Our purpose in life.

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles.  And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.  For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”  Hebrews 12:1-2   Ash Wednesday has come and gone a few weeks ago and it reminds me that Easter is fast approaching; it causes me to think about the death and resurrection of Jesus.  The real purpose of His life was to offer Himself as a sacrifice for our sins, for the sins of mankind.  Jesus became sin for us so that we could be forgiven and found sparkling clean in the eyes of our Heavenly Father.  Jesus knew His purpose on this earth and he predicted when and how it would happen in Matthew 26:2.  

Do you know your purpose as your journey continues?  Luther would probably say our purpose is to love and joyfully serve the Triune God.  If you have read Rick Warren’s ‘Purpose Driven Life’ you may have a more laid out course that you feel matches your God given talents.  The verses in Hebrew 12 direct us to fix our eyes upon Jesus, the perfecter of our faith; Jesus looked beyond the cross and focused on the joy that would be for us.  

The attached photo is pure joy.  This girl is holding up her plate of happiness and giving thanks.  The Bible teaches that there is great joy in heaven whenever a sinner repents and my human mind thinks that there is also a great shout of joy when over 30,000 children in Haiti receive a plate of food that will bring energy to their life as they go out into their neighborhoods sharing the Gospel message of their Savior who died and rose on Easter Sunday.  

What is your purpose; what is her purpose?  Our awesome Triune God gives us many opportunities to share the news of His only Son, our Savior with the lost in this world.  We have been given an opportunity to share of our abundance with a generation of believers in Haiti who will in turn bring the Cross to the lost.  Your purpose and her purpose can be one in the same; that is a God thing.  Thank you for your continued support of these Trinity/HOPE feeding programs.     

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay

Do His work.

“As long as it is day, we must do the works of him who sent me.  Night is coming, when no one can work.”   John 9:4  

Trinity/HOPE school feeding programs are all about school children; they are the future missionaries in Haiti.  Their Christian witness in Haitian Creole is far superior to anything that a blan North American could say or do in their neighborhoods; ‘go and make disciples’ pertains the work that we are called to do and they are called to do.  Most of the time you see the photos of the children studying, eating, playing and smiling and there are a core of individuals whose importance sometimes gets left in the background.   

In the attached photo are two teachers at Bon Berger Lutheran School in Caredeux.  The woman on the right is one of my favorite teachers, Sylvia, Pastor Thomas Bernard’s sister and I was delighted to see her in March 2010 and know that she and her family survived the quake.  While traveling throughout Haiti visiting schools it was interesting to find that many of the teachers returned to the small schools where they had attended as children to become teachers and principals after they received their teaching certificates.  Their journey certainly provided hope to the students who sit in the classroom wondering about their future.  They will prayerfully share the news of our risen Savior with the lost and perhaps return to their roots and also share their lessons of life with the next generation.

Teachers; my mom was a school teacher in Seward County before she became a farm wife and raised my sister and me, teaching us life’s lessons.  When teachers go to Haiti on a mission team with me, it is always a comfort to have them along as they interact with the children so much better than I do.  They share the love of Christ through songs and crafts and that leaves time for me to do the mundane tasks, checklists and interviewing the children.  

I never thought about interviewing the teachers in the same manner as the children are asked about their eating habits away from school, but hope to do that more often when I return to Haiti.  Looking at the smiles on the teachers faces, it would seem that they could be your next door neighbor but their lives are much different.  They too eat a Trinity/HOPE lunch and are probably just as thankful as the children at their school to have a meal every day they are in school.  

Thank you for your continued support of these programs.  When you pray for the children attending Christian schools in Haiti, please remember to add the dedicated teachers and principals as well to your daily petitions as they are an integral part of His divine work in the lives of the children in Haiti.  

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay

Living in darkness.

“Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.”  Psalm 51:7  

To the Christians who have lived in Haiti all of their lives, the reference to ‘snow’ in Psalm 51 is truly foreign to them.  Probably 90 percent of Haiti does not have electricity in their homes and the only way for them to get close to anything cold as snow is to purchase ice from a street vendor; man-made ice in a ten pound solid block or perhaps a small plastic bag with a pound of cubes.  Snow, a gift from God, is something that is very distant from them.  

When North Americans travel to Haiti and visit schools and worship on Sunday, they are always amazed at how brilliantly white and clean the children’s clothes appear.  The Haitian teachers, principals and pastors are asked what kind of detergent they use through an interpreter and their question too is foreign because the Haitians just use plain soap that typically has no brand, just a small plastic bag of white soap.  Again, they don’t have electricity, they don’t have Laundromats but they do have and ample supply of time, energy and rivers and canals.  

Lori Wolfe-Beerenstrauch from Lincoln, NE captured the attached photo of a woman doing her laundry in a canal near Gonaives.  This woman is cleansing each garment with a small quantity of soap and an ample supply of elbow grease.  Everything is there, wash water, rinse water, the wringer and the drier is on the rocks behind her.  While living in Haiti I preferred to use Woollite on my laundry in the small bathroom sink and was blessed with a clothesline on the top of my apartment where the Haitian sun would dry my clothes.  Nobody ever stopped to ask me how I got my clothes so clean; guess I used the wrong brand of soap.  

The children attending the Lutheran and Christian schools in Gonaives learn about washing clothes and also about the washing of their sins through Baptism.  Their sins are washed away by the blood of Jesus Christ; they are whiter than snow.  Thank you for supporting their Christian education in Haiti as they take their daily Scripture lessons to the lost into neighborhoods where the lost reside and still live in darkness.     

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.   May God be with you…Jay

Worship in Haiti.

“O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.  Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving, and make a joyful noise unto him with psalms.  For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods.  In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also.  The sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.  O come, let us worship and bow down: let us kneel before the LORD our maker.  For he is our God; and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.”  Psalm 95:1-7 (KJV)  

For those of you baby-boomers who grew up Lutheran, you probably recognize these verses from the Liturgy of decades ago.  There were a few Lutheran churches in Haiti that sang that song in French, and it was a joy that I could sing along in English as they sang in French and it caused me to think about what Heaven will be like; all singing praise to our Creator in one language together.  

Worship in Haiti is slightly different than in North America.  We both share in common the Liturgies, Lord’s Prayer, Confession and Absolution, the proclamation of our faith through reciting the Creeds and the Sacrament of Baptism and Holy Communion.  Sermons are much longer, choirs sing more songs, Sunday school children and adults recite their Scripture reading at the beginning of the Church service…and did I mention that the sermons were much longer?  

I heard a song recently about singing praise to the Lord on a Gospel station on the satellite radio and it caused me to think about Haiti.  It was called “God wants to hear you sing” and was written by Rodney Griffin.  

“Their chains were fastened tight down at the jail that night.  Still Paul and Silas would not be dismayed they said, “It’s time to lift our voice, sing praises to the Lord, let’s prove that we will trust Him come what may.”  

The attached photo was taken years ago near Cap Haitian as people were traveling to Church, getting ready to lift their voices and sing praises to the Lord.  I have yet to see people come to my Church in Bloomington, packed into the back of a pickup.  When I would drive my truck to church at Bon Berger in Caredeux there would usually be six church members in the cab and another twelve in the back.  There are many differences between Sunday in Haiti and Sunday in North America.  

“God wants to hear you sing, when the waves are crashing ’round you, when the fiery darts surround you, when despair is all you see.  God wants to hear your voice when the wisest man has spoken and says, “Your circumstance is as hopeless as can be.”  That’s when God wants to hear you sing, He loves to hear our praise on our cheerful days when the pleasant times outweigh the bad, by far.  But when suffering comes along and we still sing Him songs; that is when we bless the Father’s heart.”  

