A little about my trip to Haiti

So I thought it would be a good time to share a bit about my upcoming trip to Haiti with Visiting Orphans. Our team has started having weekly conference calls to prepare and we only have 2 more before we all meet in Miami to head to Haiti together.

First of all we will be heading to the city/town of Gressier, Haiti. Gressier is about 20 miles west of Port au Prince. We will be working alongside Respire Ministries. With their school year just starting up this October (this will be there 2nd official school year as a ministry) we aren't exactly sure of our jobs or what we will be doing when we get there. I do know we will be helping with their feeding program and I am excited to see how this all works and pans out.

They have a 6 room primary school, a 4 classroom Kindergarten, and a 4 classroom Secondary School. They have a feeding program every Saturday morning and discipleship program every Saturday afternoon. They recently opened the Freedom House for girls in severly abusive and dangerous situations. They have started an English Language Program, Soccer Discipleship program and recently broke ground for a medical clinic.

They have roughly 500 students enrolled in their school, 70-80% of these students are restaveks (children slaves). These restaveks are children usually between the ages of 4-15 who are sometimes sold between families, do all the chores, cleaning, washing, fetching water and unfortunately most often abused and do not go to school. Respire wishes to make relationships with the people of Gressier in order to educate them on the Restavek crisis. Through education, scripture and God's love, they hope to create awareness of equality for these children. Read more about  Restavek Awareness and Education HERE.

It is overwhelming to think of how we will even be able to make a bit of difference in only 1 week with these people but I know God has a plan for us as a team and for those we will meet and live with for a week at Respire.

Thank you in advance for your prayers for our team and for those at Respire who live everyday to serve these children, so they can learn of God's love for them and to serve those in the community who do not realize the importance of these children in their lives.