Hello,

The second October team made it to Seattle with no problems, thank you for your prayers. Also  thank you for faithfully praying for the ministry and our family. I enjoy receiving responses to the prayer partners. Sometimes I write and then wonder if anyone reads them :) But some of you have let me know the updates bless you, thank you for the encouragement. 

It seems like when God gives us another piece of the vision, he opens the door almost as he gives it. It seems like the door barely cracks open and everything is laid out before us. In such a way that we know it is the hand of God. I am not saying we then have this perfect part of the ministry and it is all taken care of and provided for. I am trying to say that He lets us know beyond a shadow of a doubt that He is fully in whatever part he has called us to walk out. Then we still have to walk it out. I would like to share just such a part with you tonight. One we feel like God has called Mike and I and Nathan to.

As we have been ministering in Pass Rein, one thing has been obvious, the communities intense desire to follow God. We have also noticed another desire, the desire to grow and learn. So with a new school just finishing being built, but used only during the first part of the day, and remaining vacant for the second part of the day. God has laid it on our hearts to help the community learn and grow. Most of the adults in Pass Rein (and other villages too) have never been given the opportunity to attend school. 

So this week we opened our first adult school in Pass Rein. The adults start school just after the children finish. We have three classes. They study for 5 hours each day Monday thru Friday. This being after they have worked in their fields, sold produce at the market and prepared food etc. for their families. And the many other survival duties they attend to. Just visiting the school makes you cry. So many adults willing to move past the inconveniences and embarrassments and admit they cannot read or write. Can you imagine trying to sell your produce at market and depending on the customer giving you the right amount of money and not being able to count and make change. Or imagine not being able to read important documents and signing them with an X. I can not fathom not being able to read directions whether in the city or on medicine for my children. How about not even being able to read the bible that has been given to you. The list, I am sure goes on and I am not even beginning to touch on what it means to each of them. We were so blessed to see and experience first hand the joy these people feel going to school for the first time. Some of these adults have become our friends. Some of them are in their 40's and 50's. One of the couples we visit frequently. They are always cutting coconuts for us, and sharing other items from their land. Many of my plants have come from this couple. I was so excited to see both the husband and wife at the school. 

We pay the teachers who teach the children during the day, but the teachers who are giving 5 hours of their time each evening to teach the adults are volunteering. This speaks volumes in regards to the change of the community in Pass Rein. One man in particular who helps the school director during the day for free, is the director of the school for the adults. He also oversees the leadership in the church. He helps in every area he can for the community. I would love to see him be sponsored and maybe even receive some encouragement from some of you.

Please remember to pray for these adults as they try to learn. I for one, know how hard it is to learn new things, like a second language after the age of 50 :)

It was unbelievable and absolutely amazing being able to experience God's hand of blessing on the people today. Praising God !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Blessings, Chris

Our adult school in Pass Rein

The first class ever for these adults

Learning our alphabet

Children from our Marotte school

Our Poteau school

Children from our school in Poteau

Debbie, Dustin and Luie passing out school supplies in Poteau

Robert and Luie working the sugar cane press

Luie and Amanda enjoy a soda together :)

Debbie,  Amanda, Robert, Luie and Melissa putting together packages for school supplies.

Our two youngest little girls ready for their first day of school:)

Hello,

I wanted to let you know how the team is doing. It has been great having them here. Each team has such different personalities. God puts teams together well :) 

On a little side note. A few e-mails ago I shared some of the things boys will do. I have another quick one to share. There is one little boy in the children's village named Belano. He wanted to help me with my laundry really bad. I said "yes, but please go wash your hands first".  So off he went to wash. He was back in about 10 seconds and I am looking at his wet hands and saying, "that was too quick, how did you wash that fast". I thought about it for a minuet or 2.Then I said "Belano, did you wash your hands in my turkey's water"? He smiled really big and said "YES". We busted up laughing and then I sent him to really wash his hands, using soap :)

I forgot to mention that after taking school supplies to Perou, we visited a sugar cane press. Mike took a great photo of Luie and Robert working the press. In the evening the team made chocolate chip pancakes for everyone. The children loved them, so did the staff.  