Singing praise to the Lord, good times and sad, He loves to hear us sing.  God loves to hear the children you are supporting in Haiti sing praises of their creator, redeemer and comforter throughout Haiti to the lost in their neighborhoods.       

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay

My thorn.

“Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the truth.  But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted by what I do or say, or because of these surpassingly great revelations.  Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me.”  2 Corinthians 12:6-7  

God does not promise any of us a care-free life like some of the celebrities in North America seem to be enjoying every day.  “Why?” we are tempted to ask.  Only God can know all the reasons, but according to this scripture reading, it is sometimes God’s way of forcing us to depend upon Him; that is a tough pill for this North American to swallow on some days.  Tornadoes roared through Nashville early yesterday morning and left two dozen dead, many injured and much damage in four counties.  I saw a video of a United Methodist Church that was destroyed and a house nearby didn’t appear to have any damage; “why?”.  

Paul tells us that God purposefully allowed satan to torment him.  The Bible teaches us that satan is like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour and therefore, we may assume that he is allowed to attack many of God’s children here in North America, in Haiti, in Nepal and throughout this world. I don’t ever recall at this moment, what Paul’s particular ‘thorn’ may have been.  When I see the word ‘thorn’ it reminds me of what my ancient feet seem to touch every morning when I arise.  It seems that perhaps this ‘thorn’ in Corinthians may be more about pride.  We in North America have many thorns to deal with; what happens to be “Number One” this year, new boat, new house, new gold watch; and the list goes on and on, we are proud of so many things.   Not every thorn has to do with pride, but perhaps more do than we would like to admit. Regardless of the reason, this we can know; God will not allow thorns to afflict His children without first there being a divine reason.  But what we need most to understand is that God’s reason is not for the purpose of punishment, but rather for the purpose of provision.  

The attached photo is a stark reminder for me; to give thanks for where I live, what I have and most importantly ‘Who’ made all this possible.  This woman near Gonaives holding two small children does not have very much of the ‘stuff’ that we have in North America.  I cannot imagine hearing her boast about anything, but I can tell you that when she receives a blessing from you, it is as if God placed the energy bar into her hand instead of you.  Why can’t my ‘thank you’ be like her “THANK YOU?”  Satan must be smiling as we wallow in our wealthy ways and seldom give thanks to God for all that we have, the words may be in our mouth but our hearts have difficulty embracing how blessed we truly are by his providence every day.  Please don’t doubt my sincerity when I thank you for supporting feeding programs in Haiti.  The over 30,000 children thank you and will see you one day in Heaven where there will no longer be any thorns in your side or in their lives as they run to hug you.  

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay

Feed My sheep.

“When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?”   “Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.”  Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.”  Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”  He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”  Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.”  The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”  Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.”  Jesus said, “Feed my sheep.  Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.”  Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, “Follow me!”  John 21:15-20  

A few simple truths from our Savior; ‘seek and save the lost, feed my sheep and follow me!’  When you travel to Haiti with a Trinity/HOPE mission team, you will see living evidence of these instructions from our Savior.  You will see the vodou flags in the neighborhoods and know that the presence of satan is within your reach.  You can see it, smell it and hear it in their neighborhoods; it has been there since Haiti became a country and continues to try to lure His children into the snares set with lies and fear.  

When you visit one of the over 140 Christian schools throughout Haiti with a Trinity/HOPE feeding program you will sense the need to ‘feed my sheep’ as you see the children who are not eating daily bread and hear their responses to the questions; “did you have anything to eat last night before bed or this morning before school?”  There is no fridge in their home with meat, bread and cheese or cupboards with pop tarts and cookies.  Their families live from day to day not knowing if there will be food on the table.   When you witness their class learning about the Apostles Creed, or listen to their meal prayers you will better understand the pressing command to ‘follow me!’  These are the children who will be the next generation of missionaries in Haiti, taking the love of their Savior out into the streets and pathways, sharing the message of salvation with the lost.  

