My Forever Family

Where do I even begin? I mean I have obviously been really terrible at keeping up with my blog, but this is now the perfect tool for this moment of time. A moment for me to reflect on the past year of my life in Haiti; a time for me to share with you how this family of mine has forever changed my life.

CHCH kids--God created me to be drawn to children and young people, and He knew that in sending me in my first journey down to the orphanage last year that it wasn't going to be my last. He knew that I wouldn't be able to resist the call to stay with you after all of you poured into me and opened your beautiful hearts to me. He used your love to draw me in right where He wanted me, right where He needed me--for you and for me. Each and every one of you showed me what love is all about. Love that has no boundaries; love that is bold and free. You each taught me that love is endless and that even in this separation, our love for one another will live on forever in our hearts. Through my time with you all, God taught me what real patience looks like; He taught me that patience is a lifestyle not just something circumstantial, and in order to make it a part of you, you MUST invite the Holy Spirit to supernaturally give it. You showed me what adventure really looks like. Living amongst you all, I saw that life isn't about sitting around and waiting for it to happen--its about getting up and doing something with your life, something fun, something adventurous, that makes you really alive. I am forever changed by your astounding and beautiful love, and I will never forget you, never stop loving you and never ever stop praying for you. 

Hunter and Jillian--Have we been through some crazy stuff or what?! No one will ever be able to comprehend how deep our relationships run. I ran across Psalm 126:5 the other day and it made me think of us, our friendship and work together: Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. We have fought some tough battles together--some piercing droughts and battles that only with our prayers, trust, uniting, and surrendering to our Fierce and Sovereign Lord we were able to fight and win against the enemy! My friends, no, my family, thank you for loving me so much, being so open and real with me. I look forward to keeping in touch and continuing life together from afar. Please know that I am ALWAYS here for you all. 

Gerome--Oh I don't think I have laughed as much as I have in my life as I have with you my brother. You have taught me so much about Haiti, the language, the culture, and what being fearless looks like. I have never met someone so fearless, and not just fearless alone, but fearless because you have a strength and amazing dependence on Jesus. I am forever blessed by the time I had to get to know you and build this friendship with you. Please know that this, what we have built, doesn't end here brother. I am forever your sister or in a better way to say it, you are my brother from another mother :) 

CHCH staff--I have never been so encouraged. Thank you for accepting me, teaching me, pouring into me, and loving me. Everyone of you were God's tools in helping restore me from the inside out. I am forever changed by your love, the love that you so freely gave to a complete stranger--that is truly Jesus. I am beyond grateful for every single one of your presence, experience, and love you so willing provided to my life.

Bible study friends or better said, my white friends :)--In Haiti, its not abnormal to just call people white or Haitien, and I have many white friends in Haiti believe it or not, and man, are these my true brothers and sisters. I will NEVER forget our experiences--good, fun, tears, and all, I am truly blessed that God placed each and every one of you and your experiences in my life path. I will always have a special place in my heart for each of you. Thank you for being real with me, showing me what community really looks like, praying for me, helping heal me, accepting me for ALL that I am. You all have no idea what you have taught me. I love you guys. 

Jonathan--You are a person that by looking into your eyes anyone can know who you keep as your Company. You are an incredible man of God, an amazing example of what living in the Light looks like.  God has used you more than you know in helping me understand God, the gospel, and how to apply all of it to my life. Thank you brother. 

And last but certainly not least, God--thank you Father for showing me Your beauty in this place of the least of these. It is more than glorious how you can reach out in some of the most ugly of situations and the most broken people and create such amazing beauty. You are amazing God, no, You exceed that, You are indescribable, and I thank You Lord for leading me to Haiti-- teaching me who I really am, what I can really be, and who I can be in You. Lord I praise You; I praise Your holy name for all of these times, Your vessels, and this place that you so willing bestowed upon Your daughter to experience. I love You. 

Here's to show you some of the beauty of my forever family and priceless moments in Haiti. 

                           

His Timing..