Friday the team took more school supplies and passed them out in the villages of Poteau and Marotte. On Saturday the team was able to see the Awana program in action in our Marose Church. They also had a water balloon fight with the children. Everyone thoroughly enjoyed the game. In the evening everyone was able to play with Glo-sticks. 

Sunday morning Nathan was at the Poteau church with a choir he has started. It is a combination  all of our Good Shepherd churches. Mike preached in Pass Rein. Many came forward for prayer after the service. In the afternoon we celebrated all of the October birthdays. Nathan played the accordion and we sang Happy Birthday in English and Creole, along with other songs. 

Tomorrow the team will be headed out to Port-au-Prince very early in the morning. The team will be leaving around 5:30 am.The team will fly out in the morning also. Please pray for safe travel.

It will be hard as two team members are my son and daughter in law. I miss my family greatly.

Well, I guess that is all for now. Thank you for your prayers.

Blessings, Chris

Eating lunch in our new Pass Rein school

Getting backpacks at our new school in Pass Rein 

A little girl from our new school in Pass Rein

Luie, Melissa and Debbie passing out school supplies in Perou

Our teachers in Perou

Nathan and Mike with our new solar panels

Hello,

We wanted to share more from Haiti with you. Our second October team arrived Sunday. They were supposed to fly out of Seattle Friday night and arrive in Haiti Saturday. Twenty minuets before arriving at the airport, which is 2 hours away, they found out that their flight was cancelled. They were not able to get another flight until Saturday evening. The airlines put them up in a hotel for the night, but it makes their trip one day short :(

The team arrived in the late afternoon on Sunday and spent the rest of the day playing with the children. Nathan said 4 people gave their lives to Jesus at church.

Monday morning we spent time organizing and dividing out the school supplies for all of our schools. We also divided out the new embroidered shirts for the teachers at our schools.

Tuesday morning we went to our new school in Pass Rein. We took the school supplies and passed out backpacks. We also took photos of the children and Melissa took photos of each child individually for school child sponsoring. We spent a few hours at the school and totally disrupted their school day:) After visiting Pass Rein, we went into Gonaives to the market. The team then decided they would like to go to bible study and prayer and worship in the evening back up in Pass Rein. On Tuesday nights it is held at someone's house and affects the neighborhood. As we drove into Pass Rein it started to sprinkle. After two songs, it really begin to pour. One of the team members later said they had never been so wet from rain. When it rains in Haiti it is serious, the rain does not mess around all day trying to decide what to do, like in Seattle. We were totally drenched, then we found out that another witch doctor wanted to give their life to the Lord. We drove as close as we could to her home and then got out and walked. When we arrived at her home, she was surrounded by 4 of her younger children and 2 teenage children. The two teenage children said that they also wanted to accept Jesus into their lives. We sang and prayed for her and her children. Then another child in his early twenty's came out of the hut and said that he too wanted to accept Jesus into his life. So we sang some more and prayed for him. Nathan went into the house and talked to another boy in his twenty's and he too said he wanted to accept Jesus as his Lord and Savior. So again we sang and prayed. The whole household chose to accept Jesus last night. It was a pretty amazing time. We were rejoicing over the incredible opportunity we were given, as we walked back to the trucks in the rain.  

Today, Wednesday, we visited our school in Perou. We passed out school supplies and brought the teachers some of the new embroidered shirts. We also took group photos in Perou. Some of which I will post. Later on today, we took all of the children to the river, which was a lot of fun. We sat in it, were carried away by it. We also passed out new flip flops and crocks to the children and underwear for the girls and a track and field shirt for the boys. Then tonight we showed the second "Ice Age" movie to the children. It is one of those films that show the comedy, which is enjoyable in any language.

