Let's go, let's go, let's go, let's go!
Johnентиe is a kid for sigma.
This kids is not a kid
that gives his birth to minimalist kids.
It's that little boy, cool,
that makes his pants bigger,
when he speaks to Claire's parents.
I'm going to the church, I'm going to the church to come
Haiti's hard. There's no soft edges in Haiti.
I really didn't know that much about Haiti other than what I've seen on TV and portrayed post-earthquake
and the little bit that they've said about Haiti and church, but those two things didn't really match up.
So I really had a perception of Haiti that it was a poor area that probably didn't really have God in that area.
And I was really wrong about that.
Haitians are people like us. They're intelligent like us. They care for their families like us.
They have very strong morals like us, and they're a people who respect each other.
And we need to respect them.
It's pretty fascinating to see how they've supported themselves with the little that they do have.
It's got a beauty to it of its own. From a distance you look at an area and you see how gorgeous it is.
And then when you see it up close you realize how hard their daily existence is.
You have a very common homogenous type of people that live here, but you also have this very diverse world culture that comes in there
that is helping a country that is really struggling every day just for survival.
The few times that I was able to get out in a vehicle and go to town, I noticed how the main mode of transportation is walking here in Haiti.
And I'm not just talking about walking from your house to your neighbor's house.
I'm talking about walking from your house to a town that might be five miles away and it's over very rough territory, very rough landscape.
They have to carry their goods, and it's quite an effort that these people put forth just to meet their basic necessities.
A typical child's morning will be arising at as early as 3 a.m.
They will go down, they will get the water for the morning cooking and the washing, bring this back,
and then turn around and head off to school if the family is fortunate enough to be able to afford to buy them a school uniform.
When you hear these pastors talk, their focus is on what God is doing with the people who are suffering.
And an awful lot of the suffering allows God to be able to work in ways that we don't see in the U.S.
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Yesterday I got the privilege of listening to you interview a real patriarch in the faith, a real man of God,
a man that has been fighting the forces of evil and doing God's work in Northwest Haiti for decades.
And he said with a big smile on his face that Haiti is opportunity, that Haiti is a land of opportunity.
And when he quantified where he had started, when he first came in here and the little shack that he held his first worship service in,
the differences that he's made, then you can see, yeah, this is a land of opportunity.
It is a land of unlimited opportunity.
It just takes men of faith, like Pastor Creesbone, to be obedient and to stay the course.
And then you see, it's a marathon, it's not a sprint, but then you see the fruit, the fruit of his labors, the fruit of the men and women of God that work here and live here in Northwest Haiti.
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My name is Creesbone Flayes and I am pastor of the Baptist Church of Post-Metje.
But I am also the pastor of record at nine other churches and supervise another 35 in this area.
When I arrived in 1981, no development was going on.
Three other pastors and I worked together with two missionaries and we set up a development committee.
God blessed the work we did together. Now there's water in the communities and we started markets in the villages of this area.
We also put in clinics where there was no medical care and the school which had only 65 students now has over 350.
When you are a pastor here, you work in all kinds of things because there are so many needs. It's been a long road, but God has blessed the ministry here.
I'll tell you something about starfish treasure. There's a Haitian proverb that says, a poor person's bank book is his animal. When a man owns an animal that is having little ones, even if his garden isn't doing anything or there's a drought, he can sell offspring to buy food.
Also, there's a lot of families here that when they have to carry something, they have to carry it on their head.
There are times I drive to Port-au-Pay and I just want to cry.
I saw a woman one morning and I stopped for her. She had a big basket of stuff on her head.
But when I stopped, she didn't get into the truck. So I said, why don't you get in the truck? She said, it's so heavy, I can't put it down.
Then how did you get it on your head? I asked and she said, two people picked it up and put it on my head.
So I got out of the truck and helped her unload it into the back.
That lady is a widow with nine children and was carrying that load to market to help the children.
So, I tell you, when we get help from Starfish, we're able to get people a donkey when they couldn't afford it otherwise.
And there's a lot of people now whose hair is growing on their heads again because the load has been taken off by Starfish treasure.
I guarantee you, a church with that program is a church putting money in the bank of heaven.
I know God will bless them down the road.
I'm amazed. I'm amazed and I'm awed and humbled by the faith and obedience that our brothers and sisters in Christ have here in Northwest Haiti.
Haiti is, in one word, remarkable. It's hard to actually describe in words, but in an area that's considered poor because they're deprived of material things,
they are so spiritually rich and you can feel God's presence here and you know that God is working.
Haiti is a spiritual battleground and I think that's one of the things that you sense most when you're here is, you know, there's a battle going on here spiritually for the souls of men.
It's full of educated people who are trying their best to use the resources, the few resources that they're given to do great things.
The worship of the true God is more vibrant and more real than any place I've seen in our own country.
Oftentimes they go to bed hungry, but they're hungry for other things. They're hungry for the Word of God.
Even though it was very difficult to get here this year because of a lot of things going on, I deep inside knew I needed that reality check and I think I love Haiti.
Thank you.
