Mission Impossible becomes Mission Accomplished

We are home! Well, almost. As we look back on our week and all the seemingly impossible obstacles to overcome, we are reminded of God's sovereignty. His ways are not our ways and His purposes are greater than ours.

Our last few days in Haiti were a whirlwind of activity. Friday was our last day of VBS and it was the smoothest day of the week as far as our other VBS days were concerned. We started the day on time with some great singing. Due to the craziness of the previous days' schedule, we moved the Bible lesson to the beginning so the children would get the most important part of VBS, GOD's WORD! Of course right as we started Bible, smoke began to work its way into the church building. (A nearby fire caused a huge amount of thick smoke to linger in the church.). To our amazement, 1600 people sat and listened to the gospel message. Yet the smoke lingered on, as if Satan was trying to thwart the VBS once again. We pushed through and did a fun craft, sang more songs, and somehow played some games with 1400 children and 200 leaders in a smoke filled room. But, "greater is He that is in us, than he that is in the world"! We pressed on, sending most of our team upstairs where the open windows helped lighten the smoke while the main leaders kept singing and teaching. The day was a success! The moment VBS ended, the smoke cleared. By then the mission had been accomplished; 130+ children accepted Christ as their Savior! We serve a mighty God! VBS ended on time and we were able to take the extra beans and rice to feed those in need on the streets of downtown Port Au Prince at Zakat. We celebrated back at the hotel with ice cream (compliments of our Tennessee friends) and watching the Olympics Opening Ceremony.

Saturday brought us back to Zanfan Lakay for work projects and then turned into a moving project to get all the stuff from the old Zanfan house to the new one. It was a long and hard day of work, but so much got accomplished. We left exhausted but satisfied.

Sunday began with a Church service at Zanfan Lakay, with Eric from Tennessee preaching about being a new creation in Christ and then several testimonies from the team. Once again, God's hand was at work and 17 children plus one worker came forward to accept Christ as their Savior. With full hearts, we then celebrated Jimmy & Kathia's first wedding anniversary. (They are the house parents of Zanfan Lakay.)

It was hard to say goodbye to our Haitian friends, and it was hard to part ways with the Tennessee half of our team once we arrived in Miami, but we all agree the the trip that threw so many impossible things our way became trip "Mission Possible"! And as we all go our separate ways and return to our normal routines we are tangibly reminded of how we each personally experienced our VBS theme first hand.
"Everything is possible with God!




(Notice the thick smoke?!!!)





"Everything is possible with God!"
Posted from Monica's iPad

Location:Miami, USA

Haiti Here We Are!

Yes! Our team is finally together here in Haiti. Carrie, Luke, and I finally were able to make our wake to Haiti and joined them just in time to watch them faithful and successfully present the VBS leader training for 150 Haitian volunteers on Tuesday.

Our interesting arrival to Haiti included a 2 propeller, 19 seater plane where the navigation system looked like one of those portable ones you put in your car! We arrived travel weary and without luggage but ready to do what God had called us to do.

Day 1 of VBS was a bit different than expected. Okay, a lot different than expected. Our song leader/finale leader, Doug, was sick and not able to attend. We also arrived to the church to discover that we had no classrooms or courtyards available for use due to government testing and the church was preparing to send out their own mission team so their supplies filled the entry way to the church. So the 1400 VBS attendees and our team were confined to one room! Let's just say nothing went as planned. Our team really had to walk the talk as we taught the kids to trust God!

After a good time of worship back at the hotel and a helpful debrief we were ready to try plan B for day 2 of VBS. But the day found us once again walking the talk as we had to trust God since a wedding was taking place in the church and lasted until 11AM! So we switched things up and implemented a plan C, or was it D?...K?...P?!!! Let's just call it Plan Y! Of course that wasn't it because after feeding 1400 children with an early lunch and officially starting VBS at 12:30, we received news at 1:50 that we had to be done in 10 minutes so a 2:00 wedding could begin. Once again we were reminded to Trust GOD.

So now, as we sit here in the hotel enjoying wonderful fellowship, we are reminded of all the positives that God has shown us:
-We have had great visits with the boys and girl's at Zanfan Lakay.
-The VBS children have loved the VBS and sang their hearts out.
-ALL the children at VBS know their Bible point for day 1 & 2.
-Our team is learning patience and flexibility!
-God's plans are bigger than ours!

