Where God Guides...

"Where God Guides, He Provides...So Trust God" was the theme of a VBS at one of our special stops this summer spending time and serving with our friends in Crossroads, TN. It has continued as the theme of our summer as God continues to guide us all over the place! We have enjoyed our time with everyone we have been able to see in eleven states and three countries so far! We are so thankful for these relationships and the time so many you of have invested to share your lives with us. God has created us for relationships. He uses relationships at all levels to draw us closer to Him and through that relationship draw us closer to one another. Oh how we wish we'd been able to blog about all the places God has guided and provided for us during our travels in detail. Everyone has been so wonderful. We truly have the best friends and family in the world...all over the world. My grandma who is now with Jesus used to say everything was the best. "He is the best baby! This the best cake! That was the best sermon! Oh honey, it is just the best!" She said that about every baby and every thing she experienced everywhere she went! Everywhere we have been we have felt that it was just the very best. And then we enter another home and that was the best too! Thank you from the bottom of our hearts to all of you who have loved and served us the past few months! You're the best!

"I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now." Philippians 1:3-5

Through you God has provided the following answered prayers!
-One family decided that they could do without their suburban for two months and graciously allowed us to use it to travel from Illinois to Canada and back.
-Another family added phones on their family phone plan and mailed the phones where we first landed so we could use them for the summer. These phones also served as our GPS to get us everywhere we needed to go.
-Another family used their job benefits to help us get cheap flights on standby that got all of us and our many bags back to Texas after we returned the borrowed vehicle.
-Several friends and supporting churches have provided homes and hotels, food, fun, fellowship, and many additional treats (Disney World, zoo, beach, the gift of new family photos, Braves game, Gatlinburg/Smoky Mountains, drive in theatre double features, Summer camp for kids in Canada, Six Flags) along the way. Anything our children may have felt they missed the past three years spent in Haiti was made up for all in one summer and our girls got to relive a great deal of the childhood they never had. These special times have meant so much to us!
Because of your amazing hospitality we have been able to save a good portion of what we thought we would need to spend on the road and regular monthly expenses. We have saved nearly enough to pay the yearly rent on our Haiti house. We are very thankful for this and that our landlord has been gracious in granting us extra time.
Right now we have raised 1/3 of our fully funded monthly budget to be able to serve in Haiti well for the long haul. We are praising God for His provision and trusting Him to continue to provide for where He guides our family and yours in His perfect plan.

Other praises...
-There is a strong possibility we have a family of four and another young man coming to serve alongside us this upcoming semester in Haiti! We are excited about what God has in the works! 
-Kofael continues to progress and the loans needed for the rest of the summer are fully funded from donations and as the women have been faithful in paying back their loans. A team led by our mission organization assisted with the Kofael meeting in Haiti this past month. We are thrilled they were able to be there to encourage the women and be encouraged by this ministry.

Prayer request...
-Eric will be traveling to Israel July 22nd-August 5th. This trip has been planned for a long time. If you have been watching the news you know this is not the best time to go. However, Eric, Scott (who is traveling with Eric and leaving for Africa straight from Israel), and the HGIM leadership team believe they will be able to accomplish the goals of the trip. We have many contacts in Israel that will be able to help them do so as safely as possible. Please pray for their travels and safe return as you pray for the peace of Jerusalem!
-A terrible new mosquito virus called "chikungunya", "chickV", and also "the bone crushing disease" has been plaguing the entire island of Haiti since around the time we left. Nearly every person we know in Haiti has suffered from this virus and most everyone who has suffered continues to have severe on-going pain from relapses weeks and months later. Please pray for their full recoveries and for this epidemic to end. Pray also for wisdom as we plan to return to Haiti soon with our family and do all we can to stay healthy so that we can continue to serve well.
-Pray for the funds to be able to purchase a large generator and batteries to come in the next month so that we can get this set up as soon as we return to meet the needs of our family and the five others coming to live and serve with us in Haiti. We do not see how it will be possible to function well and stay healthy (mosquitos stay away from fans but fans need electricity) to provide for such a large household without any electricity or running water. We have set up a separate fundraiser page for the generator. Please check it out HERE and pray with us for this big expensive need!

-Please pray for continued traveling mercies for us, for healing and direction for some of our family members going through difficult times, for the new partnerships God is bringing us in Haiti and financial provision for them as well, for us to trust God with all of these. Remembering, "Where God Guides, He Provides...SO TRUST GOD!"

Thanks to Lyndsey East for our first photos as a family in the U.S.!

Wherever Our Feet May Roam...

Three weeks in the US and three weeks in Haiti have the Ream Team split.  I am in Haiti.  My family, as many of you know, is in the US.  It is difficult to be separated as a family. Part of who I am is in two worlds not far apart geographically, but far apart in every other way.  It feels like I have one foot in Haiti and one foot in the USA.

Our family of six traveled to the USA for the first time together after waiting four years to be able to do so.  Watching my daughter Esmée as the plane started to move brought us all joy and excitement and tears to my eyes. 

Esmée is an American citizen!

