Thursday, March 30, 2017


Hello,
Some very good friends of ours have brought a team here from 100 Mile B.C. Canada. We are so happy to see them. They arrived Tuesday evening and had a very uneventful trip to the Children's Village. They spent Wednesday in Marose with the children. Today, Thursday we went up to the village of Bon Berger, Pass Rein and visited the school, voodoo camp, stake, villagers and property for the new church building. We spent time praying for each child and the teachers. It was a very meaningful time for the team and I think for the students also. 

Tomorrow the team will go into the market in downtown Gonaives and visit the transitional house for boys that we live in. Then tomorrow evening we will be having a crusade in Badjo. The crusade will be Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings. When Mike and Nathan were in Badjo last week a man came up to them and said that he had a piece of property that we could use or buy for a church plant in Badjo. He said we could use it for the crusade also. Nathan and Mike checked it out and it is right off the main road in Badjo and large enough for crusades. We are praying about setting up one of our tents there. Mike will be preaching tomorrow night at the crusade and then our friend Jay will be preaching Saturday evening. Please pray for open eyes, ears and hearts. Pray for healing for the hearts of the people in Badjo as they continue to morn for so many friends and family that died in the accident. Also, thanks to you we have been able to purchase 190 bibles that will be given out to the new believers in the days following the crusade. We would love to be able to purchase even more, as we believe this is just the  beginning of a revival in Badjo, Mapou and Lakou. Badjo and Lakou are two of the three voodoo villages that are internationally know for practicing voodoo. So, very much like DeForce, Pass Rein, now changed to Bon Berger, Pass Rein we have been and will continue to be breaking into the enemies territory. Please pray for us, the ministry and the hearts of the people of Badjo, Mapou and Lakou. These villages boarder the villages of Poteou and Debarriers, which we are already ministering in. They cover a 6 - 7 miles radius. We are soooo excited to see how God will move over the next three nights, thank you so much for praying. 

Blessings,
Chris

Saturday, March 18, 2017

Hello,

Thank you so much for your prayers. God is on the move. Last night we went to a church in Mapou, next to Badjo. Nathan led worship and Mike preached. There was one salvation. 

This morning at the pastors conference Mike felt like he was supposed to take the whole group of pastors and leaders to Badjo as an outreach. So we made "pen avek mamba", a type of hard roll with peanut butter. Then we drove across the river. When we were across the river we started seeing people from the funeral. This morning they had a large funeral in Gonaives, which the president attended. The president purchased coffins for each of the 46 people who died in the accident. In Badjo many of the families also had their own private funerals, which is why we started seeing people. There were about 500 people at the grave sites when we passed the cemetery  We stopped in the front of the witch doctors home that had given her life to Jesus during the accident. I explained this in the last email. There were quite a few people in her yard. We spoke to them for a while, then we asked if we could pray for the different people there. They said yes. 8 people in the yard gave their lives to the Lord. The most fun was a young man with long dreads down his back, which is usually very unacceptable here in Haiti. At first he laughed when we were praying for someone by him and said "you can't preach to me. I won't accept Jesus." Mike then noticed a black arm ribbon on his bicep. Mike asked what is was and he responded that he had gone to a voodoo camp that morning. He said it supported the people who died. Mike asked how it did this as the people were dead, he then said it couldn't but it supported him. Mike asked how it helped him? He responded it shows solidarity. After a few minutes of thinking about it he started crying and he took it off and threw it on the ground and said he wanted to accept Jesus. A huge miracle. 

Next we went to another house and met a family of Christians, we prayed for boldness for them to start reaching out to their neighbors, they were like a little light in the darkness. The mama who was very old was so full of the spirit, I loved her. They led us to another house to pray for people. And another 8 people came to the Lord there. Two tough but wonderful stories came from that household. The first was a little old man, he was 77 years old, which is very old for Haiti. He was so bent over that he was only 4 1/2 feet tall. His wife had given her heart to the Lord last Wednesday when they were there. She came running up as we came in the gate and said that we needed to pray for her husband to accept Jesus. He told us no we could not pray for him, because he had quit attending rara's and voodoo ceremonies a few years ago and he was better then Christians. We talked with him a really long time and prayed for him to be willing. Eventually he choose to pray so that " he could be in Jesus house when he died like his wife". He was such a precious little man. No teeth, but a Cheshire cat grin. 

