Uncategorized – Page 4 – Hope Rising Children’s Home

Hope for Haiti?

In a country where there is 85% unemployment I wonder how people survive. The minimum wage in Haiti was recently raised from $4.44 to $5.00 a day. So 15% of Haiti is making $5 a day. How do they live? “A recently published report by Solidarity, the nonprofit affiliate of the American Center for International…

Substitutions

One thing I constantly struggle with in Haiti is cooking. It never fails that every time I make a grocery list and go to the store they only have 1/3 of what was on my list and that’s if I’m lucky. So I have gotten pretty good at substituting. Easy substitutes are instead of pinto…

Tired and Weary

As we have been busy with teams, construction, and the move of Pastor Julbenson and his family we have certainly felt physically tired and weary. Or probably more accurately stated, just completely exhausted. We get emails, messages, and phone calls reminding us to take it easy, get some rest, don't grow tired and weary, even…

A lady named Eleanor

About a year ago we had a team doing door to door evangelism who ran into a paralyzed, almost blind woman. That woman made such an impression on this team that they had asked me to check back in on her for them. A few weeks later we had another team so I went with…

Persistence

God has been teaching me for awhile now on the importance of being persistent, but this week He has allowed me to start seeing the effects of persistence. It started with a study in Luke on the parable of the persistent woman and the judge. Then while in the states our interim pastor told the…

We’re All in this Together

One thing I have been so encouraged by in Haiti is the way other organizations work together to accomplish the most for God’s Kingdom. In the states I would see many organizations, churches, ministries, all competing not collaborating. Just this week we have worked with 5 other organizations that I can think of off the…

A Call to Fast

Have you ever had something so unexpected happen in your life that you just can't eat? Have you ever thought of that feeling as a call to fast? I never had until recently.I had always seen what I call “planned fasts”, where an individual or church makes the decision to fast and pray over something…

Lesson Learned

Many of you have heard this story, but I wanted to write it down as something to look back on. People continue to tell me “you need to write this down” or “I hope you are writing all this down”. Well, I have not been so I may be playing catch up these next few…

Not what I expected

We have been living in Haiti full-time over a year now and all I can say is….it's not what I expected. The only realistic expectation one can be certain of in Haiti is to expect the unexpected. Matt and I both felt God calling us to Haiti for the purpose of discipleship but we have yet…

The story of Joel

We often get questions about the large age distance between our middle child and our youngest son Joel. So I thought I would share the story. Matt only wanted two kids. I reluctantly submitted and he had a successful vasectomy when Dean was a little over a year old. About 3 years later I felt…