage of gasoline. The restaurant is in an area that doesn't get much electricity, so they have a small generator and it has to be filled with gas. For a couple weeks people had to wait in long lines to get regular gasoline (we use deisel, so we were spared this time) but that seems to be over now.

Can you imagine running this business without having your own vehicle to transport things like gas to the restaurant? I'm sure it's hard.

Anyway, the reason I wanted to write a post about Elysee and his restaurant is that it seems they just got a good opportunity. A high school near them is going to have a special party for the seniors, called Philo here, (All over Haiti they celebrate "Philosophy Day") there. So far, they've just been cooking food for the small numbers of walk-in customers each day like many other restaurants here. But Elysee shared his dream with the owner of the property he's renting. He explained that he wants to host parties and events, as well. Because he shared that vision, the owner, whose son is a Philo student at this high school, suggested that Philo day be at Elysee's restaurant.

So today they're making food for over 50 people! They borrowed all the card table and chairs we had as well as table cloths to make room for all these folks.

In addition, we have lent them a bunch of restaurant stuff that the old Township House Restaurant in Newtown threw out when the restaurant changed hands. We did not know how and when God would have us use this in Haiti, but he knew. It has been a great blessing to know that God's had a plan for this stuff all along.

Do you have a dream you should share with someone? You never know who God may want to be part of it.

Christian Literature Distribution in Haiti

One of our key partners in Haiti is Life Ministries (www.life-ministries.com).

They have supplied us with thousands of tracts, Bibles, and Christian books in Creole that we have distributed during our soccer outreaches and as we follow up.

In addition, we occasionally supply Life Ministry books to other missionaries. Below is a report from one of these missionaries who works in Gonaives, the 3rd largest city in Haiti that was completely destroyed by flooding in 2006 and again in 2008. (Imagine New Orleans flooding again!).

Dear Rich--Just wanted to update you on where the Bibles went that we got from you. We had my Pastor and a team of 12 other people come from my church in El Dorado, Kansas, USA. We had a Crusade in the evenings as well as a Pastor's Seminar during the week. The complete Bibles (24 total) went to the Pastor's Seminar and also 60 of the New Testaments went out at the conference as well. The pastor we have been working with is Pastor Mattieau and he took 60 Bibles to pass out to the people who received Jesus in the Crusade. He also took 50 of the follow-up booklets to disciple the new converts as well. We took 60 Bibles to an orphanage and plan to distribute more there as 60 was not enough. The Bibles have also been given out to the Ladie's Bible Study group that I lead each Monday evening. I just take some each week and give them out to the new ladies who come. So far 30 NT have been given out there. The remaining Bibles have been kept here at my house so when people knock at our gate to get food and clothing we also give them a New Testament. We plan on also giving NT to the Kids' club that we have in our home which is consisting of 20-30 children per week from our neighborhood.

This year I've gotten involved in the youth ministry of Quisqueya Chapel. I'm co-leader of a small group of 9 12-14 year old girls. My co-leader, Coby DeBlaeij and I hosted a Christmas party for the group over Christmas break. Seven of the nine were able to come. We made necklaces and gift boxes, sang Christmas carols and ate together. Please pray for these girls to open up--for most of them it's probably the first time they've been part of a group like this.
Edline, Shirley, Sendy, Rachel, Jules, Jennifer. (Natasha, Elodie & Naika not pictured here)

The Lord gives, takes away, and gives again!

I always appreciate it when people send me news articles about things going on in Haiti. About a week before the TREC training started, my Crossworld supervisor, Dwight Lehman, sent me a newspaper article about a group of Canadian College students who were bringing over $40,000 worth of sports equipment to Haiti.

Since we are always in need of equipment, I wrote to the editors of the paper asking them to send me the e-mail of the person in charge of the program “Right to Play” (http://www.righttoplay.com/). They were kind enough to respond, and right away I sent an e-mail giving the contact my number in Haiti and asking him to contact me.

Unfortunately, I got an “out of office” response, and since I was busy doing TREC at the time, I thought we had lost our opportunity. But God had other plans – the next day, I got an e-mail from Roger LeBlanc, the Canadian Professor heading up the group and he said he would be glad to meet with us.

It was 9:30 on Thursday night by this time, and Friday was the last day of the seminar. So I prayed with 2 other Haitian leaders, asking God to open the way for us to get some equipment and meet with Mr. LeBlanc. Then I picked up the phone and to my amazement, got a hold of him right away.

He said he was available, and so I told him we would send our pickup over to pick him up with some of his college students on Friday morning.

When Mr. LeBlanc arrived, he was very excited about what we were doing, even though he made it clear that “Right to Play” has no religious affiliation. He brought his daughter along, who is a soccer player, and another young lady who is the captain of the College's soccer team. They also brought along 5 BAGS of soccer equipment!! The bags had uniforms, cleats, sneakers and bibs that we desperately needed for the over 28 teams that were represented at the training. THANK YOU MR LEBLANC AND RIGHT TO PLAY!!

That afternoon we combined this equipment with the equipment we already had on hand thanks to Ian Moore of AACH and others who shipped donations to us. We were able to outfit 11 new teams and re-stock most of the other teams represented! THANK YOU IAN!

