Just Another Mission Post

We went some places and did some things. 

We did this and we did that next. Then we had lunch, did some more stuff and came back for spaghetti.

Thus your classic mission blog begins. Usually about where the average reader ends their interest and skips back to Facebook to see if the friend from Ohio put up the new pictures of their child.

Not today. Because each of the members of my mission team, and all of the people with whom we spent time deserve much better.

Chronology matters in this narrative only in that it frames what we learned to love about Haiti today. Our morning on the road was slowed down with some vehicle issues. Unlike many groups I’ve spent time with on this planet, in other times, and other uniforms, this did not result in endless kvetching and eye-rolling. People laughed, looked at the pristine sky, and chatted with each other while we waited for the translators to take care of our vehicle. Good guys, every one of them. Excellent drivers, sheep dogs when wolves approach, and friends to share a joke with during the moments between moments. 

This is my second trip to Haiti. Not my last. I was greeted with smiles and hugs from all of them. Evidently tales had been told, because the ones who had just started all seemed to know about me. Reserving comment on that: I’m honored and nervous.

Time now encroached on the mission. That doesn’t change if you’re flying bombers over Nazi Germany, making stops at orphanages, or driving the kids to hockey practice. Our leaders are good ones. They sought our opinion, weighed it and decided. Bad leaders move by consensus regardless of the situation. Our leaders did the right thing. Maybe not in my opinion, but theirs. I appreciate that and love them for it all the more.

We did the full core workout today: bouncing on bad roads in the back of the van will do that: you have to use every muscle in your core to stay on the just-not-wide-enough bench and avoid smashing into the person next to you, or the grab rail just above your head. Your team will catch you/cushion you as you roll around. Mutual defense through mutual contact.

Now to the point. Glistening soap bubbles floated toward the palm trees lining the orphanage as the snow-cones amped up the sugar level in our blood. Not one child was  alone in the night, nor were we. We loved the time together, the bounding soccer ball and the cracking jump-rope. Small children, 64 year old retirees, and twenty-something men and women who had more in common than most families: Jesus Christ.

Mutual respect, loving kindness, and joy reigned supreme from the breakfast table to the diesel smoke clogged highways. Spiritual love and blessings went right along side of the squeezable apple sauce. Peace and joy occupied the knees of middle-aged men as children sat upon them in search of solace.

So, while we did go places and do things, we mainly were the hands and feet of Christ.

That made it a perfect day.------Joe