At this same house we had a young man around 20 years old telling us "if Christ was so great why weren't we here earlier before his friend had died" He had tons of questions like that. He went on and on. He thought he was pretty tough. Finally, after a lot of talk I said I felt like God said the door is open now and it won't always be, maybe tomorrow your friends and family will be crying over you, like you are over your friend now. Kind of blunt and harsh, but he was arguing and taking the attention from others. It must have been God, he gave his life to Jesus 5 minuets later. In all 16 people gave their lives to the Lord today. 

Please keep praying we are trying to follow God's leading, it feels like another Pass Rein, Bon Berger. God is sooooo good.

Blessings,
Chris 

Wednesday, March 15, 2017

Wow!!!

God is on the move in Badjo. Many miracles happened this morning. Thank you SO much for your faithful prayers.

Mike, Nathan and the team headed to Badjo this morning, they were going to start with visiting a friend of Nathan's and see where God led after that. But on the way they passed an older women sitting all by herself in her front yard. Nathan stopped the truck and waited and then said he felt like God wanted them to stop and talk to her. So they did, they explained that they just wanted to comfort the people who had lost loved ones in the accident. Her response was absolutely amazing. 

This is her story. She said that she was the main witch doctor over Badjo and she was at the Rara and involved in the accident. As I had said earlier when buses hit people they take off, if they stay witnesses usually try to burn the buses, many times with the people still in it. And they kill the driver. So just 3 blocks early the bus had already hit 2 pedestrians, killing one of them. So the bus was trying to get away and had turned its lights off and was not using it's horn to warn people it was coming through. The witch doctor said that for some reason  she turned towards the direction the bus was coming, she said the bus came with no lights and no horn. She said the bus came within a few feet of her and she watched it hit and kill many people, as she looked up she said she saw Jesus and that he revealed himself to her. She said that at that moment she renounced satan and voodoo and rara and told him that she wanted to accept Jesus in her heart. As Mike and Nathan  talked with her she shared that her son died in the accident. Mike said he was given words for her that she would be influential for God in the community, like she had been for satan and voodoo. Then another women, her daughter said she wanted to accept Jesus. After they shared with them awhile, Nathan asked if there was somewhere else they should go? She said go out the gate in her back yard, anyone they ran into would have family that had died in the accident.

So they started walking and a young girl called to them and said please don't go, there are two women over here that want to give their lives to Jesus. So they went to talk with them. One of them had a mangled eye from being beaten by her husband, who had died in the accident. Both of them accepted the Lord. 

They then walked another block and talked to a family, which Mike said was the hardest to talk to, because of their hurting and sorrow. They had lost 4 family members in the accident. The older lady there shared that they had lost 3 teenage grandsons and her son, who was husband and father to some of the people there. 8 different people gave their hearts to the Lord.

They walked a block and came to another house, where a family had also lost 4 family members. They had lost 2 older grandchildren, a husband and an uncle. The older lady that was talking with them said that she was also a witch doctor and said when she heard that her family had died in the accident she right then and there said never again, she was done with satan, voodoo and rara's, and she gave her heart to Jesus, all by herself, just between her and God. 

Both the first and fourth family said that Mike and Nathan could not leave them. That they needed them to stay and help. They begged Nathan and Mike to start a church and show them how to live differently. 

God's spirit is moving, it is exploding in Badjo, today there were 26 salvations in a 3 block area. Please pray for wisdom and discernment. We do not have an extra pastor to send to Badjo, they will need bibles and people to walk beside them and be the hands and feet of Jesus. Right now the biggest need is for someone to come alongside Mike and Nathan and be mentored to pastor this community. Also they will need bibles. A full Haitian Creole bible is $10. We would also like to be able to reach out to the community and feed them, as they work through their grief, much like we would bring meals to a grieving family stateside or in Canada. We would appreciate help in these areas. Please come alongside of us and help us reach out to the people of Badjo. Please help us be the hands and feet of Jesus. The death toll is up to 46 people now and this is from a very small village, where almost everyone has lost someone.

Thank you and blessings,
Chris

Tuesday, March 14, 2017

Some of the pastors and leaders praying over Hendor.

Prayer needed for outreach to bus accident families

Hello,

We wanted to thank you for praying. We have felt your prayer covering. Mike took Hendor to the airport in Port-au-Prince  early yesterday morning. Again the trip was uneventful. Things seemed to have calmed down a bit politically . Having Hendor here was such a blessing. Saturday morning Hendor spent time with Mike at the pastors conference encouraging and praying for the pastors. He also spent time with the boys in the Children's Village teaching them how to play flag football. In the late afternoon we hiked through the rain, mud and river to baptize 5 people, one of which was from our Children's Village. Baptisms are always fun here in Haiti. There is singing, praying, crossing rivers, joy and laughter, it definitely is an event. On Sunday morning Hendor preached in Pass Rein and ministered. God touched a lot of people. Sunday night was the last night of the crusade in Marose. It was a great night of worship. Hendor preached again and did ministry. It was his last night preaching and some of the pastors felt led to pray over him.

