Port-au-Prince | The Illinois volunteers are back home, but still thinking about their experiences in Haiti. Check out the images below, and pray with us for people who heard the Gospel last week, for Haitian pastors and leaders, and for Christians in the country who are reaching their families and friends with the truth of Jesus Christ. And read more about the trip in the August 12 issue of the Illinois Baptist, online at http://ibonline.IBSA.org.
We spent our first night away from home in the Miami airport, waiting to catch an early Sunday morning flight to Port-au-Prince.
New Life Children’s Home, our oasis and home away from home for the week.
New Life’s guest house coordinator, Lisa, shares the rules with the team. (The bus behind her was our transportation from the airport to the children’s home.)
Moses, our first new friend at New Life. The kids there loved to interact with the team, despite our language barrier.
Abby Fleischer speaks a universal language – funny faces – with a child at New Life.
“Jesus Loves Me” in English and Creole painted on an open-air classroom at the children’s home.
Autumn Wetzler from Waterloo makes a new friend. (This photo was taken right before he colored her face with a blue crayon.)
New Life takes care of several kids with special needs, including Christine, pictured here with Illinois volunteer Chris Flynn.
Our first day at our work sites: Kids were waiting at the church in Bigarade when we arrived.
Last November, volunteers from Illinois helped build this church.
Pastor Estaphat, who leads Gosen Church, led us in a few songs before we walked to our construction sites.
Bob Elmore, our leader.
Many of the houses in Bigarade were built by Baptist Global Response after the January 2010 earthquake.
Late last year, Hurricane Sandy caused this river to flood, damaging homes in Bigarade and sweeping away some of the land built up around the river.
To make mortar, we sifted soil to get rid of the largest rocks and mixed the remaining material with concrete and water.
Our Haitian bosses and their helpers ran the construction sites during the week.
Thomas Ogens, who helped coordinate the building projects and deliver supplies, with Pastor Estephat’s daughter.
The kids loved to fix the volunteers’ hair…
…and play clapping games.
And look at pictures of themselves.
The team also had the opportunity to read the Bible and a discipleship book with our Haitian friends.
One day after lunch, Sarah Harriss led worship songs with her guitar.
And the team walked through Bigarade singing praise choruses and hymns.
Some of the great faces we met in Haiti.
Preparing to put a roof on one of the new houses.
One of the homeowners standing in his new doorway.
Bob Elmore leads “Our God is so big, so strong and so mighty” during worship and prayer time on our last morning at the job sites.
Each morning, we had one prayer in English and one in Creole.
On our last full day in Haiti, we visited Pastor Evens and his church in the rural mountain community of Blanquette.