The girls in the attached photo are from Ouanaminthe and they are receiving one of the over 30,000 meals that were being served throughout Christian schools on this particular day in October.  Over thirty thousand of His lambs were fed on this day and will be fed tomorrow and the next day.  Their strong voices will spread His words, “follow me!” to the ears that have not heard that message and voices silenced by the lies of the vodou priest.  Thank you for sharing in this miracle by supporting their mission to seek and save the lost.  

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay

Adversity.

“Then the King will say to those on His right, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the Kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.” Matthew 25:34  

How do you prepare for adversity?  How do you react to the highest of hurdles that present themselves along your journey?  When the dim flashes of upcoming problems become brilliant lightning bolts of tragedy into your life; where do you find strength?  

Life’s challenges that take us from our comfort zones are somewhat different to an adult living in North America than to a child living in Haiti.  We can certainly try to prepare ourselves for such times, but we don’t want to because we would rather not experience these stressful times ahead.   While we hope for the best, we also need to prepare ourselves spiritually, physically and emotionally for the worst of times that may catch us off guard.  

The children and this old man in the attached photo are in Ouanaminthe; enjoying the shade of the tree in the school yard, enjoying a time of merriment; a game of patty cake that breaks all language barriers and fills that void with endless smiles and contagious flowing streams of laughter.  Enjoying life on this planet under the shade of a tree; together in the shadow of the tree and also together in the shadow of the cross of Christ.  

In my preparation for unforeseen problems in North America, and as this child prepares for her future challenges in Haiti; together we stand at the foot of the cross, in the shade thinking about why God has placed us here and praying that no matter what happens to us, we are always under His care and watchful eye.  And, when the days are over and our journeys have been completed, we have the promise of a heavenly home which was prepared for us since the beginning of time.  

Until then we labor and continue to do His work, seeking and saving the lost by whatever means He has empowered us.  Thank you for being there for them, under that tree, in that shadow, responding to His call by blessing their life with your prayers, your blessings of a feeding program and your encouragement.  We all have different callings in our own journey; thank you for being such an integral part of these children in Ouanaminthe.   

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay

Prayer guide for March 2, 2020

We begin our prayer time in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. + Amen.  

Isaiah 1:15-17: “When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you; even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening.  Your hands are full of blood!  Wash and make yourselves clean.  Take your evil deeds out of my sight; stop doing wrong.  Learn to do right; seek justice.  Defend the oppressed.  Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.” ‘

Adoration’

Psalm 27:4; “One thing I ask from the Lord, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.”  

God created the earth and the universe and this month is typically the beginning of the rainy season in Haiti and many gardeners and farmers in the Artibonite, Les Cayes and Plateau Central always give thanks for this time of year when the Heavens open and refill their cisterns and replenish the ground moisture; ain’t God good?  Our God is indeed good and while we consider all of His majesty, we need to place at the top of our list of wonders the fact that He has forgiven our sins.     

A time of ‘Adoration’ to our Heavenly Father.    

Please take time to sit and consider how our Triune God comes to us through His ‘WORD’ every day and how He has impacted your life.

Think about the provisions, protection and love that surround you because of His unfailing love for you.

Give thanks for where God has placed you and the gifts that you were given to use for Him along your journey.  

‘Confession’

Psalm 51; “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.  Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.  For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.  Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight; so you are right in your verdict and justified when you judge.  Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.  Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb; you taught me wisdom in that secret place.  Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.  Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.  Hide your face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity.  Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.  Do not cast me from your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me.  Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me.  Then I will teach transgressors your ways, so that sinners will turn back to you.  Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God, you who are God my Savior, and my tongue will sing of your righteousness.  Open my lips, Lord, and my mouth will declare your praise.  You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.  My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart you, God, will not despise.  May it please you to prosper Zion, to build up the walls of Jerusalem.  Then you will delight in the sacrifices of the righteous, in burnt offerings offered whole; then bulls will be offered on your altar.”

