Walks to Remember

Proverbs 16:9 "In their hearts, humans plan their course, but the Lord establishes their steps." We are learning this first hand during our time in Haiti.  Each day we establish our plans, but each day God has His own agenda for our steps.
The day started with a long, treacherous, and nauseating ride up the mountain (see previous Top 10 post for clarification).  Our first stop was a plot of land that was being utilized for harvesting coffee beans.  We were given the privilege of doing a chore that we were all used to: weeding!  After an hour of this, Frankie told us to load up and move on out to our next journey:  the "coffee hike."
Once we made it to the top of a beautiful mountain, the scenary, as we have gotten used to while in Haiti, was absolutely stunning.  Pictures were taken (too many in my opinion), mouths were dropping, and lunch was eaten.  Then, in a generous act of hospitality, a wonderful Haitian family traveled up to meet us bringing along their coffee shop, Thousand Hills Coffee, balancing it on her head.  There was wireless, Dave Matthews playing in the background and fresh aroma of expresso permeating through the air.  Well, not quite, but in all honesty, their hospitality was amazing.  They actually carried up the hill a coffee cup for each of us, homemade bread to eat it with, and beautiful smiles as they served us.  They even kicked it "Dunkin style" and had the sweetener mixed in, winning over even the non-coffee drinkers (RA-chel).  The beautiful time in the mountain was concluded with a wonderful, moving time of prayer, as the Americans lifted up the Haitians and their country while the Haitians lifted up the Americans and theirs.  The nationalities, honestly were only significant in the way that they highlighted the unity that is profound at this level, only in the body of Christ.  Otherwise, color meant nothing else as we prayed for God's kingdom to come and His will to be done.
The next walk brought about a different type of scenery.  We were told that the next stop was the market.  Many of us were expecting some sort of a food market/grocery store; these expectations were soon expelled from our minds when we saw that the parking lot was an open field with donkeys tied to trees.  As we walked through the hundreds of people, there were the beautiful mountains in the background, the lucious greenery at each of our steps, the sight of freshly butchered cows and swine for folks to buy, a live pig that was hog-tied in preparation for his big day of butchering, and chickens held upside down, all prepared to be sold.  Along with these "grocery store" items, there were seed, vegetables, fruit, and other items for sale and a donkey keeled over dead from heat stroke.  We definitely stood out visually and attracted a lot of attention and as always, when we approached our fellow brothers and sisters of Haiti, our greetings were received with much warmth and appreciation - NOT.  In all honesty, the scene was somewhat overwhelming for some of the team, but ended with an opportunity to meet the local governor. 

To end our day's venture, we were disappointed in Shadrach when we were told that the kids were not available, as they were enjoying the market that we had just left.
Our concluding meeting back at the hotel consisted mainly of what our strategy would be, given that our expected 3-4 days with the kids had been reduced to one.  We wait with great expectation to see how Jesus multiplies our time tomorrow in the same way that He multiplied the bread and fish of one boy that was willing to do the Father's will.  We are confident that as our plans and approaches have been altered pretty significantly, the Holy Spirit's purpose that was ordained before the beginning of time is still in place and will continually unfold as it was already intended.  We are enjoying the ride. 

Love, Joey, aka Joe-dawg, Wasssss up, Joeman