All of us rejoiced at the miraculous way God provided this equipment! The Lord gave!

So it was with great joy that we dropped off our newly trained coaches with their equipment at the bus station at 4:30 AM the next morning while it was still dark.

We had to take 2 trips to the bus station because there were so many people to take, and so one of the teams left a large box in the back of the truck which was for one of the second group.

Before we left the bus station the first time, we checked to see that the box was there.
However, when we arrived back to the hotel, the box was gone!! It was a big, heavy, box so we did not bother to tie it down. Apparently thieves lifted it just as we were leaving the bus station! Not only did this box have equipment in it for one of our regions with 8 teams in it, it also had $40 cash and one of our key coach's personal belongings. Needless to say we were disappointed at this loss. The Lord took away, but as Job said, blessed be the name of the Lord!

The following Sunday, I was telling another missionary friend about our seminar and she said that she had some soccer cleats available. When I asked her what size, she said the exact sizes we needed to replace the one stolen! The Lord gives, again!

AIS sends 3 Great coaches for TREC 08-09

Ambassadors in Sport International has been the driving force behind this year's TREC. Not only did God use them to provide most of the funding for this year's TREC, but they also send 3 very gifted coaches to Haiti to do the training: John Boggs, Matt Pheneger and Shame Wiebe.

John Boggs grew up as an MK in Haiti. His Dad was the director of an Evangelical Christian Bookstore for many years and also helped to found Quisqueya Christian School where Carol teaches and which Joy and Ricky attend. John is married to Cathy and they have a one year old son. He is in charge of summer camps for AIS, among other things. He has been a great help because he speaks Creole having grown up in Haiti.

Matt Phenger is in charge of International Training for AIS and is married to Laura and they have 2 lovely little girls ages 3 and 1. Matt has visited practically every country AIS has a foothold in either as a player or as a trainer. He has been a great help putting together this TREC!

Shane Wiebe took a week of vacation to come and help us coach. This is Shane's first experience with AIS and we hope it will not be his last!

Here is his bio:

"I was born in the U.S. while my parents were in missionary training with NewTribes Mission and raised in Bolivia until I was 15. I graduated from Bible College in '91. I later continued my education as a Bible major and aviation minor at Cornerstone University. I had been in ministry with high school and college students for 7 years when God moved me to the Florida Keys to be the director of Student to Student in 2000. I count it a privilege to continue to share the love of Jesus here in the Keys and around the world. I have been blessed to be able to use the skills and gifts God has given in both soccer and volleyball to minister to others. I have had good coaches and have been able to play soccer with very talented players from my time in Bolivia and in Europe and with The USA U19 team . I have coached soccer and volleyball up through the college level for the last 17 years. I am so thankful to God for teaching me so many things about Himself in such a fun way. I want continue to use these tools to show His Truth to His people."

We praise God for these guys who sacrificed their holiday to train Haitians in soccer ministry.

The AIS coaches are seen here with Daniel Jean-Louis, the Assistant Director of AIS Haiti.

TREC 2008-2009

Thank you so much for your prayers and support for our second annual leadership training seminar.

The training started on Dec. 26th with the arrival of over 35 delegates from all over Haiti. This year we are training two groups of people: Veterans from last year that we hope will be able to teach the courses next year, and about 25 rookies who we are training to start soccer ministries in their schools.

So far everything is going well, and the participants are really excited about what they are learning.

However, sometimes I forget just how poor most people here in Haiti are. In spite of the fact that we told the participants that they would be trained in coaching techniques by experienced US coaches, they came to the seminar with only sandals. When we asked them why, some of them said they do not own sneakers or soccer cleats! So today, we had to go out and purchase 20 pairs of sneakers so they could fully participate in the training!

We are also setting up local and regional committees to help us better administrate the ministry. These are exciting times as we look forward to what God is going to do through these trained and equipped leaders in 2009!

Merry Christmas! Joyeux Noel! & Happy New Year! Bonne Annee!

Miracle by the Airport

We have been trying to get 5 boxes of soccer equipment out of the airport customs office since last August. We had the stuff air-shipped to Haiti special so we could give out uniforms for our summer soccer tournament in Leogane which was held from Aug 8 to Aug 20th.

We partnered with the Haitian Soccer Federation for this tournament and asked them to help us get these uniforms out of customs duty-free since they are a tax-exempt organization in Haiti.

We thought this was something they do all the time since the Haitian National teams need to import equipment all the time. But it was now December 15th and the stuff was still stuck in customs.

So after two failed attempts to go through the Federation, we decided we had to take matters into our own hands and plead our case with the Director of Customs.

So this morning (12/15) we went to the customs office with a letter requesting a meeting with the Director of Customs. We were just going to drop off the letter and hope that he would honor our request to speak with him 2 days later. But when we arrived at his secretary's office, there he was, signing some papers!

He overheard our tale of woe and stoped and looked at our paperwork. His first reaction was that he could not reduce the fees. But then his secretary piped up and pleaded our case. He waved his hand and told us to start the paperwork and come back to his office!

So we got the paperwork typed up and then went to verify that the stuff was still there after all these months, and it was.

Tomorrow we will find out how much they will charge - so keep praying!!

To be continued...