Today was a fairly boring day. All we did was build a church. The whole church. But don’t call us Church in a Day.
That was not the original plan when we went to bed last night, but this is Haiti. We put the new one in the same spot as the old one so that required us to actually lift the old church and move it out of the way. Yes, lifting and moving a church by hand has officially been crossed off of all of our bucket lists. We had to wait for the material to be delivered so until about 9 we were sitting around twiddling our thumbs or playing with the neighborhood kids. Once it got there, the frame went up before lunch and the rest fell into place by about 5 o’clock when some Habitat for Humanity executives showed up. All 10 of us would like to extend a huge thank you to whoever prayed up the incredible cloud cover this afternoon. We literally didn’t see the sun after lunch when the roof was being put up. The time that we were all the most worried about wound up being the coolest temperatures we have seen all week. It’s almost as if God had this all planned out the whole time. Who would’ve thunk it?!
The crowd was about what we expected with every single person who walked, rode, or drove by stopping to check out what the group of 10 white men were doing. Roody was completely taken aback when he pulled up with the Habitat people and couldn’t find the words to express his gratitude and amazement. It was quite the moving day for all of us. You could really tell how thrilled the community was to get an updated structure. It was something that they desperately needed and it is so rewarding to have been a part of an experience like this. We may never know or see the fruits of our labor but, rest assured, we will find out when we all get where we’re going.
The highlight of my day was the period of time while we were waiting for the material to show up. Rommie had a little buddy show up named Adlere. He is a 3 year old little boy but he would be small for a 2 year old. I’m pretty sure he is Cale’s Haitian twin and that may have had something to do with why I instantly was drawn to the kid. He came and sat in my lap and just talked and talked and talked and I, of course, had no idea what he was saying the whole time but I’d respond with some universal sound or gesture and he’d just smile and go right back to talking away. Occasionally, Rommie would inform me of what he was telling me but I pretty much just let him jabber away. He took my hat, told me to sit down (even sounded English), and refused to leave my side for the longest time. If I hadn’t signed that agreement and promised Bob Harper I wouldn’t bring a kid back, I would have been pretty tempted to sneak that one back with me.
The prayer concerns for tomorrow are that we can finish strong. We have some loose ends to tie up and maybe a couple more houses to throw up. We are running on E and we are losing Rommie tomorrow. He is the vice president of the English club and has to go teach tomorrow. It was such a joy to be around him all week and grow closer to him. We still have Alex so he will be in charge of all of the key/picture/Bible ceremonies tomorrow. It should be a relaxed day but the job is still not finished. We have to finish out what we have been doing all week. Strength is our biggest concern at this point.
Thank you for all you have done for us this week.
Until tomorrow…
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