Thank you for your prayers, we are here safe and have checked in to our hotel rooms here in Santo Domingo. Please continue to pray that Dieuferly’s surgery on both feet will be better than even expected. There is power in Prayer!
Mark Ostrander comes in tomorrow to work on the dorm medical staff housing, among other things. Water project: should pump 1,200 gallons of water per minute! This is for the whole community and the local farmers. They have aqua ducts bringing water to their farms and gardens. We are working on getting the right parts needed for the pump connections for Fond Parisien. They need water desperately. Love is something you do!
To the Dominican Republic… We left early this morning to go to the D.R. As some of you know, Dieuferly, one of our older children, has had severe problems with his club feet. He had some “botched surgeries” when he was a child and has been in constant pain.
We found a really good orthopedic surgeon in the Dominican Republic who can do both feet in one operation. He said that Dieuferly would have five days of bad pain and then, it would be much better. He said that within a month, he would be walking… I am asking anyone who reads this post, to please stop for a moment and whisper a prayer. Dieuferly has suffered all his life with his feet. We are hoping and praying that the operation will be a success and that the pain will be less. Dieuferly is such a bright young man with a lot going. He is currently learning “editing.” He has his own drone and does lots of photography, but more than that, he loves the Lord! When he was small (about three), we found him in the mountains of Covant, after traveling many hours on a mule!! We have been through much, with all his surgeries. We want this one, to be his last, in the name of Jesus! Let’s all believe for a good report!
Thank you, dear partners!!! We love you!
Bobby and Sherry
P.S. A Special thanks to some of our partners, who have sent in funds to sponsor his surgery. Thank you, with all our hearts, thank you!
“Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall.” 2 Peter 1:10
A missionary asked me a question today. He knows someone who may want to come and be a missionary in Haiti. What advice could I give? Does he have the true calling of God to be a missionary? There is a difference between a calling and a desire. If you come to Haiti or any other mission field with just a desire… When you run out of money, the temperature is unbearable, you have left your friends and loved ones, everything goes wrong, you find out you are not living in a glory cloud, the desire will leave fast… they always return back home.
The true calling of God will keep you and burn within your heart like a flame! No matter how tough it may become, you know the Lord has called you!
There’s almost water for Fond Parisien!!!! Nothing is easy in Haiti. It’s been a long hot day. Everyone worked so hard. God bless all the guys from Blue Ridge. They are the experts. The pump and all the pipes are deep in the earth. All was completed today.
At the end of the day, one part of the shaft did not fit. The new part was so small. You can see the difference in these pictures. We will solve this problem soon. Thank you, Pastor Elaine Britt and Academy Cathedral, Inglewood, California. We love you all.
His mother died and his father could not take care of him. When we received Mikael, he was in poor, poor health. He came to us with malnutrition.
Mikael… What can I say about Mikael? He is a very unusual young man. First of all, “he loves to work!” (How many kids in the U.S. are like this??) Mikael is always up early, about 4:30 a.m., sweeping, cleaning, and watering the plants. Mikael “loves work!!” He is very obedient and “zero stress.” (Thank you, Jesus!)
He is a “go-getter.” H is always “looking for work,” when some kids are hiding from it!!!! Ha. Mikael is very intelligent and makes high grades in school… but, he loves to drink “sugar water!” And, he is “always looking for food!!!” He will eat anyone’s “leftovers!” He has a bottomless pit, but he is thin! He is like a growing “garbage disposal.” He eats and eats and eats, and never gains weight!!! We love Mikael, he is no trouble, hardworking, and always wanting to help. He is just a little heavy on the “food chain.” Ha!
Breaking news: Here in Fond Parisien we are putting in a submersible pump and new pipe for the community. Water will be coming!! Blue Ridge Well Drillers are the experts! The old pump has been broken for months. No water for the crops or the community. No water pipes are going to houses. Everyone brings buckets to carry water on their head.
Thank you, Pastor Elaine Britt and Academy Cathedral from Inglewood, California. We love you all. About 6 hours from now we should have water. Be looking for pictures and the miracle story!
