Dear Mission-Haiti Family,

November brings a time for us to reflect on the blessings in our life. We have an endless list of thanks to bring to God for the way he provides for us each and every day, and an endless list of thanks to bring to all of you for pouring into us in so many ways. The past couple months have been anything but easy in Haiti as hardships have piled on one another. 

In August our excitement quickly turned to alert as Haiti’s unfortunate troubles increased and became more serious. The country’s president was assassinated in his home, an earthquake occurred in our area killing and displacing thousands, a powerful tropical storm passed shortly-afterwards damaging homes and crops, and gang control was ever-increasing in Port-au-Prince. We’ve always said that Haiti as a whole has its difficulties but we know that in Ti Rivyè, home to Mission-Haiti’s headquarters for more than 25 years, we’ve felt secure and safe. Ti Rivyè and MH have become synonymous with each other, and it has been our home. However, as the political instability, economic hardship, and gang violence increased so did the difficulties that our foreign missionaries, local leaders, and staff within MH faced from a very few, dangerous individuals in the community.

In September, due to continued verbal and physical threats in our community from these bad actors, it was deemed necessary to permanently send our foreign missionaries home. We did not see this coming and we did not know what was going to become of Mission-Haiti.

For the past 8 years the goal of our leaders has been to work ourselves out of a job. To a lot of us, that sounds counter-intuitive, but that type of mindset is what we, as leaders of Mission-Haiti, have preached. The most effective way for MH to live out our motto to Love Jesus, Love Others, and Make Disciples is by developing and equipping the current and future leaders in Haiti to take more and more responsibility. Realistically, that means that things should continue to operate well even if our foreign staff, suddenly are not living in Haiti. Unexpectedly we found ourselves in the reality of “practicing what you preach” sooner than we planned.

Haiti's story as a country is marred by a few individuals causing harm and chaos to the many. For a moment, it crossed our minds that we may be forced to cease all operations indefinitely. But God has blessed us with tremendous leaders in Haiti who, amongst the chaos, can continue to carry out our mission with support from the states, as it has been for the last 25 years. We are continually reminded that this mission organization is not ultimately about us, our board, or even our supporters, but about God’s purpose for us to empower our Haitian brothers and sisters. These leaders are the ones who will bring change in Haiti. They are the future and the hope.

This may sound cliché, but now more than ever is the time for us to continue this partnership as we ask of you to prayerfully consider giving an End-of-Year gift to MH. More importantly, we ask for your prayers for the many leaders and staff of MH who will continue to face barriers and obstacles as they carry out our mission and for the country of Haiti that is probably facing a couple more years of hardship before things will eventually turn around for the better. We firmly believe that it will get better because our hope is not in ourselves and what we can do, it is in the Lord. He is the same God amidst any change or challenge. Our hope for 2021 was realized in an unexpected way as He is increasing MH’s stability and effectiveness for the future, through our Haitian leaders.

Many thanks to each and every one of you,

Wishing you a very Happy Thanksgiving!

~The Mission-Haiti Team