When You Can't HE CAN!

We welcomed another team from Bless Back Worldwide yesterday. This team is comprised of medical and dental professionals, their sons and daughters, and others who will be focusing on working with children this week.

The team joined us for a wonderful worship service in Thozin this morning.

After church they all got right to work setting up the clinics for the team and inventorying medicines. LOTS of work. Thank you Bless Back!!!

This past week we had a really FUN day at the school. Our students spent the ENTIRE day here for a recreational day.

There were two student soccer matches.

And we held the final for the school talent search.

On another day we had a meeting with parents. It's always great to see the families get involved in educating their children. When the teachers and the parents are on the same page, the students are more likely to excel. It's a great, team effort!

The clinic construction project was started by a generous donation by our friends at Mission USA. Thank you so much to all of you who gave through them! And to the individual donor who sent in a gift toward this project, as well.

The funding has continued with our friends at Clifton Lutheran Church. They raised $5336 at their third annual fundraising event for MOHI. Wow! We are so grateful to all who came out for what proved to be a very joyous occasion for all. They will be holding their next event November 2, 2019. If you are in within driving distance of Marblehead, MA, please mark your calendars with that date, as Pastor Lex and I have already done.

This morning at church in Thozin we had a visitor from our church in St. Etienne. He told me he decided to come to church because he hadn't seen me and was afraid I would head back to the States before he made the time to come by. How sweet is that?!!! I felt very special at that moment.

I had an "Aha" moment in church this morning. Often times when I hear people (here in Haiti) encouraging people to be thankful, they talk about things like, "If you're not on a hospital bed, if you're able to walk and raise your hands...you should give glory to God." When I hear this, I often think, but what about the person who IS in the hospital or who CANNOT walk or CANNOT raise their hands? Should they be any less grateful?

I thought about my time on a hospital bed last month. I realized that as I was under the knife, I was well. When I was in pain, I was still well. I even had occasions when I was able to minister to hospital staff right there while I couldn't even get out of bed. And I asked myself, how is laying in a hospital bed any different than going through a financial crisis? Or dealing with problems in relationships? Or having to publicly eat humble pie? These can all be seen as crisis situations. They all can come with severe pain. (Sometimes emotional anguish is even harder than physical pain.)

I believe that no matter your circumstances in this world, how you are in the midst of them is totally dictated by where you are focusing your eyes - your attention. There are so many dark places to see in this world - in many aspects of our own lives. But fixing our eyes on Jesus - what He has done for us - who we ARE in HIM - the inheritance we share in HIM in THIS life... No matter my circumstances, when I see as HE sees, I will always be content!

Many really exciting things have been happening for me this week. I'll tell you more about it in my next post, but I'll leave you with a little hint from Dr. Seuss and P.D. Eastman. Have a great week!