Sunday, November 13, 2011

Changes....

Well here's one change - the baby inside me is growing so much! Blows my mind every time I think about the fact that God is growing - knitting together- a little person, our child, inside of me.... how awesome.


Another change - We're working on a garden. Jimmy's been growing little sprouts from seed in his recycled coke bottles for months. Now we're in the process of putting together a gardening bed on the top of our roof out of scraps of wood, recycled tin cans, and some left over cement blocks. We'll transplant the sprouts into the garden and hopefully get to see some things grow. Here are some in progress pictures, hopefully we can show you the finished project by the end of the week.(I know most of you live somewhere where it gets a little cold in the winter, and may be wondering what sort of crazy person would be planting a garden now... one that lived in Haiti of course. It feels like summer here year round, so it's perfect for growing.)






Changes at school - seems like there is always something to change and work on at school. Every few days, we step back and look at how things are how going and find another area in ourselves and the students that we need to address, to work on and improve. Whether its certain curriculum gaps some of them have, attitude and character issues, our organization systems, comprehension or writing... There is always something to evaluate, talk about, come up with new ideas, and prayerfully try to change for the better. It is nice to have the freedom to do this. And another fun change is there is a woman cooking school lunch for us now - yum!

Changes at church - there is a new Pastor and his wife that just moved to Haiti from Australia to lead the church that we are part of here. It's exciting to see how God will use them to bring, unity, growth, discipleship, depth. We went to Sunday school for the first time today. Jimmy's mens' class was big probably 30 men all Haitian except for him and the teacher. Mine was just 6 women, all Haitian except me and the teacher. I also found out a little bit about getting involved helping with the kids at church, so that will be fun. We've been trying to carry on our Living Hope practice of being sure to meet new people every week and we're beginning to get to know some people and it's begining to feel more like "our" church. We've also begun (seperate from church, but because we need the fellowship- church is further away and more of a once a week than involved in daily life sort of fellowship) a "community group" out where we live and are trying to connect with other families who are also looking for growth and relationship. This has been good.


I guess that leads me into the last change... the one I was thinking about when I began this post. It's a change inside of me. I first noticed it 2 weeks ago. Two weekends ago I found myself thinking that maybe one day it could/would feel like we belonged in Haiti - like this was our home. That maybe this could be more permanent than just a year. It's actually funny how much that thought caught me off guard. Before we moved here, although we were technically just coming for a year, it felt kind of like we were moving forever. We both quit jobs and got rid of everything and said goodbye to everyone, and I think deep down in us we both felt like it could be for a long time. But for me, that changed after we got here. In my head I still knew that we would see what God did this year and what he had for us after that and that a lot of things are unseen and could change. But everything felt so crazy, nothing felt permanent, it certainly didn't feel like we "fit" here, or like I could or would want to continue being here for a long time.
So all that to say that 2 weeks ago really was the first time I in any way felt that since we got here. And over the last 2 weeks it has only grown more daily. Realizing that I really do love this place, seeing God begin to involve us with different relationships, feeling really invested in school and our students, loving the ways God is using Heartline to minister to the people of Haiti and knowing that somehow indirectly we are part of that. Continuing to try to learn and use the language just a little bit. Getting more used to the routines and chores required for daily living and beginning developing things here at the property with the yard and goats and gardening.
About an hour ago, while dealing with the multiple annoyances of nasty dish water, cockroaches, fruit flies in our compost and our power going out, out of my mouth sprang the words "I love you Haiti". Not with frustration or sarcasm or anything like that- they were genuine. My husband had to ask me 3 times what I said, because I am pretty sure that is the first time I have said those words. I have just been laughing all week at God's timing in these changes inside of me. Last weekend we found out that we needed to begin making some decisions already about what we will do next year. Of course we've thought and talked about that since arriving,especially with a baby coming, but it's felt a long way off and honestly was something we didn't think we'd need to make any decisions on anytime soon. So I've been laughing at God all week as I see my heart changing more and more. Because 2 weeks ago if we'd had to start making those decisions it would have been easy for me to have a whole lot of reasons not to work towards staying here...and now... well...we'll just have to see what He has in store.
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