27 May 2007

i'm falling in love

yesterday, on the way back from the mephibosheth house, we stopped by pastor dio's church. (the church is located on a side-street - we'd barely call it an alley) the local kids recognized dio's truck, which we were driving, and they swarmed us. they had all sorts of things to say, and i felt bad i couldn't understand them. they all grabbed for our hands to greet us, and one little boy kept making a thumbs-up and fist-bumping me. i crouched in the back of the pickup and took pictures of them with my digital camera and showed them the pictures. they'd yell, "blanc! blanc! femme! femme!", point to themselves for me to capture their image, and then grab for the camera to see the picture i'd just taken, passing it around and laughing as they saw themselves and each other on the screen. there were about 20 kids and i think i took pictures of all of them. they spontaneously began clapping and singing "frere jacques." i videoed it, and they thought that was just great to watch. SO CUTE. they made me laugh so hard, as they kept asking me, in creole, to take more pictures and show them. this went on for at least 10 minutes... 10 of my favorite minutes here, so far. :)

after eating lunch, the past few days, we sat on the floor of one of the rooms we painted, to sing a few songs and talk. yesterday, two of the haitian workers (including eliphete, who i mentioned before and will talk about again in a few minutes) joined us. marilyn, who has been here several times and remembers an unbelievable amount of creole, began singing the song, "Jesus, i adore you. i lay my life before you. how i love you..." in creole. the two haitian boys sang with her, and those of us who didn't know the creole sang along in English. my voice cracked as i blinked back tears: there was something so incredible, so moving, about sitting with these two guys, worshiping the God we shared, in our native languages. it was amazing to know that MY God, who hears the prayers of my heart, in English, also knows the hearts of those boys just as intimately.

a couple of weeks before i left on this trip, i realized i was missing romans 5 - revelations from my Bible. it made me sad because i've had that Bible since high school, and it has been with me through a lot of hard and good things. but i joked about it, asking ryan, "if you see my epistles laying around, would you let me know?" anyway, i looked all over our house and never found the majority of my new testament.
the week before we left, i kept intending to grab one from the bookshare or something at church (to bring with me to haiti), but on my way home from work on friday, i realized i'd forgotten. on friday night, ryan and i went out to eat at boca chica in st paul. when we were leaving, we backed out of our parking spot and ryan laughed. he
got out of the car and grabbed something off the hood. a Bible. now, i don't know about you, but no one has ever put a Bible on the hood of my car before. i laughed so hard and told ryan, "God gave me a new Bible to bring to haiti!"

so, i was painting the window sill in a bathroom while eliphete, who does "ceramic," was tiling next to me. i was chatting with him a bit and he asked me, "did you accept Jesus as your savior?" the direct question caught me off-guard but i said yes and asked him the same question. he grinned broadly and said, "yes. for almost one year." i told him i was happy for him and he said, "yes, i am happy, too." a little while later, he asked me, "do you have english Bible?" i said i did. he asked, "for me? to have?" i smiled, thinking of The Bible God Gave Me, and said, "as a matter of fact, i do!"

so, God gave me a Bible, so i could give it to eliphete. perhaps i'll find the rest of my old one when i get home?

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I love that God gave you a Bible for Elephete. He really does work miracles in our daily lives, if only can see them.
I'm praying for you and your group. Thanks for keeping up the blog!

Anonymous said...

Dear Amy, I miss you so much. My class at school is praying for you. I love you. - Victoria

Anonymous said...

I like the part about the kids loving watching/seeing themselves.... haha, it reminds me of Tori. I guess all kids love themselves! Haha
Love you! Miss you!
-Stephanie

Unknown said...

Amy- God is sure at work in you and in your experience in Haiti. It's amazing you had a Bible to give to Elephete! What an amazing story. Oh and Matt has requested you bring home a Hatian baby for us- figure by the time it gets here, we'll be married, right?
Love and Miss.
Lisa

Anonymous said...

Hi Amy,
I just caught up on your blogs from the weekend and have lots of tears in my eyes. Wow. What a trip. I think God may have plucked your epistles for that very moment, it floors me how He goes ahead of us.

Kevin and I were being "you" a lot on Friday, once at the same time. Miss you a bunch! Sandi

Dawn said...

This is my favorite posting of all of them. I love the story of the children crowding around your camera. Children really act the same everywhere, in many ways. I also love the story of you singing with the Haitian believers. Christians really are the same everywhere, too, in many ways. And the story of your Missing Epistles? It makes me cry. I remember you bemoaning the fact that your Bible was half-missing. The Bible that Dad and I bought you that you loved and didn't want to replace. I remember you telling about the Bible you found on the car hood after your dinner out the night before you left. And then to hear about how all that came together so that one man could get a bible?! The world seems a lot smaller when I read this blog.