Tomorrow we will be going in to see another friends ministry and then we will celebrate my son Dustin's birthday a little late with my son Joshua's birthday a little early. 

Thank you for your faithful prayers. Please continue to lift the ministry, our team and family up in prayer. 

Blessings,

Chris

   Prayer Partners:  Mike here, Just wanted to let you know that we have made an addition to our website at www.newgenerationhaiti.org  Please check it out. We have added a page telling you a bit of the story behind "Trish's Playground."  I was so very blessed to be able to fly home just to attend this most amazing out-pouring of affection and support to a very loving mother who has struggled with the tragedy of loosing her adult daughter and unborn grandson. The fundraiser was a huge success in that it brought so much healing and real sense of the presence of God for her mother Norma. Also it brought many many family members and friends back together again after such a long time of grief. Everyone felt the joy emerging from the ashes. It was such a privilege to be a part of it all.

    One huge benefit for New Generation Ministries is that the money given in Trish's honor will go to our Good Shepherd's children's village in Haiti to build a wonderful covered playground. Yes, your memorial donation in Trish's honor, will help the Good Shepherd Children's Village build a fun playground for orphans to play, be happy and enjoy themselves in, as Trish would have loved them to.

    If you would like to come along side of Trish's mother and help to build this playground, please just click on the donation button on the webpage, and help these children have a fun, safe place to play in Haiti............

Mike and Chris

Hello,

I wanted to send out another update and let you know of prayer needs.

The solar power is running great. It is so wonderful to have power 24 hours around the clock. It is such a blessing, it is hard to express. You would have to live in a place with little or no power to fully understand the appreciation we have. Dana has been here doing the follow up and will be leaving for Port-au-Prince tomorrow. He will be staying with a friend from college who lives in port and he will be flying out the next day. Please pray for safe travel and on time flight connections for him. Please pray that God blesses his socks off for all he had done for the Children’s village here in Haiti.

Sunday night we had 7 more people give their lives to the Lord. Sunday night the Madame, who was the main witch doctor that originally had control over the village of Pass Rein, came to Nathan and said she wanted to talk to him again about accepting Jesus into her life. She still has not made the commitment, but I think she may be closer if she is willing to talk about it again. Please keep her in your prayers.

School finally started Monday morning in Haiti. The Haitian government postponed the start of school by a whole month this year. It is no wonder that the country of Haiti is so oppressed. Almost everything is against them. We also started school again in Marose, Marotte, Perou and Poteau. This year we added a new school in Pass Rein. So if any of you would like to sponsor a child starting school for the first time ever, please let us know. We have a lot of unsponsored children. It is only $15 per month per child. Next week when things are a little more settled into a routine at the schools, we will take our second October team, which arrives Saturday, to visit the schools and take some photos for you. We will be passing out the school supplies you have donated to the school children. Please pray for all of the children as they settle into school, some of them for the first time. Also please pray for our second team as they fly out of Seattle on Friday and arrive here Saturday. My second oldest son and his wife will be part of the team. They are expecting their first and we are very excited to see them.

We have 11 older children going into Gonaives for High School this year. Seven are from the Children’s village and four are from our villages. Three of these children from the villages need to be sponsored, so there is lots of opportunity to help.

Praying that all of you are having a fruitful fall.

Blessings, Chris

John and Dana the brains of the system

Mike and Chris by our new solar energy system

Dana the owner of the company

"Whispered in the sounds of silence...." an old song from the 70's. 

The words I thought of to describe what I am hearing tonight.

