Weekly Review

This past week a collaboration of players launched what is now known as the "Ebenezer Discipleship Training Center" in Petit Goave, Haiti. Ebenezer is a group project including Canaan ministries, World Wide Village, Lighthouse Church of Allendale, MI and a church of native Haitians living in the Grand Rapids, Michigan area. The center opened last week, beginning the first phase of the vision to empower and disciple Haitian nationals to build up the church and advance God's Kingdom in Haiti. Phase one is literacy training for pastors from rural areas. The ultimate goal is to train pastors and raise up native missionaries that will be able to spread the gospel and take ownership of the spiritual advancement of Haiti and her people. Later phases of Ebenezer will include a residential discipleship and training program for existing pastors and a program to identify and call out church leaders from future generations. More information is available here on the WWV website.
World Wide Village now operates a guest house in the Tabarre/airport area. It will mainly be used for groups/teams. It is a really nice house but you still get the oppressive heat and disease-ridden bugs to make you feel like you're on an exotic mission.

Two people moved off our property this week. They were both hired as employees of the guesthouse and live there now. That brought the numbers down to a manageable even dozen for the next couple weeks. It is close to our home and we'll all work together to get things done at both properties.

Jeronne's daughter Jenny is visiting for the month of July. She is 10 and very soft-spoken and sweet. She has lived with her paternal grandmother most of her life. Jeronne believes this is the best arrangement for Jenny. It is very uncommon for a mother to raise all of her own children in this culture. (But Jeronne only has one child.) It seems terrible to many of us but it is the norm here. Some days I want to embrace the culture and send one or two of mine to their grandparents to be raised.

Jeronne likes to spoil the kids. The other day she brought home a bunch of bottles of King Cola. There is no liquid product with as much sugar as King Cola. I am sure of it. Noah already has one tooth rotting out of his skull so I try to limit his sugar food, especially in the evening. Troy was splitting a King Cola for the boys one evening when Jeronne walked in and said, "Oh, Noah can drink a whole one by himself, that is what I give him. He does not need to share." Troy explained he was not so much splitting it because they boys were not capable of drinking an entire soda -- but because drinking an entire soda makes them insane. And, it makes their teeth ugly. Jeronne thinks we might be breaking their spirits with our strict and terribly oppressive ways.

Updates on the Women I wrote about last week- The 63 year old does not have an absorbed fetus from 18 years ago. But she might have cancer. For the majority of the population Cancer means death. Not a lot of Chemo being offered in the sprawling corrogated tin communities. In better news, the sick baby looked great on Tuesday and Mom seemed to have a whole new outlook on him and on being his Mom.

Teen Challenge Haiti has hired an executive director. He is a great guy, Troy and I both think he and his wife are incredibly capable and have enjoyed our brief meetings with them. The next phase of planting the ministry is going to happen at the end of July when a couple of the Board Members travel from the Twin Cities. Please be praying for this ministry and its leaders. World Wide Village and MN Teen Challenge are working together to get this much needed recovery ministry off the ground in Port au Prince in the coming months.

Not much to say about last weeks running. I logged the miles. I did all four runs in my neighborhood following a 6/10th of a mile loop around and around. One guy says something to me every.single.time.I.pass.him. Some days that is like 13 times. I may just need to ask him to save the conversation for a time that I am not dripping wet with music in my ears. Two runs were average. One was really hard and one was really great. C'est la vie. For cross training I tried Yoga. I would never let anyone see even a tiny glimpse of that hour of my life. Even the guy on the dvd seemed to be laughing. Downward dog? This week my training calls for 3 - 6- 3 & 12 mile runs. Only the 12 makes me gulp, but I have finally given in and realize that I cannot just wake up at 5:30 on long run days. I need to be to my running location and in motion by shortly after 5am ... if I would not lard-out when the alarm goes off - I could (in theory) get 5 miles in before the sun was even up.