Churches Helping Churches

This week, my Sunday worship was in Haiti.

“This is my first time preaching since the earthquake,” said a pastor at the Tabernacle Baptist Church in Port-au-Prince to open his sermon. “It was difficult choosing a passage. I didn’t know what to say.” He continued, “I spent 24 years building my home, and it was destroyed in less than one minute. I remember pulling out my wife from the rubble …” he said, trailing off.

This week marks three and a half months since the Jan. 12, magnitude-7.0 earthquake struck just outside the capital. The event continues to remain front and center in people’s minds.

We sang songs about not being afraid. Then, in the middle of service, we turned to one another and exhorted, “Do not be afraid!” We read liturgy about not fearing. Then, came the preaching to hope and not be afraid. During that service, “Fear not!” the most frequent command in all of Scripture, took on whole new meaning to me.

When your very foundations have been shaken (literally), the only possible way to “fear not” is to hope in something that is unshakable, namely God. This church was singing it, saying it, preaching it, believing it, and most of all, doing it. Throughout the service, I felt like I was watching my favorite team hold the lead in a championship game.

With Pastor Jacques’ help, I made the announcement about Churches Helping Pastors. I invited pastors and church leaders to join us at the May event. Immediately after service, a woman leader in the church approached Jacques and said, “This is for me. I need this.”

Pastor Vladimir

Meanwhile, I went to speak with one of the pastors of the church. It didn’t take long before Pastor Vladimir, of Tabernacle, gently requested in broken English, “Please pray for me.” Concerned, I encouraged him to elaborate. “In the quake, I lost my wife, my daughter, and my mother-in-law.” He said that he needed Churches Helping Pastors. I prayed for him, took his picture, and promised that others would also be praying. (That’s your cue.)

I discovered that less than one week after this man lost his family, he was spotted coordinating water shipments for the STEP tent city. Those around him were startled. Pastor Vladimir was already serving again. He is an example to us all.

“We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.” 2 Corinthians 4:8-10

The U.S. military announced today that it will wrap up its mission in Haiti by June 1. Current troop numbers are already down to 2,200, from their peak of 22,000 in the immediate aftermath of the Jan. 12 earthquake. Relief effort funds will still be going to local Haitian police and private security forces as they battle Port-au-Prince’s extensive gangs. Notwithstanding, the security situation is relatively “calm” these days, say officials, and is not affecting humanitarian efforts.

Follow us on Facebook & Twitter to stay up to date as we continue to roll out phase one of our response plan for Haiti.

50 pallets. 50,942 lbs. $1,705,561 of aid.

Those are the stats behind the latest medical aid we are sending into Haiti.

Where it’s going: New Missions has been planting churches that provide education and medical care in Haiti for the last 27 years. Their medical clinics, staffed 100% with Haitian leadership that New Missions has trained, are able to serve over 1,000 patients each month.

How it happened: After sharing about needed medicine, CHC contacted our partner, International Aid. Within 2 days, International Aid was able to secure a boatload (literally) of product.

I’ve been involved in many good business deals in my time, but I’m still scratching my head over this one. At a cost of $16,800 to CHC to procure and ship, we are able to bring over $1.7 million in aid to Haiti. I guess when God is in the equation, the numbers don’t have to add up.

-Tom

Follow us on Facebook & Twitter to stay up to date as we continue to roll out phase one of our response plan for Haiti.

From Reuters today:

Haiti’s parliament has approved the creation of a commission that will allow foreign donors to participate in deciding how to rebuild the poor Caribbean nation after its devastating January 12 earthquake… International aid workers are striving to care for more than 1 million homeless Haitian quake survivors who are camped out in makeshift tent and shelter communities sprawled across the wrecked capital and in other damaged towns.

Aid workers say that unless safer, more secure shelter is found for the hundreds of thousands of homeless quake victims, the imminent rains, and the hurricane season starting on June 1, could cause another humanitarian catastrophe.

Four months after the initial earthquake hundreds of thousands are still without shelter, and there continues to be systemic mistrust of the government making relief efforts complicated and rebuilding slow. Our hope over the next few months is to help in the spiritual rebuilding of the  lives of the Haitian pastors who in turn pastor those still living in these catastrophic conditions. Governmental steps like this are encouraging because infrastructure needs rebuilding, and it will take time and money, and at the same time we pray for the hearts that need rebuilding as well.

Read More from Reuters…

You can read about the first phase of Churches Helping Churches’ response to Haiti, right here.

Please follow us on Facebook and Twitter to stay up to date as we help the pastors, churches, and people of Haiti.

Introducing phase one of CHC’s Haiti Response: Churches Helping Pastors.