I am sitting in the light, and it is quiet, utterly quiet. So quiet in fact that I can hear all the insects singing. Something not ever possible before. Either we had light and noise or no light and the sounds of silence. I know this does not make sense. But in all of the years I have either traveled to or lived in Haiti, light and electricity has been a scarce commodity and has always come with the noise from a generator. There is very inconsistent power available in the three largest cities. Sometimes even in Port-au-Prince the electricity from the city would be off all day and come on at 2:00 am in the morning for 3 or 4 hours. Or sometimes it would just go off and on every 20 mins or so for the whole day. Here in Marose, there is no power available and we have always depended on generator power. So it has been limited, costly and noisy. I am someone who likes to garden with no lawn mower noise or noise from any other power tools. So it took me a few minuets to figure out why I felt so peaceful. Then it dawned on me, that I could HEAR insects, which can be quite loud in the night here, AND at the same time I had LIGHT. Somehow that was never in my expectations of having solar power! It was a huge and joyous surprise. So much so that I went and got Mike, Dana and John and made them go outside and listen to "the sounds of silence". I feel soooo blessed!

The solar powered system is now completely installed and the team is spending time monitoring things. They are also teaching us how to monitor, and do maintenance.Thank you for your faithful prayers. 

Church was great this morning. Many came forward for prayer and healing. After church we took individual photos of the youth group kids (and a few adults that insisted we take their photo also). We will send the photos to their partner youth group in America, along with their letters. 

Please pray for John as now that our system is installed, he will be traveling to Port-au-Prince in the morning and flying out in the afternoon. 

Blessings,

Chris

First row of panels on

Working on the second and third rows

Installing the invertor and electrical panels

The crew installing the panels

Hello,

Today was a great day here in Haiti. Thank you so much for your faithful prayers. There were some hitches with the solar system, but all of them were able to be worked out. The team even said they were ahead of schedule this afternoon. So please continue praying that everything works great as they continue the installation process. We are so appreciative of all who have come together and given of their time, money and energy. It is such a huge blessing to us and the children. I think all of the helpers really enjoyed working together today. The solar system will be a huge blessing to the community also. With power available 24 hours a day, we will now be able to have a small refrigerator, which will allow us to do lab work and have some immunizations available. Again thanks for your prayers, they really helped today.

On another note to Lori, Philip, Brenda, Loralee, Brian T.and Brian D. Today I hiked up the mountain and was able to spend about 3 hours worshiping by myself, singing my heart out to an audience of ONE.(Normally I never get even close to that much time alone.) Thank you so much for all of the incredible music you have written and played over the years. It is so spirit led. Thank you also for the friendship and support. The last song I sang with was, "All I need, you are all I need" Thanks guys!!!!!

Many blessings,

Chris

Doing our hair

Totally engrossed in the Action Bible

One of theVBS projects

Sue and children

Becca and Sue playing with the children

Sue and Chris getting the church clothes organized

Great looking church clothes

So cute !

Feeling like princesses

Could the smiles be any bigger?  :)

Hello, 

We are so excited. Today our first team of October arrived. And thanks to them we will hopefully have a solar power system running. We have been so extremely blessed by Cookshill Community Church. They desired to bless us and chose to hold a fundraiser for a solar powered system for our Children's village. They raised enough to purchase the system and ship it to Haiti. Then Dana, who is an alternative energy engineer designed the system for the Children's village and flew here to install it.  Some prep work was done this afternoon when they arrived. Tomorrow we have two fellow missionaries who speak great Creole coming to help and learn about solar power. So we will have a crew of both Haitians and Americans working side by side. Please pray for everything to go smoothly. They have a lot to accomplish in their 10 days here. Please pray for them to be blessed as well. 

This Sunday Mike will be preaching at Pass Rein and Nathan will be leading worship. Please pray that God draws the people. We still are seeing many salvation's in Pass Rein.

We have two girls who live in Pass Rein who would like to go to high school. They have to commute daily into Gonaives to accomplish this. Pass Rein is a fairly poor area, even according to Haiti's standards. The two girls have asked us to help them with the cost of tuition, a uniform and books. I was wondering if any of you would feel led to help them. $30 per month is all that it would take to help each of these girls further their education. The majority of Haitian's never get past 6th grade. For a girl to be educated is even more rare. We would really like to see these two be able to go to high school, which is the next step for them.

Thank you so much for standing with us in prayer.

Blessings,

Chris