When I was a young Christian, I used to hear a lot of testimonies. That was the day when the pastor said, “If anyone has a testimony, stand up and let’s hear it.” I always used to hear one church lady start by saying, “I’m so glad I’m in the way.”Then, she would tell all the trials she was going through, and it was so depressing, by the time she sat down, I thought, “That’s your problem, lady. You are ‘in the way.’ You need to get out of the way and let Jesus take over.” But, I never told her that…
Many times, when we are facing a problem, we get in God’s way. Bobby and I had been praying for God to do a certain thing, and we did all we could do… I would find myself sitting around, trying to help God out. Sometimes, we “get in the way” and I have come to find out that like the song says, “Give Up and Let Jesus Take Over.” When the disciples were in the boat fishing, the Bible says they had “toiled all night long and had taken nothing.” Luke 5:5
But, when they gave up and let Jesus take over, they caught so many fish “that it broke their net!” Do everything you can do, and let God do the rest! “Having done all, to stand.” Ephesians 6:13
This is the word for today: “Give Up and Let Jesus Take Over!!!!!!!!” Have the best day you have ever had!
Jean Edwouard is such a sweet, kind young man. He is now going into his last year of high school. He is so intelligent and so, so respectful! He always talks in a calm gentle voice. We first found Jean Edwouard in the mud hut village of Old Letant. We had a team with us from Feed My Starving Children. I happened to see this sweet little boy, about five or six years old, carrying a heavy bucket of water on his head. He then built a fire (by himself) and prepared to cook food for a large family. I found out that he was a restavek child. (This is a child whose parents have died and there is no one to take care of him/her. The child goes to stay with a family, but this child will do all of the work and never go to school. He/she becomes a slave to the family.)
We brought Jean Edwouard home with us. He began to do well in school. When he was in high school, he began doing clothing alterations by hand… sewing the boys’ pants, etc. We found out that he wanted to be a tailor and make clothes! Someone donated a sewing machine, and he took off! In the meantime, we hired him for our “painting team,” so he is either studying, painting, or sewing.
Yesterday, we found out that he has “two young men” working for him, doing alterations, and sewing. We’ve decided to give him our old “dental clinic,” which is really an old shipping container, as his “alteration/sewing shop!” He is so excited! He will begin to fix up his “sewing room,” so that he can have two others helping! He is really an entrepreneur! We have always taught our Love A Child children to “dream big” because, with the Lord’s help, you can do anything or be anything, as long as the Lord is on your side!!!
All of our Haitian children are learning “something!” We have future doctors, nurses, dentists, tailors, school teachers, and construction workers! These little boys are Lucson, Nelson, and Wilguens in this picture. They are mixing cement and carrying off buckets of pieces of cement!
They love “working with the big guys!!” They can stay there and work until they get into trouble! Ha! With 85 kids out of school, you can imagine how hard it is to keep track of them! But they always come back when “they smell food cooking!”
We love all our children; we love “watching them work!”
We are so proud of our Love A Child children! They all have “big dreams,” and you, our friends, and partners are the ones we have to thank! They all love the Lord, but we have taught them that they must “reach for the stars.” They are the future of Haiti. Roselyne is in her first year of Medical College here in Haiti. She always volunteers when she comes home for a visit.
Lovely also volunteers in our clinic. (She thinks she wants to be an attorney, but she always volunteers in the Jesus Healing Center or Birthing Center.)
Dumolia is waiting on her visa to go to Italy to an English-speaking college (she went to school in the States due to all the skin grafts she received. She suffered from severe burns as a child. Due to this, she graduated from an English-speaking school and she speaks little French.)
Jovanie will graduate from college as a midwife, but she already has her RN degree. She’s a “tough cookie!” Fabienne is in her third year of Dental College as a Dental Hygienist, and Sarah is also. Sarah is in her first year. When we first built our beautiful orphanage, people told us, “it would be too beautiful for an orphanage,” and people would not support it. But God told Bobby, “Build it! You will be raising thoroughbreds!” The Lord is always right!