We were born, sinful and unclean, through no fault of our own, but because of the sins of our parents, grandparents…Adam and Eve.  God sent His only Son to die for our sins. Jesus did everything right while he was here on this earth. He loves you with a love that cannot be measured.  He gave to the world when no thanks were returned to Him.  He healed when there was no hope, and He died without complaint.  Jesus did nothing wrong and everything right; all this for you.  He lived for you and died for you.  Our sins nailed Him to the cross on Calvary and kept Him there until His life on earth had ended.

A time of personal confession. Our sins are placed at the base of the cross...His cross, and we give thanks that the times we have fallen short in the eyes of our Heavenly Father have been washed clean and we have been forgiven through the Blood of our Risen Savior Jesus Christ.  

‘Thanksgiving’

Our brothers and sisters living in Haiti are thankful for the lapli (rain) that comes in March.  School children walking to school bring their umbrellas and ponchos to protect them and their homework from the moisture.  We are thankful for the return of calmer conditions in the larger cities in Haiti and for the plans being made by TrinityHope to send Mission Teams to Haiti in the coming months.

1 Corinthians 11:23-25; “The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.”  In the same way after supper, he took the cup saying, “This is the new covenant in my blood; do this whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.”  Now may this true body and blood of our risen Lord and Savior Jesus Christ strengthen and keep you in the true faith until life everlasting.  Amen.”

Heavenly Father, we come to You now with hearts, minds and words filled with ‘Thanksgiving’.” We give thanks for our Creator, Redeemer and Holy Spirit.

We give thanks for having a Savior who gave His life for our sinfulness; “your sins are forgiven”.

We give thanks our providence; monetary, food, clothing, moisture and shelter.  As we give of our first fruits may we also give a portion of our best to His children in Haiti who need the assistance we can provide.

We give You thanks for the Haitian children who are not only the prime purpose of Trinity/HOPE but also Your missionaries for the future generations in Haiti who bring the true message of the season of Lent to lives who have never known.

We give You thanks for the work that is being accomplished by the Haitian parents, teachers, school principals and Feeding Program Directors who are shaping the lives of young Haitian children this school year.

We give You thanks for the directions and implementation of the restructuring of our Board of Directors.  May our increased efficiency feed more children and prepare more missionaries.  ‘

Supplications’

The timely rains that come from Our Triune God are so appreciated by people living in Haiti as it benefits their gardens and crops and the promise of more food on the table and at the local market.  With the additional moisture comes mud into the schools with dirt floors and more laundry for mom.  More time and energy will be needed to gather another bucket of water to hand scrub shoes and socks so their children will appear respectable when the walk to school and begin another day  Too often we fail to understand how blessed we are with our day to day blessings and need to stop and consider what the parents of these young missionaries are going through to prepare their sons and daughters who are living in challenging times; taking His Light into the darkness of their neighborhoods.

Romans 8:26-28; “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness.  We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans.  And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.  And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” Heavenly Father, we bring our supplications before You;  

Heavenly Father, please continue to lead and bless Trinity/HOPE with Your loving hand; may the number of children increase and may we always strive to accomplish Your will.

Heavenly Father, please place Your healing hand over Mark Gudlin as he faces more challenges; dissolve the infection that has been so problematic.  Be with Denise and her family; give them patience and comfort as Your hand brings healing.

Heavenly Father, please bless new donors unknown to us but who are out there ready to help to feed Haitian children through the Matthew 25 Project.Lord, as mission teams are brought together, please bless their plans and their travel. 

Lord God, bless Your Word wherever it is proclaimed.  Make it a Word of power and peace to convert those not yet Your own and to confirm those who have come to saving faith.  May Your Word pass from the ear to the heart, from the heart to the lip and from the lip to the life that, as You have promised, Your Word may achieve the purpose for which You sent it; through Jesus Christ, our Lord.  Amen.

