Faith

Haiti to me is a huge test of faith. We have very little control of things working out here in Haiti. You can try as hard as you like but when it comes down to it, things are just more difficult here. Sometimes the product you need simply isn't here, the road isn't good and you simply cannot get into town, or the cell service is nonexistent and you just can't contact anyone. But something really cool about Haiti is, despite all of the hardships, the struggles and the unexpected issues somehow everything always works out. Everything always comes together. Everything is always okay in the end and all I can say to explain this is Praise the Lord. 

In America you can be pretty confident that if you go to the grocery store or the gas station, that you will be leaving with groceries or gas. In Haiti that is not necessarily the case.

This to me is part of the adventure. Part of the fun but can be part of the frustration. I love relying on God in this total free-fall sort of way. I have found that it makes me less stressed, makes me happier and it makes me know that I am truly following His will because it is Him who brought me here. With all of that being said, I never said it was easy. Just because I say I love it, doesn't make it easy. When I go to the water supply place to buy my filtered drinking water during the hours they are open and they don't let me in because they are closed for some inexplicable reason, thats not easy. When my car needs gas and I spend so much time driving around from gas station to gas station looking for gas, thats not easy. When I am trying to call someone but can't reach anyone to help me fix my- what feels like 100th, but more like my 35th flat tire in Haiti, its not easy.

However, it works out. It always works out. God has His hand on me and is guiding every single thing. From the moto that almost sideswipes my car in town, but misses; to healing me when I am sick, the Lord always comes through. This is a mantra that I say to myself in these situations when I don't know exactly what will happen because this is Haiti and the unexpected is expected here. The Lord always comes through, always. 

I am not saying He will come through in the way I think, or even in the way that I want. But He always comes through. It really took Haiti for me to see this. In America we often don't feel like we need God day-to-day. (obviously we are severely mistaken..) We feel like this because we know what will come out of situations. America is predictable.

Haiti is unpredictable, unexpected, everyone is more vulnerable. This has its downfalls, but it also helps us to put our faith in God. It helps us to have faith because we see it every day. We know how impossible and difficult things are here that there is no way that we can physically do any of this on our own.

Americans need to realize that they are not doing it on their own. God is in your day to day. God is the one safely getting you to pick up your kids at school. It is Him who provided the food you are eating. It is Him who gives you clean water to drink. The issue is, you were expecting all of those things already so you don't necessarily see that it was the Lord. Here in Haiti we aren't necessarily expecting those things, and they are not easily achievable that we see the Lord's hand in it all.

I challenge you today to look for things that you see the Lord in. Look for those "God-sightings". Look for all the ways He is carrying you through your everyday life and you don't even realize it.