We are back in the US!

We are back in the United States!

We arrived at the Cap-Haitian airport just a little after 8:30 this morning and we landed in Fort Lauderdale not too long ago. Everyone is safe yet tired from such a long week. We will have a long layover in Fort Lauderdale before we board a flight to Atlanta. There we will have a brief layover before we finally head back home. Our flight schedule has us returning back to Pittsburgh International Airport around 11:30pm. So keep praying that everything goes as planned.

While we are in the airport, I will be taking the time to upload all of my (Joel) photos from the trip. Sometime in the next few weeks I’ll collect the best photos from the trip from different team members and upload them to an account on a photo sight. That way you get different perspectives of the trip taken from different members of the team. I want to use this post to recap what happened during our last full day at EBAC. 

Yesterday, our team and the orphans worked very hard all day in order to complete as much of the basketball court as possible. The day started as we worked together to put down rocks while some of the Haitians mixed together concrete by using shovels, sand, rocks, cement, and water. We first worked on the area closest to where the concrete was being made. Then some team members and the orphans carried buckets filled with concrete to the spot where it needed to be poured. We lucked out this trip by having on hand a Haitian man who specialized in making and laying down concrete. He contributed a great majority of his skills in the completion of this project. As the day went on, so did the buckets of concrete. After we filled one half of one side, everyone took a break for lunch. When we returned we continued to work. Sometime later when the holes were dug out for the basketball poles, we set up a system that would hold the post up while it set in the concrete using ropes. A lot of measuring went into making sure that the posts were even in every area. While the posts were being put in proper position, others continued to work to extend the other end of the court. Once the posts were in place and the ground was dug out on the other end of the court, we formed a long assembly line in order to get buckets from the concrete area to the spot where they needed to be poured. This process took almost an hour and a half as we had to keep breaking for people to form a new batch of concrete. Once it was finished, we knew we still had to put the backboards and the hoop up but we needed to wait until morning so the concrete could set in place. At 5am, some members of the team woke up to finish the job we started. Working initially with flash lights and three ladders, we were able to get the first basketball hoop up. By the time we got to the second one, the orphans were awake and eagerly waiting for us to finish so they could start playing basketball. As we finished on the final hoop, some of the kids started to shoot around on the new hoop. You could see the joy on their faces that they were able to play basketball again. We were scheduled to leave the orphanage at 7am but we ended up finishing the project at 7:03am. It was a job well done. Afterwards, we packed up the bus, said our goodbyes and headed to the airport.

Leaving Haiti is always bittersweet. There are so many relationships that are formed throughout the week, some people started new friends, and others rekindled old ones. At the end of the week, it’s always difficult to say goodbye. Last night, the Pastor that helps with the orphanage prayed for us when we finished laying down the concrete. He blessed the court and the time we spent there. But there was one thing he prayed that really stuck out to me. He said “We are sad to see our friends go, but we look forward to the day when they no longer have to go.” What a great perspective on the hope and reality of Heaven that will bridge the distance between us and these orphans. One day, we will no longer have to leave our friends. We will no longer have barriers between us. We will no longer have to go so far to have so much fun. But rather, one day we will be running, laughing, and playing with them on streets of gold and through the land that God has promised to those who love Him.

God has done so many incredible things through the lives of the people involved in this trip. He has taught all of us the perspective of humility and simplicity. He has shown us that true joy is found in our hope in Christ. He has given us the heart to love others as He first loved us. Haiti is always a life changing trip and my prayer for everyone is that we never lose sight of God and sharing His love when we return back to our lives. I hope we take the light God has shown us in EBAC and share that light with the rest of the world. God loves Haiti but God also loves those who don’t know Him quite yet. As great of an impact we can have in a third world country, we can have an equal if not greater impact in the lives of those around us who are broken and hurting but in different ways.

Thank you so much for your prayers. All of them were answered.

1^st John 4:19 – “We love because He first loved us”

Joel