God's Graciousness and Gustav

Dear Family and Friends,

This has been an interesting week. You will be forced to endure my wordy descriptions because I took, like, three pictures the whole week. (Bad blogger, bad! I know.)

Last Sunday, I mentioned that there might be riots in Les Cayes due to increased tuition prices and food costs. There was some action in town on Monday that kept Marie Lucie and the pastors away from the office. I used the day clean out about ten years worth of accumulated stuff from my bathroom cupboards – old, yellow Band-Aids, a random ankle brace, gooey bottles of unidentifiable liquids, countless ant baits, expired medicines, and little (thank goodness) bug corpses. By Monday night, I was watching Tropical Storm Gustav pretty intensely. The National Hurricane Center was predicting that it would pummel Haiti by Tuesday afternoon, and Les Cayes appeared to be directly in his path.

In the meantime, I was fighting an ear infection. Now, I’ve never had a true ear infection. One time at Lake Webster, I fell off my skies and slammed my head into the water. Two days later, I had this raging earache. Turns out, a piece of duckweed got lodged in my ear and became infected. The ENT doctor thought that was pretty funny; I found it less than humorous. In any case, I now have a deep compassion for any child that gets ear infections all the time. I tried to treat it myself, but by Tuesday morning, I had given up. I’m not going to describe to you the amounts and colors of nastiness coming out of my ear that day, but I could do it with great deal of vividness and expression. Use your imagination...

So, Tuesday morning, Tess took me to the local clinic, not far from our house, where I saw the doctor and got some antibiotics. I must say, I was praising God for the invention of modern medicine. Even with some high doses, it still took me three days to feel better. In any case, I only worked about two hours that morning and then left to prepare our apartment for Gustav. We took everything off the porch, closed our hurricane shutters, and checked supplies. The sky looked threatening that afternoon and evening, but we had little wind or rain. The Gutwein girls and I watched The Sound of Music and ate popcorn. It was that kind of weather.

The rain started that night and continued for two days. Now, I didn’t know this remarkable tidbit until this week: Haitians treat rain like Hoosiers treat ice. Apparently, if you get wet down here, it’s going to be days before you dry out again, so no one goes out. Very few people showed up for work on Wednesday and Thursday because of the rain, even though we had very little wind. Marie Lucie and I were able to spend some dedicated time together without any interruptions! That was a blessing.

While God spared Cayes, other parts of Haiti were badly damaged. So far, 70+ people have died and some are still missing. Jan Gutwein explored some of the wreckage and said there are a lot of desperate people right now. Please pray for those who lost their loved ones, livelihoods, and homes.

Saturday, Sheila and I went to market with the excellent assistance of Mark Gutwein. Saturday night, we had a potluck supper with some of the other single missionary ladies. It was a great time to share stories and encouragement.

I’ll admit, I was homesick on Saturday and spending time with other Godly women who are living this life far more graciously than I am was refreshing and inspirational. I was questioning God on Saturday night asking Him if He was really sure I should be here or if this was just a terrible mistake. I opened to Acts 7 where I read, “Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and come into the land which I shall shew thee.” Well, that shut me up. Praise God for His patience with me, my whining and questioning and general fussiness. This is my life now, and I want to live it for His glory and in His name the absolute best that I can.

This morning’s service was a Spirit-filled message of restoration. You know, sometimes you don’t need to understand all the words to be fed and filled by His Spirit. Just being in the presence of Godly men and women who were praising His name in spirit and truth was enough to rejuvenate and restore my wayward spirit. Thanks for your continued prayers! They make all the difference in the world. Sorry about the lack of pictures this week; I did a video message instead to atone for my lack of photographic dedication.

Remember, the camera adds ten pounds. I love you all!! God bless.