We arrived in Ft. Lauderdale, FL, where Elisabeth and Esmée finished immigration in record time and met the rest of us who were still waiting for our luggage. We finally make our way to the front of the customs line and the immigration officer pulls us out of the moving line and asks us to wait. We explained that we were going to miss our connecting flight if we were detained any longer. They basically said they didn’t care and left us standing there for what seemed like forever before being escorted upstairs and detained further in the same room we had just completed our daughter’s immigration process. The officer who had just processed our paperwork argued, “A family of six? Wait! These two were just in here and I cleared their paperwork! What are they doing back in here?” Surely he must have known how many background checks we have been through in the past 4 years! The other officer said that something had come up and that they were waiting for their supervisor. We did our best to tame wild imaginings racking through our minds over what that “something” could possibly be while four wild and hungry children kept asking what the police were going to do to us and if we were still going to Texas. After an hour of waiting with knotted stomachs, I am pulled into an office and questioned about Haiti, the what, the why and the how of what I do and the same questions for every other country that is stamped on my passport (Israel, Jordan, Turkey, Dominican Republic, Mexico).  The officer questioning me was genial and seemed interested professionally and personally in my travels and what I was doing in those countries.  I had a great opportunity to share who God is and why my feet have been in several countries.  In a frustrating situation, I thank God that He helped me offer a kind response to the interrogating officer, and to plant or water a seed for the gospel.  Our long ago missed connecting flight began our separation as a family early. The rest of the day was almost as wild as we scrambled to make separate standby flights with kids perched all over the plane. Elisabeth and the kids made it to meet several supportive friends at the airport just a little later than scheduled. Thank you friends and family who welcomed us with smiles, signs and hugs increasing our joy to end this long wild ride with you. I eventually made it to Texas later that night. Though Chick-fil-A was already closed, I rejoiced that a double portion had been saved for me.

Our time in Texas reunited us with amazing friends and family, churches, eating too much food, making doctor visits and getting paperwork and evidence ready for another court proceeding pertaining to the girls' adoptions. The adoptions and citizenship had been completed but we needed to register both foreign decrees stateside in order to receive new birth certificates with their name changes and correct an error on Esmée’s birth date. This also allows us to no longer tote a large dossier of adoption paperwork with another stack of translations around with us! Our court appointment went well and everything is finished now.  Thank you to our family, friends, doctor, lawyers and God’s Littlest Angels for each step you walked with us to make this dream become a reality.

I arrived home in Haiti on April 8^th to the inconveniences of having no power for over two weeks at our house, major plumbing issues still not fixed, rainy season beginning and huge leaks in the roof. But never fear because help is on the way! Or so I thought. Our landlord was supposed to come over two weeks ago to assess and deal with the situation. We have not heard from him or anyone who was scheduled to fix some of these big issues in the house.  This is such a huge prayer request. We need to get these issues fixed and make a new contract before I leave in three weeks. Please pray that all these details will come together this week. We need to pay for at least one year’s rent at the signing of the new contract.  We need help, prayers, and participation right now to meet this need. We need 12 people that could commit to give a one time gift of $650.00 this month. Please contact us and/or visit our donate page on this blog if you desire to help. 

My foot in Haiti has been accomplishing some other more exciting things in the last few weeks.  I participated in my first graduating class as a volunteer principal at El Shaddai Learning Center. While it is hard to be away from my family, there are different things I am able to do when my family is not with me that are additional blessings.  I have had many great spiritual conversations with several of the 20 -30 year olds in our neighborhood while hanging outside late at night.  These guys said, “Eric, you hardly ever do this with us when your family is here” (late night conversations). That gave me another great opportunity to talk about the responsibility of a husband and a father in the home.  Please pray for these men who are not yet believers and are so open.  God is working!  I have been able to take some of them with me as I have traveled to other parts of Haiti since I do not have a car full of family.  For many of the guys it was their first time to visit these places even so close to home in their own country.  I had part of my discipleship group over to the house and took some of them to play tennis and swim one day.  Some had never been in a swimming pool, a nice grocery store, and definitely had never played tennis before. 

Guys in my discipleship group hanging at our house!

Fun times learning and loving on students!

Discipleship guys play tennis for the first time!

Thank you for helping us minister here and offer the gospel and a life devoted to serving the Lord! It is a wonderful blessing to build relationships with our neighbors, students and friends through fun experiences too! We pray that as they look back on these fun times they will always remember the conversations about the Savior that took place and remember to look to Him.

Our neighbor Stanley's first time in a pool!

I spent last Saturday with the women of our KOFAEL program. It is always an encouragement to see those with what looks like little praising our Lord for so much! This ministry continues to grow and be a blessing of provision for many Haitian families. Please continue in prayers and support for them. There is an immediate need for $2,400 in donations to provide for the next round of business loans that the women expect and have worked to receive. We need to be able to grant this money by next months meeting on May 31st. The women have been faithful to pay back their loans and sustain their businesses and families. This lack of funds is a deficit from the $250 per member we must raise to grant the loans in the first place. If you are interested in learning more about this ministry program and/or a tax deductible donation please visit kofael.org.

KOFAEL women praying together at the April meeting.

I felt your prayers this morning as I led school chapel. Two students confessed that they needed Christ and several more were strengthened in their desire to walk in Christ!  The Holy Spirit is busy working!

Both of my feet will be in the USA by the end of May.  We will be traveling in IL, FL, GA, TN, KY, IN, OH, NY, TX and Canada among other countries that I will travel to this summer.  We would love to see you and connect with you, your family, small group and church this summer. Our schedule is filling up quickly, but we will do our best to make room for you! Thank you for making room for us in your hearts and homes as we partner together to glorify God and make Him known around the world.

May your feet and ours be beautiful as we share the gospel of Jesus Christ wherever our feet may roam!

Romans 10: 14-15

 Eric