It started a year or two ago, when I got a super-excited, and exciting email from Autumn, a paediatric occupational therapist working in the north west of Haiti (St. Louis du Nord and Port-de-Paix region) through North West Haiti Christian Mission. She'd heard about our new solar radios and wanted to know if she could raise funds to get some radios to use in her own ministry with children (with severe physical disabilities) and their families.
Her email said:
I LOVE LOVE LOVE what your mission is doing through the radios and what a POWERFUL way to spread the word and love of God. I have been wanting to get Bibles to my families but realized that most can't read and so wouldn't do much good. These radios are and will continue to change lives and thus Haiti for the kingdom.
As you probably very well know, the view of disabilities in Haiti is that a child with disabilities is worthless, cursed, possessed. And a parent with a child is seen to have caused the problem and often becomes an outcast as well. Our outreach program is working to break this mindset and help the parents see these children are special and have potential, and training them to learn to take care and love their child for who they are. God is moving and these negative mindsets are slowly being broken. We are at the point now that we want to place them with resources that make them visible in their communities as well. I think it would be AWESOME to get each of my outreach families one of your solar power radios and make their homes become a central place in their communities to hear the gospel preached and break the barrier in the community as well.
Fast-forward to July this year. While the girls and I stayed in Cap-Haitien to await the arrival of the last team we were hosting (a Dynamic Women in Missions team, gorgeous ladies!), Storly traveled to St. Louis du Nord with Medson, Pastor Hérode and 4VEH team with a box of radios for Autumn, tuned to our network partner 4VET (based on the island of La Tortue) on FM, to 4VEH on AM, and with the audio New Testament (read by Storly). And at very short notice, Autumn and two of her local co-workers attended the evangelism training that Medson and Hérode led for pastors in that city.
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| Storly, Autumn, 4VEH staff Lynn-Audrey, Medson and Pastor Hérode |
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| The official 'handover' photo! |
And back to a couple of days ago. Autumn posted these pictures. (Thanks so much for sharing these, Autumn! Read more about Autumn's ministry at: www.autumnsreflections.blogspot.com.)
She went to visit a young girl named Nerlan as part of her outreach and follow-up with children and their families. Autumn said:
We were able to bless her family with a solar power Christian radio from Radio 4VEH. They were beyond excited & started cheering!Seeing the photo and reading that, I was beyond excited and starting cheering too!
And then this one. Notice the girl at the front, Prisca, and the older girl at the back in pink holding a radio. Autumn said:
A bittersweet moment visiting Prisca today. Found out she is now living in an orphanage as her mother abandoned her. But the sweet part, watching her light up, seeing the other kids interact with her, seeing this amazing small orphanage run completely by Haitians. I loved the fact we were able to bless this orphanage with a solar-powered Christian 4VEH radio with New Testament in Creole.These two reports are not the end point. But the point where our work in raising funds for the radios and for the station, where our prayers and planning projects and budgets, and writing letters and emails and Facebook posts, and standing in front of a bunch of strangers in another strange place, where hours and hours and hours (and hours...) in the studio for Storly to read and record, to edit out the hiccups, the breaths and slip-ups, where all those things (combined with the efforts of so many others, like the volunteers at Galcom who build and test and re-test every single radio, and all those who go to tell the good news and put these radios into people's hands as a gift), where all those things are done. At least for this one radio. And the next phase begins.
The seeds are planted. The radio is in the hands of people - in the case of the orphanage here - of many children and those caring for them. Now the daily efforts of everyone at 4VEH and partners mean there'll be water for the seeds in the form of lessons about God, life, family, community, health, farming. There'll be inspiration spoken, sung or prayed. There'll be a friendly voice saying, "You can do it. Trust God. He is with you."
Seeds planted. Watered daily. And the rest is up to the Lord.
Would you pray with us for the whole big Resounding Hope project? It's huge. Our goal is 160,000 radios delivered to families and homes across the five northern states in Haiti. At $60 per radio. Lots of needs to pray for. Financial needs. People to get involved. Help for our partners at Galcom in their task of making the radios. Logistics and shipping of radios to Haiti. Then distributing to local churches to go out and deliver the Gospel - and the radios - to people waiting to hear good news.
Want to help? Visit resoundinghope.org to find out more.
And pray with us for the impact of these two radios, in the lives of Nerlan and her family, and of Prisca and all the other children and staff in the orphanage. And for the 1325+ radios that have been delivered to households so far this year.
Thank you for getting involved in this stuff with us. Would you share with others who may be interested? Thanks so much!
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