More Children at the tent city :-)

Haitian Children :)

Today was our first day in a tent city. We will be working in tent cities every single day that we are here in Port-Au-Prince. If you don't know what a tent city is, after the earthquake, most of people's homes have been destroyed, and so thousands of tents have been donated to Haiti so familys can have somewhat of a home. It is so heart breaking seeing the conditions of where people live. God, please reign down in this city, they are in desperate need of you.

Here are many portaits I took today of the children in the tent city :) What beautiful people the Haitians are :) Enjoy!

The Children At The Orphanage.

Living here at the orphanage in Haiti is such a privilege. We live directly on the orphanage, and are witht he kids all the time. They are the most precious children in the world. They love spending time with us and seeing us.
Every evening at 730pm, the kids have a service every night. Last night i went in to with and there were like 50 of them. The leaders put a Michael W. Smith Live DVD on, and all of the kid knew every single worship song, and just sang and sang and sang, it was so amazing. They are so full of joy, hope, and love, even after the earthquake, and losing their parents. God thank you so much for brining us here, what an honor.

Haiti.. Haiti, Haiti, Haiti. Where do I begin?
As I have said before, God called me to come to Haiti when I was 16, and it is finally my time to be here. Ever since the moment I have entered the country, my heart has never been so heavy and heartbroken, yet my heart has never been so happy, ever. I know God designed a part of me to love these people, and love this country, and I do, more than I thought I would.
Today we went to downtown Port-Au-Prince, to where ALL of the destruction from the earthquake happened, and let me tell you, it's worse than you think, I promise. Seeing everything first hand today absolutely broke my heart. These people live in the poorest nation on this side of the world. And if you come here, you will see it. The children have to work so hard, the people need to go on the streets to sell gadgets, jsut to earn money for the day. Their are what are called "tent cities" here, where there are tent after tent (more like just pieces of tarp though) where families LIVE. And we are there in America complaiing cuz we don't get desert, it is 1 degree too hot in our house or we have 30 shirts, not 40. We need to realize that our country is so spoiled, and we should thik about the people in other countries, living off ONE dollar a day. Today we also went to a "hospital" ... but none of you would think it was a hospital. It was 3 run down tents... out in the heat... with like 20 run down, hot beds under the tents. One tent had babies in it.. most of them were 6 months premature, just laying there, in the heat, so close to death. Outside of the tent there was a live of over 50 people with their kids, waiting to get inside a tent to get their kids mediciine. The people have no emiotn to their faces, so much fear, so much confusion, and anger. This country has hope, but you need to go help them, and look for it. This country is so beaitoful and so amazing, but it is destroyed. I know God has called me here for a reason, and I know i am coming back, hopefully soon. I love it here more than anything. Thank you God somuch for getting to be here. I love you, and I love this country you haev created.

July 6, 2010

So after what happened last night in my life, I feel that it is very necessary for me to write a blog about it. Sometimes, after a while when you are a Christian, you feel distant from God. You don’t feel that He is near you, You don’t feel that He cares about your frustrations, and You don’t feel that you can trust Him; But you can, ALL the time. Ever since we had been on outreach, I have not had the right mindset and attidude, completely in line with God and His will. Sometimes we THINK that we are on the right path, and doing the right things, but in all reality, we have slightly gotten off track. Since we have been here, we have not had the opportunity to take hardly any pictures, and overall, we are at the YWAM base, a lot. A lot of my team was getting really frustrated, because we are now on outreach, but we feel so limited to hardly anything we are able to do. Last night though, it was God’s plan to finally reveal everything to me, and to our team.
Our team has had a lot of diversity since we have been here, and there have been complications and frustrations that have came up almost every day since we have been here; Anything from disagreements to bad attitudes. We have different opinions from each other, we haven’t been around each other much (our group didn’t have a previous close friendship), and we don’t know how to handle each other’s personalities yet. It has been a huge adjustment for all of us coming to the Dominican Republic, and especially the heat. The heat has played a HUGE tole on ALL of us. There are times where it seems unbearable; we sweat so much, so much that we wake up every morning with damp hair and damp sheets. But God has placed each and every one us us on the DR/HAITI outreach team, TOGETHER.
Yesterday, we were supposed to go out into the city (Santo Domingo) and get to lead a ministry night. All of us had something prepared, including me who was chosen to do the main teaching for the evening. I felt God tell me early this morning that He didn’t want me teaching on the subject that I prepared in Kona for outreach (relationships-guy/girl), He told me to teach on “Trusting in the Lord” for the night. So I prepared my speech, even though I did not want to teach at all, because I had a very poor attidude today. I felt so trapped in this house, and I just wanted to be able to have the freedom and opportunity to go out and be with the people in this country. God had a different plan though. We had all been in his house all day, doing work duty and having even MORE “team time” (which we all thought by now we had had enough). A huge storm came yesterday with thunder and lightning and pouring pouring rain. After a couple horus of this, the leader here at this base told us that we wouldn’t be going out tonight. This caused much frustration amongst our whole group, because we were looking forward to going out so much. So I still had my teaching prepared and when the time came tonight for us to meet, I came with a poor attidue, but a sense in my heart that God was going to do something.
Our team began to lead in worship, and in between four of the students shared their testimonies. The audience was our outreach team and about ten Dominicans from the base. During this time of sharingand worhsipping God, He began to absolutely POUR His love and joy and peace in my heart and in my life and my mind. It was a feeling and an experience that I have never experienced in my life before. I just began to smile, and my eyes lit up, because of the joy that the Lord poured into me. When the time came for me to give my testimony, I knew exactly why God had me teach on trusting in Him instead of my orignal teaching. He needed to teach our team, and me especially that He had this while here in the Dominican of daily team time, getting to know one another, getting used to not being in America, and learning to trust and obey His plans, and not ours. It doesn’t matter how WE think our day and our life should go, it ONLY matters HIS plans and HIS way, and it is ALWAYS perfect. My teaching went far better than I even planned, but it was because it was God speaking through me, and not me saying what I thought I wanted. I also got a picture after my teaching of a white heart.. so pure but it also has black at the very very edges of it, just barely. It meant that my ehart used to be so black. Hardened, angry, selfish, and unpure. But now in this season of my life, God has absolutely completely changed who I am, inside and out, and is continually doing it every single day. He knew exactly what He was doing when I chose to quit college, and when I chose this specific DTS. The most amazing fruit has been bore from it. The joy and love I experience last night was like nothing I have ever had in my life, because it was solely from the Lord, because I allowed Him to work through my attiude and my life tonight. I am leanring to trust in Him, every day, each decision in my life. Because He knows exactly what He is doing, ALL the time. Last night was exactly what we needed as a team, and God knew that. He allowed us not to go out, but to have this time of worhsipping God, annd sharing our hearts. It touched every single one of us.
Last night was so amazing, and it has refreshed me in the exact amount that God knew I needed before we head off for Haiti in one day. God you are so amazing and so good. Thank you for showing me more and more every day how to put my completlet trust in You. I love you so much and I cannot WAIT to see what you are going to be doing in my life and in the life of my team during this. Thank you ☺