It’s been way too long. One reason being is that I haven’t been in Haiti the past 3-½ weeks of time, but I haven’t really written since February so that isn’t really that great of an excuse. Ok, my real excuse is that I am not always good at knowing what to share about my life; I feel that if I am going to share what God is doing in my life that it should be something that is going to change your life, or give insight to others, help people, or guide people, or that I have to be some amazing writer, but in the end, the only people who are reading this love me and just want to hear about my experiences and growth in Christ, so forgive me for not writing more. I’ll work on it :) (But that doesn’t mean I will get any better at it because I’m not a very good at multi-tasking, so living with 60 kids, teaching, working and writing about all of it is a big challenge for me to say it lightly).

Anyway, I said earlier the past 3 ½ weeks I have been blessed to be able to have traveled back and stay in the states to attend an amazing, beautiful friend of mine’s wedding, visit family and friends, and take a break from my work in Haiti, but in the plans I had made for my time in America, God had His plans.

Let me start from the beginning and sort through all my thoughts for you. For the past six months or so I have been battling and sorting through God’s timing and plans for my life. First it was deciding on the continuation of my work in Haiti and if life and work in Haiti was part of His plan for my life or of my own hearts desire. Not too soon after I decided to submit my life to God and to His work for me here, He brought an amazing man into my life that I have grown to love very much. In the midst of all these changes, transitions and decisions, my boyfriend’s father had also just been diagnosed with stage four-pancreatic cancer. Lastly, while I was in the states in April, my boyfriend’s father Dr. Britt Arnett passed away.

So you can only imagine the number of questions I had and still have for the whirlwind of things that were and are upon me. Questions like: How am I supposed to have a long distance relationship with a man that I have gotten to spend only a few weeks with God? (Granted we had known each other before all of this, and our story is pretty cool, just ask, I would love to tell you all about it). Or God, how am I supposed to fully support him in the prognosis of his father from Haiti? Or God, why do wonderful people like his dad and his family have to suffer the way they did and are in their loss for him? Or how am I supposed to support my boyfriend from here after he just lost his dad God? Or even the question, why on earth God would you place all of this on my shoulders at once, put me in Haiti at the same time, so my heart is ripped between the two?

God is sovereign. He knows what He is doing. While going back and reading what I just wrote, it still overwhelms me, but I also know that God wants good for those who love Him (Romans 8:28). And I really can’t put into words the amazing amount of beauty and goodness in the midst of my tornado of a life. Let me explain. In the decision-making process, I was scared to commit to my life in Haiti because I was a single, young woman, who does desire a future with a significant other, but as soon as I said that out loud I realized that I was limiting God and His great power in providing that for me if that is His will. I surrendered; God provided. Now there is a man who loves me, cares about me, and most of all is a man after God’s own heart—he supports me, understands me and also submits to God’s call for me and my dedication for our brothers and sisters here in Haiti. Not only that but he is an encourager, and I don’t know if I could have gotten through ANY of this without him.  For a while, it had been a mystery to me at why an old childhood friend decided to update me about this man (my boyfriend now) and his family and his father’s condition, but she did, and I’ve now realized its not a mystery at all, it was God and His perfect timing, and this is just a smidge of the goodness that came from the trials I described above.

I have really grown to see that our time and God’s time is so different. I knew that and would have said “well yea of course it is”, but now when I see His plans for my life fold out before me, I can see the fine details of the long trials that seem never ending and on going and last months that have results of His fine beauty and goodness for my life. God opened my eyes so much about His care and comfort for His children. Granted, I still don’t get some of the things that happen or why, but in the desolation and petitioning I cried out and continue to cry out to God for the Arnett family, God blessed me to be able to be there for the Arnett’s, to serve them, mourn with them, love them and even celebrate with them the peace and freedom their loved one now has through Christ. I had the pleasure to hear numerous stories of a happy, focused, funny, inspiring, loving, generous, free-spirited, doctor, husband, and father that makes it so hard to have his physical presence gone, but I have great confidence that he is in a perfect, beautiful place with no more tears, no more suffering, and no more pain with our God that makes it a celebration.

2 Corinthians 1: 3-4 came to life for me these past few weeks: “Praise the God and Father our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort. He comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any kind of affliction, through the comfort we ourselves receive from God.” So during the affliction and challenges of my life, God was comforting me the whole way through and training me, to be able to better serve and comfort my fellow brothers and sisters alongside Him in the midst of their afflictions. Like I said, God’s timing and our timing is different, so really we may never see the end results and the good of something terrible that happens in our lives, but God is working; He is training us, designing us, shaping us, molding us, and creating us for the goodness because He cares so much for us.

