Sunday and Monday... Fellowship and service!

Sunday morning, Tim was able to join us! His passport was found on the previous plane. After picking him up from the PAP airport, we went to Michel's church for service. 

Then we took the kids out for lunch, and headed over to Sue's orphanage for a quick visit. Late afternoon, we all went back to the church where Tim shared a message on John chapter 3.

~~~According to the choir kids, they had a fabulous day and really enjoyed their time with the group! Thanks to handy facebook messaging, I enjoyed hearing from some of the Haitian young people how much they enjoyed meeting new team members and seeing old friends. They only wished the rest of us who had gone on past trips could have been there too. :)

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Today, the team began their day bright and early, at Alexandre's home in Port Au Prince. Best to wake up with the dawn and get some of the work done before the sun gets too warm. (“Hot” is a word we do not use to refer to temperature in Haiti... it's just “warm.”) ~~~

Lori started dental clinics, while Kate began the medical clinics. The rest of us started rebuilding the wall. We also had Jeff and Fresnel help us. They were great workers! It was so amazing to see how much of the wall was done since we had helped with it during our last trip in May. We are hoping to get the wall finished for Alexandre.

The work that we did was moving the broken bricks onto a truck, driving it around to the back of the house, and unloading it. Also unloaded new bricks and moved rocks. This work is all done by hand, so we are all tired, but happy to see the last part of the wall going up! Th[is was] Johanna's birthday, and we are all looking forward to seeing Ben again. 

- Deborah

~~~I'm told the wall looks great, and they took a bunch of pictures! :)

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Ben had his appointment to expedite his new passport this morning. I talked to him around 4:30pm this afternoon, so here is the update on his day and travels. Good news: His passport is all up-to-date and he is, once again, on his way to Haiti!~~~

Ben (with slight paraphrasing): “Today was pretty crazy... but it all worked out well, which is a blessing!

The GPS in the rental car quit working on the way into Chicago, so it took a while to find where I was supposed to be, but I got there. Then, while filling out the paperwork at the office, they told me I needed a picture of myself in addition to my expired passport photo. (Seriously... Who carries around photos of themselves normally?) I didn't have one along, so I went to find somewhere to get a picture taken.

After talking to a man in the lobby, he directed me to a place where I could get a photo taken, so I did that, returned with the photo, and then completed the paperwork for my new passport. Instead of giving it to me right away, I was then told to come back in four hours to pick the passport up. That meant I had to first return my rental car, since it was due at 1pm. I took a bus back to the airport, and spent some time reading for a while. 

Then, since I needed transportation to go and pick up my passport, I got a taxi.

My taxi driver was very nice Muslim man. We had some awesome conversations about spiritual stuff. Then he even took me out to eat at sister's Chicago restaurant, paid for my meal, and wouldn't allow me to to tip him.” - Ben

~~~Such a blessing from an unexpected source... God works in mysterious ways, His wonders to perform. Lord willing, seeds were planted through some of the things that Ben was able to share with his kindly taxi driver and his heart would be open to God's working in His life.

Ben caught a flight from Chicago to Miami, FL this evening, and should arrive around 10:30pm. After spending the night in the airport, his Haiti bound flight leaves early and should land him in Port Au Prince around 8:15am. Praise God for working out so many details to assure his safe and uneventful reunion with the team, and please continue to support the teams ministry through prayer! ~ SP ~~~