Wednesday, September 12, 2018

Day 3 Site Site 17 Play Date, Papillion, Home for Sick & Dying Babies (Serenity Village Community Church)

Today marks day 3 on our short term mission trip to Haiti and like the previous 2 days it was nothing short of amazing.  We started the day off pretty routine with waking up with the sunrise and many, many cups of coffee around 6:30am. We gathered around the table for breakfast shortly after a group prayer around 8am and after our minds, bodies and souls were nourished for the day - we gathered our things and got on the tap-tap (like a a personal Haitian limousine of sorts). 
Our first stop was Site 17 where we spent about 2-3 hours playing with the same community of people that 2 days prior we were serving water to.  This time it was 100% pleasure, with no agenda or task at hand to distract our mind from spreading the love. We each played a special role in raising the spirit and energy of the people, but reflecting back it was truly US that the risen.  The entire spread of generations were our playing and loving on life, loving on God.  We danced, sang, hugged and laughed until we cried.  We headed back on the tap-tap for a short pit stop home - shower, change, eat small snacks and then it was off to our next adventure! 
This time we were dressed up because we were on our way to Papillion and Home for Sick and Dying Babies.  Papillion was stop one and we went up to the rooftop restaurant, drank fresh fruit smoothies and snacked on some chicken nuggets, hot dogs and french fries which were all amazing!  We played some games and waited for our guided tour.  Tour started around 1pm and Turkey walked us thru the behind the scenes of how the beautiful arts and crafts are made and introduced us to some of the key people that turn everyday items into pieces of hope.
We spent a few hours at Papillion and then we gathered into the tap-tap to go to our last stop of the day: Home for the Sick and Dying Babies.  This stop was one that our entire team was slightly anxious about entering, but as soon as we put our blue aprons on we took charge and went to work.  The work here was night and day different than any "work" we had done up until this point.  Our only task at hand was to touch, hold and love up on babies.  We started off by feeding the kids oatmeal, then after meal time, we picked them up out of their cribs, spun them around in our arms and on the playground.  The mission was to transfer the the light and love of God and I think our team did an amazing job doing just that!
We got back in the tap-tap for the last time for the day and headed home.  A quick shower before dinner and then gathered around the table to pray, eat and discuss our "word of the day".  Dinner was amazing per usual - and then off to the pool!  Some of us stayed behind for a small group discussion and got deep into each other's faith journeys.  It is such a blessing to feel the security of being REAL with those around you.  To be able to let your guard down, eliminate any sense of judgement and talk things out is an opportunity I didn't know I was going to be able to accomplish on this trip - but I was wrong. 
When the other half of the team arrived back from the pool we sat around in the living room for a slideshow of pictures from the day and our nightly devotional.  Each night I have personally been BLOWN AWAY on how every devotional SPOKE to me on a level I was not expecting.  It was like God was hanging out with us all day, then snuck a message/recap about our day into a book placed perfectly on the table for someone in the group to randomly grab and read. We all talked about what the devotional meant to us, and then most of the group headed off to bed.  It's 9pm and there are a handful of us still awake, snacking, journaling and passing additional stories and words of wisdom and empowerment to each other.  Some nights we are all in bed by 10, other nights we have stayed awake until 12-1am....I don't know what tonight has in store, but I am beyond excited for whatever God has in place!  Good night, sweet dreams and happy prayers y'all! :) -Keri Anderson