Our Creekside Church Haiti Mission Team-2017 traveled to Pignon, October 16-25. Once again--"IT WAS A GREAT TRIP."

For God is the King of all the earth; sing to him a psalm of praise. God reigns  over the nations; God is seated on his holy throne. (NIV) (Psalm 47:7-8)

Wow--a pizza place in Pignon!  Now that's what I call progress!!!! Monday was our last full day in Pignon. Tom K. took a few people to the hospital to assemble file cabinets and desks. The rest of the crew put the finishing touches on the painting project at Sunshine School. Then we all met at the new pizza restaurant for lunch (who would ever think you could find pizza in Pignon?) We ordered 6 super large for the 12 of us and our Haitian painting partners. We had a full pizza left so Ann delivered it to the Haitian workers at the "concrete block factory." I'm sure it was their first pizza and as you can see--a real treat!

My view for the month:  The theme for the week was "Love your Neighbor as Yourself" (with your neighbor being anyone who isn't you) as you "Occupy your Street" (with your street being wherever you are at any given moment. Our focus was on a couple of key points from Creekside pastoral messages the past year: (1) It is not what you can do for God--but what God can do through you. (2) What God has called you to--he will equip you for. Powerful stuff!! Our team always welcomes people from different backgrounds and viewpoints as we serve and love God's people of Haiti. Thus, we always have people with various skills and gifts that make such a vital contribution to the team. It really doesn't matter what each person's niche is--whether you are painting, fixing a roof, teaching bible school or just loving the kids on the street--each person's input is just as important as the other. Then as we put all of these pieces of the puzzle together, it all falls in place--we all worked individually and collectively to bring the dear people of Haiti a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ. What a great week as we allowed God to do his work through us--by doing those things he had already equipped us to do as we occupied the streets of Pignon by loving our neighbors as ourselves.

I promote Iowa agriculture so I will start right off by showing you two typical farms in Haiti--(left) corn (right) sugar cane. Each of these fields is just a few acres. There are no hybrid seeds or commercial fertilizer and the rain never seems to come when most needed. Don't expect to see a John Deere in these fields. Very few people even own an oxen, so most of the farm work is done with a hoe and a machete.

Mr. Tom (left) was our work supervisor again this year. Our primary work project was to paint the classrooms at Sunshine School at Savanette (above left). They also had fun and games. Kristin and Colette brought a ground parachute and everyone had fun under the mango tree (above right). All six rooms were painted two coats, but not all of the paint stayed on the walls. Tom N. (right) had paint removal duty after the kids checked to see if this oil based stuff was dry. It wasn't!!!!!!

Last night Norb challenged Tom N. to a push up contest and kicked his butt.  I think he got over confident because tonight he took on Benson. What more can I say? Maybe next time pay per view?

Once again we had bible school at the library. This is my favorite part of the trip--telling the kids the good news of the gospel. Left: Norb teaching the kids. Middle: Coloring time. Right: Tom B. teaching an adult bible school class.

Our 2017 mission trip included five very amazing ladies. I could not even begin to tell you the financial, spiritual, physical and emotional things they do for the dear people of Haiti. They do it all out of love--not for recognition--so I won't betray their confidence. But look at the pic on the right--I think that tells it all.

I show you a lot of Iowa wall murals--but this is Hait!

Left: Mural on the inside wall of a classroom at Sunshine School.

Right: The outside wall of a building in Pignon.

Left to right: Mr. Tom, Ann, Kristin, Tom, TB, Bob, Colette, Norb, Steph, Alicia, Rod and Blue Bob. Then there is the guy in the middle--Jacqueline. He was our team liaison for the week. Liaison--I looked that word up in the dictionary. It means: intermediary, mediator, middleman, contact link, go-between, representative, agent. He was with us every minute and did all of those things so well--plus much more. He was our friend--we love you Jacqueline!!!!!