Haiti: Day 4 {part 2}

  When we had finished our time in the small village, part of the team walked back down to the Mission, while the rest of us climbed up this "mountain".  It's a very steep incline with no path and a lot of loose rocks.  Although it personally took me longer to get all the way up there, I was so glad I went all the way!  It was gorgeous!  

  Being up there was such an eye-opening experience.  I'd like to share with you what I shared on Sunday during our report at church (okay, I wrote it, Lynel read it.  I lost my voice :P):

 On Friday we went to a small village called New Jerusalem.  This was a new village, about two or three months old, located on the side of a mountain across from the Mission, and consisted of about seven homes and about forty people.

 We were welcomed into a particular home where a family of seven or eight lived.  It had one bed, two small pieces of furniture, and several small children living there - including a one-month-old.

 As I sat in this shelter of metal and tarps, I remembered that I used to complain about sharing a room with my sister - a bedroom bigger than that home.  And they are sharing this "room" with eight people and it's the only room they have! 

 After our time in the village, Tim, Tanner, Christine, Nate, and I - along with two of Tom's boys - climbed the rest of the mountain.  Some faster than others.  But when I finally reached the top, all I saw was beauty and God's creativity.  

 I realized, standing up there, that even amidst all the hurt, amidst all the spiritual darkness, amidst all of the poverty...there is beauty.  It's as if God placed those majestic mountains and the gloriously blue Caribbean Sea, in a land where poverty thrives, to remind us that He is there...that He has always been there...and that He will always be there, creating beauty amidst poverty.

  That is the biggest take-away that I took home: there is beauty amidst the poverty.  The above pictures just do not do it justice.  On one side of the mountain were more mountains; on the other side was the Sea.   I often heard in my mind, and even by team members, "Climb Every Mountain" from Sound of Music while walking up these mountains/hills.  That was pretty great. :)

  Love always,
      Sierra