Until tomorrow,
Monica

















"Everything is possible with God!"
Posted from Monica's iPad

Location:Port Au Prince, Haiti

Unexpected Detour

DAY 1 of Detour:

It would be no small coincidence that the VBS theme for Haiti this year is, "Everything is Possible with God" or that the daily point during VBS is "Trust God". The irony in all this is that our entire team is having to live this today as our two group leaders, Carrie and myself, are stuck in the middle of the Caribbean while the rest of our team is in Haiti, awaiting word from us.

It all started with our team having to take separate flights from LAX to Miami where we were all suppose to meet back up together for the last leg of the trip to Port Au Prince, Haiti. The first bump in the road began with Carrie, Luke, and my flight out of LAX to Tennessee running 15 minutes behind. (We only had a 65 minute scheduled layover in Tennessee so we knew it would already be tight.). But in God's faithfulness, we arrived with 30 minutes to go and hopped right on the next flight from TN. Then of course the road block began. Due to maintenance issues on the plane we were stuck on the tarmac for 1 hour which resulted I. Us getting on that connecting flight in Miami with the rest of our team. The rebooking desk informed us that they could get us out on the next available flight on Friday. Yep...FRIDAY!!!

Of course since our VBS is scheduled to start tomorrow with training, Friday wasn't going to cut it. So we did what we could and waited 2 hours for standby on the next flight out, but to no avail. All seats were booked. (Actually all the flights out to Port Au Prince for this week are over-booked.) By that point and time, the situation was beyond frustrating and we could only laugh at the adventure we knew God was leading us on.

After using our food voucher, which by the way was the only helpful thing our airline did to help us, we began to think out of the box. That is why I am now writing this from Puerto Rico as we try to make our way to the Dominican Republic.

Day 2 of Detour:

Last night, after flying on a 30 passenger plane to the Domonican, we arrived in Beautiful Santo Domingo at 7:30 in the evening. Finally someone actually helped us track where our luggage was and arranged to have it delivered to Port Au Prince, Haiti. We got to a hotel and were pleasantly surprised how nice everything was. We were still without internet access and reliable phones so we were happy to see a computer station open for hotel guests.. After a google search we were able to purchase one ticket and two standbys for a flight to Haiti. A hot shower and a bed were a welcome respite from the airplane seats we had spent the day in.

So here wrist now in La Isabella Airport, santo Domingo, waiting. Our hopes are to all three get on the plane, but do to a lack of being able to communicate effectively, we are in limbo until check-in time. (big thank you to my parents and friends from the Imperial Valley. It has been over 20 years since I used my Soanish but at least I could get us the basics!). Hopefully more updates to come!

Resting in God's hands and thankful for safety and provision in the midst of all this confusion.

God bless,
Monica
"Everything is possible with God!"
Posted from Monica's iPad

Today is the Day!

This morning our team gathered for prayer with the Elders at Coast Bible Church. In just a few hours we will be heading to LAX and splittting up onto three different flights as our team makes their way to Miami and then toward Haiti.

We are so excited to meet up with the other half of our team from Tennessee. Pray for energy as most of our team will be sacrificing a full nights sleep to get to Haiti and prepare for VBS training. Even in our expected exhaustion, we know that in our weakness HE is strong.


We'll update you more once we get to our destination.

God bless!

"Everything is possible with God!"
Posted from Monica's iPad

One Week to Go

The picture below is last year's 3rd Annual VBS in Port Au Prince, Haiti. We had over 700 in attendance, 100 of which were Haitian adults that attended our VBS leadership training the day before VBS started. It was amazing to worship with this group.


You can only imagine how humbled our VBS team feels as we just got word to expect 1200 at this year's 4th annual VBS! We will definitely be relying on God's strength as we share the love of Christ with so many children and adults. We would ask that you begin praying with us now as we prepare to fly to Port Au Prince, Haiti in just over a week. Pray for our health, our safe travel, for our supplies to safely arrive, for God's Word to be clearly presented, and for many souls to come to know Christ as their Savior.

Don't forget that you can subscribe to this blog for our updates to be emailed to you. Thank you to all of those who donated financially to this trip and who are committed to being our prayer supporters. You are just as much a part of our team as those of us who are traveling to Haiti. We are blessed to have you!!

We look forward to having several of our Haiti VBS team members contribute posts to this blog as we experience the amazing things God will accomplish at VBS in Haiti.

God bless,
Monica Grim


"Everything is possible with God!"
Posted from Monica's iPad