We also wanted to up date you on the accident in Mapou involving people living mostly in Badjo. Our churches have been reaching out to them. Monday evening one of the witch doctors from the Rara, whose nephew was killed by the bus called Nathan and said he was tired of living the way he had been and wanted to give his heart to Jesus. Such good news!!

We also have an outreach tomorrow morning (Wednesday) in Badjo. We will be holding a worship and prayer time. Along with this we will be serving food as an outreach to the families. We have a teen challenge group that arrived today and they will be helping with the outreach. They will also be sharing their testimonies in Pass Rein tomorrow night. Please be praying for the outreach and the testimony sharing. 

Also we need prayer for this coming Friday evening, as Nathan will be preaching in Mapou, one of the villages next to Badjo. This cluster of villages are know for voodoo and are even advertised in travel magazines as a place to experience voodoo ceremonies. It is totally God that has opened this door, Please pray for soft hearts, open spirits and for God to move.

Thank you so very much for all of your prayers, they ARE moving mountains. 

Blessings,
Chris


Sunday, March 12, 2017

Hendor preaching at the crusade last night.

Hendor praying in Bon Berger, Pass Rien.


Praying!

Praying!

Praying after preaching.

Hendor and I witnessing to some children as we walked around
Bon Berge, Pass Rein,
the boy in the blue jacket gave his life to the Lord.

One of our boys getting ready to be baptized.


Hendor crossing the river for the baptism.

Five chose to be baptized today.

Hendor and Mike baptizing.

And again.

Hello,

I am writing to request prayer for a couple of events today. The first being a really bad accident happening around 3:00 AM last night. The buses here in Haiti just plow down the main highway at high speeds and honk instead of slow down for cars, motorcycles or pedestrians. As we have shared in the past Carnival is the start of a season of more intense voodoo celebrations leading up to Good Friday, which the people practicing voodoo call Bad Friday. One of the most popular ways to to celebrate is to have a RaRa. Typically they start in the afternoon as a parade that involves music, alcohol and a few whips. But late evening RaRa dissolves into a mob type parade with wild music, voodoo chanting, sexual immorality, violence and most people involved are very drunk. There are vendors with wheel barrows full of alcohol following along with the RaRa. Alcohol being given to anyone regardless of age.
So by the middle of the night most of the people are in no shape to be thinking straight. Well last night one of the buses came barreling through a RaRa in Badjo a village know for its voodoo. Badjo is a small village right next to the village of Debarriers, where we have a church. I don't think either village is more then a few square miles. They are so close to each other it is hard to know where one ends and the other starts. This bus never stopped, going full speed it ran into the people in the RaRa. First reports before 6AM were 23 dead. The main highway to Cap Haitian was blocked off. By 12 noon the highway was open, but with remnants from the accident. The death toll is now at 39. The photos coming in from people we know are very gruesome. The bus hit them head on and plowed through the crowd. The bus headed straight for the police station, most likely to avoid problems. Drivers in the past have been dragged out, killed, and then the bus set on fire. The most horrific part of this is that the crowd was dancing for satan, so most likey they are not with Jesus right now. So please pray for the families, friends and whoever was involved with what happened in front of their eyes, from the photos I can not even begin to imagine the horror they saw. Also this will mean parents not coming home to little children ever again. We have asked three of our churches that surround this village, all within a few miles, Marose across the river from Badjo and Debarriers and Poteou bordering Badjo, to go and pray for the families and people involved. We have asked them to look at this as outreach and to not judge the people that were at the RaRa. Please pray for our congregations that they will reach out and in a healing way.

Our Pastors and congregations are also inviting people from the area to the final night of our crusade in Marose. Pray that God will use the circumstances of last night to heal and draw more people to him. The main witch doctor at the RaRa was witnessed to by Pastor Nathan just last week and he told Nathan "later Nathan later". I hate hearing a witch doctor say those words, it usually means it is his last chance to accept Jesus.

Thank you so much for your prayers, we really need them.

Blessings,
Chris

Friday, March 10, 2017

Hello,

We wanted to update you on what is going on. We thoroughly enjoyed having our friend Sue here in Haiti. She blessed us and just spent time loving and encouraging our family. It was wonderful and needed. 

