OUR HISTORY IN HAITI
by Geoff Ward
I first came to Haiti in 1991 as part of a short-term missions team with World Harvest for Christ. We conducted medical clinics and shared the love of Jesus with people in the remote mountains and islands of this beautiful country. It was an eye (heart) opening experience. I had never before seen such third-world poverty, disease, and lives of desperation. But most profound was the simple childlike warmth of the Haitian people.
I met a man about my age named Michel Augustin who was our interpreter on the trip. The people called him 'Pastor' Michel, though he wasn't serving in that capacity in any church. He seemed to have a gifting of evangelism and a ready desire to preach the gospel whenever he had a chance. I felt a special brotherly bond with Michel although I had no idea if I'd ever see him again this side of heaven.
Five years later, I came back to Haiti with a group of men from Rhema Fellowship, in Lowville New York, to build a water cistern in Pestel, a city in the same area I had been before. We unexpectedly visited a Haitian church on a Sunday morning and I was touched by the faithfulness of God's people endeavoring to serve Him in their daily lives. I also sensed the Lord telling me that it was His plan for these true Haitian believers to move to the forefront in bringing the Gospel to their countrymen. They simply needed us to support and encourage them in the ministry that God was calling them to fulfill.
Michel and I met briefly on that trip and he shared with me what the Lord had been taking him through since our first meeting. He hadn't been able to find work as an interpreter very often but he had been regularly traveling out to several small churches to conduct evangelistic crusades, networking with a small group of pastors. I was impressed with his obedience to the Lord to walk in his calling with little help from anyone. The Lord planted a desire in me to come back again and see how I could be a support to Michel in his ministry.
Since then, I have made about a dozen trips to Haiti, sometimes alone, sometimes with a small team doing what we can to encourage Michel and the pastors and teachers he works with as they build the church and bring the Gospel to their own people. As we travel and minister in various ways with our Haitian brethren, we have opportunities to develop relationships, model Christ-like character (hopefully), and be encouraged in our own faith as we learn from one another. Every trip has been a unique blessing and a valuable learning experience for me personally.
A few years ago we had traveled to the district of Cayes in the south west of Haiti and hiked two hours up a mountain called Toru (the Bull) to visit a very new church planted by a young pastor named Belade Thierry. All they had were some foundations and posts holding up a thatched roof, a temporary replacement of what had recently blown down in a hurricane. We had a powerful worship service there and one of our team, Elon Waugh from New Life Fellowship in Beaver Falls, NY, prophesied that God was going to pour out His blessing on this church and His blessing would flow down the mountain like a river. Visiting again this year, I was amazed to find a growing congregation with a good-sized cement-block building serving both as school and sanctuary and more foundations laid for future expansion. Pastor Belade's vision is to serve these mountain people with a complete primary thru high school and to bring 'the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ' to this area where voodoo and animism have reigned in darkness for over a hundred years.
In January 2001, Pastor Penn Clark joined me in Haiti to conduct pastor/teacher seminars 'for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ'. These have been wonderfully rich times of basking in the Lord's presence and receiving deeply satisfying teaching from the heart of God. It's such a blessing to see the hunger in our Haitian brethren for more of Him and the truth of His word. I know these meetings have been a great encouragement to the church leaders and will have a positive ripple effect throughout the churches they represent. Each year since then, Penn and I have put on pastors/leadership seminars in various places around Port au Prince and once in the interior of the island.
As we continue to meet other pastors through Michel who have a similar dedication and willingness to sacrifice themselves for the purposes of God, I am humbled by their faith and vision to accomplish so much with so little. While in Port au Prince, I stayed in the house of Pastor Adrian who leads a congregation in a building with four walls but no roof. I met Pastor Gonzales Hilaire with two roofless church buildings that also double as schools during the weekdays. It is now their rainy season and I saw firsthand how disruptive this is to a church service. Since then, we have seen to it that these churches have had roofs put on and their buildings improved.
It has been a privilege and a blessing to get to know these men and their co-laborers in the harvest in Haiti. As we continue to build relationships and offer ourselves as channels from the Father's heart, I believe that we will be privileged to be a small part of a great work that the Lord is doing through His church in Haiti. The churches that we are networking with in Haiti are generally not supported by any denomination and have few physical resources of their own. But they have a big God and a desire to serve Him with all their being. It has been exciting to watch the Lord raising them up to the challenge that he has called them to.
Bless the Lord and bless you! Geoff
