21Oct11 – Transistions

21Oct11

So, based on the comments I have received, there’s a lot more than 3 of your reading this. 🙂
Awesome.

Today I was able to finish up the work at Madam Bonite’s in Jacmel.
I forgot to take pictures, but I’ll get some when I return there next week with Mom and Dad.
She now has about 2000 Watts of solar panels, and will test this week to see how feasible it is to turn off EDH (grid power).
I think she will still find herself a little short overall, but I don’t know. They seem to use very little power at her house/church/feeding program unless they are doing construction.
I look forward to hearing the results.

I’m getting better with MIG welding, though I found out the hard way that welding can, in fact, give you a sunburn. Oops.
I’ve also had a lot of people wanting to travel and work with me in the past couple days. I should probably figure out a way to make that happen sometime, but it is still a bit difficult right now.

My kreyol is passable that I can joke around with the other workers, and now I can even share a little faith when it comes up, which has been more and more often.
Today’s chance to share came out of some of the guys asking if I was married. When I said no, they said why not. I said I’ll get married when God wants. They kept going, asking if I would marry a haitian, an american, or even if I wouldn’t get married. To which I just kept replying “si bondye vle” (if God wills). I think it blew them away when I said I would like to get married, but only if God wants. Then I tried to explain to them, that HE knows best. If He doesn’t provide a wife, then there is something else He wants for me. For now, as Paul said, it is better to be single for the sake of Christ.

Another note from the past few days is that this is a time of major transistions in Haiti. Please be praying for all my friends here.

Dr. Ken Pierce and his wife Diane are leaving Hands and Feet, and starting their own ministry. They plan to specifically aid babies (and their mothers) who are is poor health, with the goal of enabling the mother to better care for her own children when they are ready to leave. I think it will be an amazing ministry for them. They have done this some while at Hands and Feet, but since HAF has a primary focus (as they should) on the orphans in their charge, this will be an opportunity for the Pierce’s to truly focus on this unique opportunity.
As they will be truly independent with this, please pray for God’s providence. They have 2 buildings lined up to rent. One for their residence, and 1 to use as a clinic and short term missions accomodations. Since all this is so new, this may be an opportunity for any of you that wish to come down to help out with a fledgling organzation. It may be a “build your own bunk” situation though. 🙂
They also are going to start an english language church service to try to build a community within the missionaries, which I am looking forward to attending and helping with the worship music when I am in Jacmel.

Their daughter, Emily, has returned to Hawaii to start university. This is a difficult step for her as well since she had an amazing ministry through hospital visitation and feeding programs here in Haiti. It is exciting, however, to see her going for more education to enable her to minister even more in the future.
Pray that she will be able to transition smoothly, never losing focus on the true goal, to spread the love of Christ to the best of her ability.
She is an amazing person and will be missed dearly around Jacmel while she is at school.

Tamara Steck, a current intern for Hands and Feet, is also going to transistion to the ministry with the Pierce’s. She has been helping with some of the sick babies at HAF-Jacmel, very similar to what the new ministry will entail and will be a valuable asset in helping the new mothers understand how to care for their children. Please pray for her through this time as well.

Stacie Tippet, another intern with HAF, is returning to the states this December to equip herself better to minister in the future. She is going back to school for ultrasound training and wishes to return to Haiti to aid expectant mothers in pre-natal care. This has been on her heart for many years and I look forward to seeing how it all works out. She has an amazing heart and will be dearly missed by her girls at HAF, but is certain this is where God is leading her. So, please pray for her to stay strong and focused on the path ahead as sometimes it is hard to balance the desire to be in Haiti and the desire to be better equipped to serve.

Madam Bonite is also in transition right now. Her current ministries (feeding program, prison visitation, community assitance, sponsoring kids for school, church, prayer ministry, and many other things) are going well, but she has also broken ground on the property just behind her house to put in an orphanage. This has been on her heart for a while, so please pray for her as construction in Haiti can be very draining, time consuming, and frustrating.

Patrick from Be Like Brit, is also in transition now, returning to the states from over 6 months of project management here. Pray for him as he makes this move.

And pray for me, please.
I am trying to figure out a balance.
Part of me really loves what I am doing as a freelance jack-of-all-trades type position. I have many Haitians that want to work with me to learn, and am constantly finding more work to do.
However, I also still have education on my mind. Trying to do classes for electricians and other trade skills.
And, I have employment opportunities on my mind. Trying to start a factory to build an industry base for employment.

And now, my focus is kind of sinking into a merger of all the ideas. But, it requires a big step. I am glad my parents are coming down, cause I really want to talk with them about it a lot more.
I am looking at the fact that I could really use a facility to call my own (not necesarily my own, just one that I could use/live in/work out of).
I have been extremely blessed to have ministry partners putting up with me everywhere I go here in Haiti, and I am sure they will continue to do so, if that is where God wants me, but, here is my thought:
I could really use a building to provide:
(1) a warehouse. I cannot do any more solar installations at the moment because I am out of panels. I can’t ship panels easily except in large quantities. I may have a spot in a shipping container soon, but I have nowhere to put the panels until I actually have a job for them. So I have a chicken/egg problem. Either I get panels and figure a job will come (but have to store them somewhere), or I get a job but have no panels until some unknown time in the future.
(2) a research and repair facility. as stated previously, much could be learned by looking at all the broken stuff here, plus I might be able to scrape together some workable units cheap.
(3) an office area. Believe it or not, I work best on academic type stuff in an organized environment. At least having a desk would be great. I would like to get more organized to allow for things like short term teams and the electricians class, but I find it hard to concentrate when I am laying in my bed (cause I tend to fall asleep)
(4) a lab area. So I can test ideas for the factory and develop better ways of doing things with power switching (inverters/generators/EDH), DC powered devices (in coordination with Sirona Cares), and other ideas.
(5) possibly use the warehouse concept as a sort of non-profit store. If I can stock panels, charge controllers, inverters, etc, then I can sell out my supply even if I’m not doing the job myself. Based on my current research, items of this variety are running twice as much as in Miami, if not more. (Solar panels are nearly $4/watt for example)

So, pray for me as I try to sort all this out.

P.S. Also pray for the Mulligan family, and Matt Prichard. The Mulligans are the new directors for HAF-Jacmel, and Matt is a new intern coming in this week.