Yesterday, Mike picked up another friend, Hendor, who's ministry is called King of Hearts, from the airport. We want to thank you for your prayer covering this trip to Port-au-Prince was uneventful, which was nice. Hendor and Mike spent today visiting some of our schools and villages that we work with. Tonight he preached at our crusade in Marose. There were about 250 people there. The ministry time was really good, many people were ministered too. God was showing Hendor certain people to call forward for healing and encouragement. There was one miraculous healing. 

Hendor will be preaching again during the crusade tomorrow evening. Also he will preach in Bon Berger, Pass Rein Sunday morning and then again Sunday evening in Marose at the crusade. We would really appreciate your prayers for open hearts, and for the Holy Spirit to move.

Again thank you so much for your prayers we really appreciate them.

Blessings,
Chris

Friday, March 3, 2017


Hello,

Hope all of you are doing well, enjoying your snowy winter. 

Our good friend Sue Bennett arrived today. We are so excited to see have her here in Haiti with us.

You may be asking what do rocks, flat tires, manifestations, births and prayer have to do with each other. Well let me share part of Mike and Sue's day with you. It started for Sue late last night as she boarded the red-eye flight out of Seattle. It started for Mike this morning at 5:30 a.m. with a flat tire just outside our gate.The roads are so bad in the areas we minister that we go through a set of tires every 5-6 months. These tires were 3 months old. After getting our older boys off to school and changing the tire, he headed to Port. When we head to Port we usually run some errands, as a lot of items are only available in Port. The first errand of the day was closed, after the second errand of the day he headed towards the embassy, it took him 1 hour to travel 2 miles, then another hour to travel the two miles back, it was during this second 1 hour trip that he had another flat tire, he pulled up on the sidewalk to change it and traffic had moved so slowly that he entered back in line almost where he left off. There was a taptap in front of him (basically a mini pickup brightly colored that people hop on and off of and use as a group taxi, tapping on it to tell the driver to stop) Mike glanced into the open back of the taptap and realized there was a man holding a women up from behind her and she was giving birth. She has been riding in the back of this taptap in labor while stuck in traffic and the baby was not going to wait any longer. Mike got out of his truck to tell curious on lookers to keep walking and also check to see if she was okay, then he glanced around and realized that if the taptap went up on the sidewalk where he had changed his tire previously then he could drive faster and get the lady to some help, so he told the driver his idea and the driver took off down the sidewalk. Mike's next destination then became the tire store. After getting 4 new tires, he picked Sue up at the airport. There are strict road rules here in Haiti "any direction, any speed, any part of the road", it is always interesting getting out of town. "Haiti is the ultimate defensive driving school." 

This is when things really became exciting and we were thankful for your prayer coverage. About 1/2 way home there is a town know for its political oppositions and they were having a peaceful protest. There were a lot of police out trying diligently to keep things calm and let the protesters voice their views, but as Mike and Sue got close things instantly escalated out of control and the police realized they needed to show some force or there would be a full scale riot. So 6 to 8 policemen raised their guns and began shooting into the air. Mike and Sue were only about 50 feet away, instantly most of the protesters scattered and ran for cover. But many of them turned to throw huge rocks back at the police or at whatever was in front of them, including at Mike and Sue in the truck. A friend recognized Mike and jumped into the truck to help him find a safe way out of the manifestation. After a few blocks of traveling on the highway he decided it looked clear and got back out of the truck. In a few more blocks Mike could see ahead that they had overturned a bus across the road and were setting it on fire. Mike sped forward around some trucks thinking he would escape the problem, but could then see some men causing a truck at gun point to stop sideways in the road to make another road block with fire. He then realized they were going to be stuck between the two vehicles and there were  more angry men throwing rocks trying to block the road off and a row of tires going across the road, which would be lit. He quickly pulled over onto a gravel road going up a mountain. This took them way out of their way, but eventually with the help of some of the local kids (angels in disguise, Mike said) they found their way back to the main highway. The road was clear and they were free to travel.

Mike said during the manifestation Sue was asking questions and said that she wasn't afraid. I know this probably doesn't surprise  those of you who know Sue :) God was obviously in control and He knows who can handle what. We are soooo thankful for your faithful covering in prayer. Tonight Sue said with a smile it was a memory that she will not forget. Please pray that God continues to protect and bless her visit here with us. And thank you once again for your prayers. 

Blessings,
Chris