Imagine this…

“And so he [Jesus] was fully God and fully man in one person, and will be so forever.” The professor continues, “This is the greatest miracle in the Bible”. You’re intrigued by the lecture, but you fight the urge to yawn. It’s been a long day. After a hectic shift at work, you rushed halfway across town and up the hill to get to this seminary class. Now, that physical workout is followed up by this mental workout. You look at your watch. 4:52 PM – a little more than an hour to go.

Your thoughts are interrupted by the sound of a train in the distance. “That’s strange”, you think, “There are no tracks in this part of town”. Dogs begin to bark uncontrollably. Something is terribly wrong. The “train” quickly approaches and then…..”JEZI!!!” The ground beneath you begins to shake violently, and the train is now replaced by the sound of chaos. Classmates yell “JEZI” (Jesus in Creole) at the top of their lungs, desks and chairs are tossed around like nothing, and there is the constant rumbling of the earth.

You stand up to make a run for the door. Immediately, the wickedly shifting floor causes you to collapse. You don’t stand a chance. You look up, and everything in sight is in ferocious turmoil. There’s no escape, there’s nothing you can do. You just lay down, shout “JEZI!”, and pray for your life. Just when you thought it was unbearable, someone cranks up the juice. The building is starting to come apart. You reach for something, anything to hold onto, but nothing is stable.

The shaking lets up ever so slightly. You and the others stumble out of the room and down the stairs. Seconds after you’re out, the building comes crashing down. You look around, and others notice the same thing you do. Not everyone is here. People begin to frantically call out names and climbing over the rubble.

Immediately, you call your wife and kids. The phone is not working. You need to get home. As you make your way off campus, you’re glad that you have just enough money for a tap-tap (a Haitian cab).

You rush out of the school’s gates and freeze dead in your tracks at the overwhelming sight. “Oh…my…God. This…was…” Toppled buildings, the fog of unsettled dust, spilled rubble poured into the streets, pancaked cars and tap-taps, dead bodies in plain view, injured people writhing in pain, others crying hysterically in disbelieve. Gulp

After four hours of determined walking on foot, you get home. You’re glad to find that your home is in tact. At least, it appears that way. You find out that your daughter was out and is still missing. You don’t know that she’s hurt, you don’t know that she’s not. The truth is you may not ever receive that confirmation.

While in pensive contemplation about your daughter, your church members begin to show up. Oh, that’s right. You’re the pastor. And this is just the start to a long, arduous journey. What do you say? What do you do? You don’t exactly have a talk prepared for these kinds of things. And even if you did, are you prepared to do that day in and day out for who knows how long?

“Wait, what did you say? Our church building has been destroyed?” Talk about the ministry challenge of a lifetime…

I’m not a writer, but I wanted to provide a word picture of the experiences of pastors in Haiti. Hearing these stories convinced me to do what we’re about to do, and I hope it will do the same for you.

The Plan

Some of the greatest stresses in Haiti right now are the shoulders of local church pastors. Not only were they victims themselves but they’ve been under the gun 24/7 for the last three months. They are carrying the weight of their wounded congregation while they themselves are limping. Thus, we believe the best way to rebuild the church in Haiti is to rebuild its pastors. Churches Helping Pastors – because sometimes pastors need a pastor.

In May, we are inviting key local church leaders to gather in Port-au-Prince for one week. We are partnering with seminaries, denominations, missionary networks, local church chapters/leagues, expatriate Haitian pastors, and more. Our goal in doing so is:

1. To provide an oasis of spiritual renewal and healing. We’ll worship together, pray together, study Scripture together, share together. For many pastors, this may be their first pit stop since January 12th.
2. To equip pastors with Biblical, gospel-centered counseling. If there’s one thing that every Haitian pastor cannot afford to be less than excellent at right now, it’s counseling. We want to serve these heroes by providing guidance that is specific and practical to their environments. (I will write an entirely separate blog post on this.)

Port-Au-Prince will be the launching pad. From there, we will organize similar regional efforts throughout Haiti in May-July. Even though some areas were untouched by the earthquake, they do not go unaffected. In an attempt to escape the chaos, thousands have fled into the outlying regions. Even there, pastors’ flocks have swelled with traumatized victims, and they are faced with the same ministry challenges.

If you (or someone you know) are a local church leader in Haiti and are interested in getting involved in regional Churches Helping Pastors efforts, please have that local church leader contact Jacques Louis at jacfranc@hotmail.com. He is our man on the ground in Port-Au-Prince and will be coordinating logistics on behalf of STEP Seminary.

Thank you for your partnership with Churches Helping Churches!

Tom
Acts 20:24