2 Corinthians 13:11-14; “Finally, brothers, good-by. Aim for perfection, listen to my appeal, be of one mind, live in peace. And the God of love and peace will be with you.  Greet one another with a holy kiss.  All the saints send their greetings.  May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”  

May God go before you to guide you; may His arms be beneath you to support you, around you to protect you and above you to bless you.  And may the blessings of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit be with you always dear sister and brother in Christ,  

In His love, Jay Brinkmeyer 

A Sunday drive in Haiti.

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.  Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.  If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you.  But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind.  That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.  Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do.”  James 1:2-8  

Trails of many kinds and perseverance, we all face hurdles of varying heights throughout our lives.  Emotional, physical, financial, relationships and spiritual…just to name a few.  I took the attached photo in March of 2010, and while it is not a great photo; certainly nothing I would consider putting on a wall behind an expensive frame, it has a lot memories for me.  

On Easter Sunday in 2003, Pastor Eliona Bernard, his wife Lynda, another Lay Pastor and I drove back from Cap Haitian after the service, through Gonaives and into Port-au-Prince.  We left Cap around 11 AM and arrived back in PAP around 6:30 PM.  Our travel time had many delays as there were vodou processions marching along the gravel highway.  Edge to edge, probably a block long, were lost people following the vodou priest and priestess who follow the supreme liar of this world.  We had to nudge our way through them.  

This photo was taken in the same place where that took place years ago just outside of Johanisse.  My real intent on this photo was to tell you about the children who are walking home from school on a hot afternoon.  They came from a school in La Croix which is about 3 miles from here to the west and no, that is not where the bottled water comes from that is in your neighborhood store; this location is in the rice patties of the Artibonite district.  

These four students walking back home are walking into a town with a strong vodou presence.  Their lives must face many trials of many kinds; unlike my North American trials.  Being in the Word, being given the Living Water and the Bread of Life is so very important to them to help them persevere when trials become seemingly unbearable.  This is just one photo of four children walking home in Haiti, but it could certainly have been taken in most of the 140 schools with Trinity/HOPE feeding programs.  Thank you for helping over 30,000 children learn more about their triumphant Savior Jesus Christ and become physically strong to persevere through their trials of many kinds.  

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay

Gospel Light.

“If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first.  If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own.  As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world.  That is why the world hates you.” John 15:18-19  

I read a devotion by Pastor Ken Klaus with the Lutheran Hour recently that shared a story about a young child who was participating in a Christmas program.  The children had practiced their lines, songs and all was going well; the shepherds were kneeling at the manger.  When that point in the program took place that all the lights were to be turned off except for one light bulb that shined down on the manger.  

Unfortunately, the boy who was in charge of the lights got nervous and turned off ALL of the lights in the gymnasium and the parents, family members and cast sat in the darkness and remained silent.  That's when one of the shepherds said in a loud whisper that carried through the entire room, "Hey! You switched off Jesus!"  

In Haiti, trying to turn off Jesus happens quite often as the vodou priest tries again and again to convince his neighbors and followers that the Son of God is dead and His bones are rotting away in a tomb in a faraway country.  For the boy in the Christmas program, turning off Jesus was an accident.  For the vodou priest, it is done deliberately; daily.  

The girl in the attached photo is singing ‘This little Gospel Light of mine’ with other children at Bon Berger Lutheran School in Caredeux.  They are bringing light to a world that is daily being thrown into darkness.  Their lights are bringing the truth of Jesus Christ to the souls still trapped in the lies of an oppressive vodou priest.  The song ‘This little light of mine’ was written by Harry Dixon Loes around 1920 and several congregations have inserted the word ‘Gospel’ into the lyrics.  Following are the first and last verses.  

“This little light of mine, I'm going to let it shine.  Oh, this little light of mine I'm going to let it shine.  Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine ev'ry where I go.  I'm going to let it shine.  Oh, ev'ry where I go.  Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.  Out in the dark, I'm going to let it shine.  Oh, out in the dark I'm going to let it shine.  Out in the dark I'm going to let it shine.
Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.”  

Dear Heavenly Father, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior.  Amen.  

May God be with you…Jay