I dedicate this blog to the wonderful man, Dr. Eugene Britton Arnett III, and to his family, much love to you all. My heart, comfort, and prayers are with you always.

Beautiful Moments

One morning here recently, I thought to myself, “Wow, I’m a resident of Haiti.” Seriously, I mean in a month or so, Hunter, Jillian and I will have the official documents that say, we are residents of this country. To you it may just sound like it sounds, but that’s some serious business to be a resident of a different country, and not just a foreign country, a 3^rd world country—its kind of a big deal.

Then that evening I was sitting in my home filled with precious (sometimes not so precious too) little ones playing games together, vrooming cars, bouncing balls, jump roping, meticulously and “beautifully” decorating my home with tiny hand-me-down toys, while older kids wrapped up in my blankets concentrating on their studies; I realized, this is why I built my home here—to share in the beautiful giggles that joyously shower down around me, to witness such pure joy in the simplicity of life, to learn from their natural care and tenderness to one another when they need help, to discover how to build amazing relationships through not words but through acts of love and service, and to be inspired by the amazing work ethic of this young generation. This is my beautiful life.

Sometimes I get lonely and hurt for more community; some days I feel like the enemy (that’s teenagers for ya), sometimes I really miss my family and friends; sometimes satan really gets the best of my thoughts and I doubt my abilities; sometimes I lose sight of God’s will for my life in Haiti; sometimes I get so frustrated because I don’t understand why Haiti is the way it is; sometimes I’m really selfish and want more in life; but through all the hardships, God has truly spoken and has been revealing His Love to me this year. He has covered me with a peace I can’t even begin to describe—then I realize He has showered this blessing of Love upon me to be able to share it with my family, friends, and co-workers here in Haiti. When I make every effort to add to my faith, goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. I can and will become more effective and productive (2 Peter 1:5-8).  He has shown me Love, because He is Love, now it’s my job to increase the other fruits of the Spirit in my life to be complete in Him and spread Him to everyone.

Yea, how blessed am I? I continue to learn each day from this amazing family I have here in Haiti. God is blessing me so much and the more time I spend at the CHCH, the more I can see Him molding and shaping who I am: He is teaching me, guiding me, providing me with knowledge and wisdom, nurturing me, protecting me, disciplining me, strengthening me, comforting me, serving me, trusting me, stretching me, all through His opportunity for me in this wonderful place.

Life in Haiti as I describe it sometimes may seem to be pretty rough, but man when I am gaining as much beauty as I just described above, how much better does life really get?

Below are some of the beautiful moments of my life here in Haiti… 

It's ok to be human..

Today is my last day in the states. I knew it was going to be this way, just hitting me now—who, what, where, and how I’m leaving, to up and move, yes, move to Haiti. I did my visiting, eating, resting, traveling, even, dating J while I have been in America, and it has been so amazingly wonderful, and so of course in my human weakness, today I’ve been struggling.

But, today is also a day for celebration, I may be struggling today, I may be sad today, but it’s only an open door for Jesus to teach me something.

I am already learning that sometimes God’s timing doesn’t make sense to us, but He knows what He’s doing, has His hands in our lives, and He has been, is and will always be there. I have also learned that God will give you more than you can handle because in the end, when we fall, the only option us humans have left to do is to surrender everything to Him. I am also learning my purpose in life, and that is to love. Yea, it sounds super simple, and you would have thought I would’ve figured that out a long time ago, being considered a Christian and all, but loving like Jesus calls us to do, in a fallen world is pretty hard to do. I mean we don’t even comprehend the love God describes in the scriptures; I mean we think we do, but we can’t because HE IS LOVE, and if someone has figured Him out, well let me know I would really like to hear your detailed philosophy of our Creator’s heart, mind and soul.

I say all that to just remind us that we are human, we don’t know it all, we don’t understand God, we never will, its ok to struggle, cry, not know how to love or feel love, fall down, get scared, because in our broken times, our Savior is most known to us.

So lets honor our Lord’s Sovereign word with our lives and “Be cheerful no matter what; pray all the time; thank God no matter what happens. This is the way God wants you who belong to Christ Jesus to live.” 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

I told you I had been dating while in the states, well here he is....