Do you ever wonder what the money you are sending to missions organizations is being spent on? Sure, we trust that the dollars given are being used to further the Gospel, but isn’t it cool to get the updates on the reality of the day in day out life of missions and what your dollars did? As our career partner, Stephanie Taylor, asks for support for her next five years in Haiti, she shared on her blog what people’s support enabled in the last year of her ministry in Haiti. As we are thankful for her continued ministry and commitment to CPR-3 and Haiti, we’d love for you to see how God has worked through her and CPR-3. As such, here’s a re-posting of her blog:
Last year, your money…
established relationships all over Cabaret as I lived at Shernando, then Bercy as I both worked – then moved – in the Sant Mouvman. Relationships also started to take root in Canaan and Labourdie in the meantime as I spent lots of personal time in partner communities.
Your monthly partnership gave Nadia someone to pour into her, and Maxon someone to take him to the doctor – it also sent him to the doctor, paid for the medicine, and paid for all the moto rides.
Your dollar – literally, your one dollar – grins at the street boy who sells water all day in the heat of the Cabaret and gives him a little extra for those three plastic bags.
Your money put someone in the kitchen to listen to Louis about her life and remind her that she is loved in it all. Louis accepted Christ on Valentine’s Day, which is one of my favorite details because the representation of true love.
Your money walked to the back of Bercy and sat down on an upside down aluminum can as a chair under a banana leaf roof that created a gathering area outside of Simon’s home. God used what you sent to use a broken vessel for his glory, with his Holy Spirit guiding a young woman blown away as Simon looked at her saying, “Aren’t you going to pray with me to accept Christ today?” in the midst of crosses, hanging bottles, and blue paint all over the sides of the home.
When Janine, the neighbor that God placed right next to the Sant Mouvman, breaks her strong exterior as she’s at a loss for what to do in the midst of school fees, God is using the work from your hands to provide the simple 1000 gourde – 20 American Dollars – that she cannot imagine finding in time. Maybe you give up exactly that amount each month, and God is using it to pour into Janine, Kiki, Gina, Bethsaida, and the rest of their family for five more years as a result – pouring into them not just spiritually but physically, like Christ.
God used sacrifices in lives of those who gave them, in church members who came on teams, and in those who only hear about God’s work through a simple blog updated when the Holy Spirit is stirring a topic. God used those same sacrifices – or for some they weren’t even sacrifices, but just changes in spending priorities – to break through to young women who seemed to be closed off forever.
He let me watch Wes grow up and sit with Juslaine (Ti probably making him grin as she still sticks to being stubbornly silent in the personality he stitched together if I show up with anyone more than just myself.
God provided for over thirty children in Haiti through the sponsorship program that Amanda and I helped get off the ground the past school year and he pushed the miracle tree that he created into families with the orange hair of malnutrition.
God uses the day to day, from walks to the moto to get to market to sitting on the tap-tap visiting with Friegal while waiting for teams (who just accepted Christ in June!) as we give the money and resources he gave us back to him.
Contact Stephanie at steph2haiti@gmail.com