As many of you know, My Father's House is full to overflowing. We have over a hundred children in a house that we thought was full with forty. But the needs of the children of Haiti demand some radical solutions, like sleeping two or three to a bed. But this cannot go on for long. Such crowding is not healthy. We have been praying for another house to rent in the same area. The Lord has answered our prayers! Five minutes away from our home another house has come available that will meet the need. It’s large and sound.
Taking an additional house requires a step of faith. It will cost us thirteen thousand dollars a year to rent (paid in advance) but will house, comfortably, over a hundred children. We have prayed earnestly for God's direction and decided we would take the house. We had to give the landlady a date on which we would take it and pay the first year's rent. That date is August fifteenth. After getting the house, we need to outfit it with beds, mattresses, generator, refrigerator, freezer, tables, chairs, pots and all the other things necessary to immediately house about fifty children from the first house.
This additional house will enable us to relieve the crowding at My Father's House #1 and to start meeting the needs of the many children we have had to turn away for lack of room. Praise God for provision!
Each day we have to turn away children. Turning away real orphans, orphans that might starve or might be sold & mistreated, breaks my heart. I cannot endure the thought that there might be something I could do or should be doing to save those children and I'm not doing it. I believe God has impressed us with the need. He has shown us the need. We have seen it and touched it. I believe God will hear our prayers for these children and will answer. He has answered thus far and He is able to meet all the need in Port au Prince. If we will not turn any away then we must be willing to take them all. I don't believe that the Father of the Fatherless wants us to turn away any child that comes to our door. I believe He wants us to eventually have 'doors' throughout the Port au Prince Metropolitan area. But for now we need to have a second door in Giardo Ravine. Then I believe He wants us to fill the house with children. Then we must care for them, educate them, lead them to faith in Christ Jesus, disciple them, train & equip them for life and send them back into their culture as leven of righteousness to the glory of their Father. As we are obedient He will enlarge and multiply our houses to meet the need.
Perhaps He will raise up others to meet the need. That would be wonderful, but we must be obedient and faithful to fulfill His calling no matter whom else hears or sees or doesn't hear or doesn't see the need.
There is a picture, we received from Haiti, of a little boy left with his six siblings at our door. Their parents had died and they were being cared for by their grandparents. The grandparents had no food for them. They were starving. Other family members brought him and his brothers and sisters to My Father's House. They heard that we feed the children three meals a day! That we put them in school and that they have books and a clean place to sleep! They heard that we love the children and that we don't abuse them! He was brought to the door and was told that there was no room at My Father's House. The house was full to overflowing. When the adults heard this rejection they started crying, said 'forgive us' and ran away abandoning the seven hungry children to whatever we would decide. They were the last children we have taken in. There is literally no more room. The photo of this little boy (maybe two?) standing in one of the rooms to pose for his snapshot breaks my heart. He has soiled himself. He looks afraid. I think you would be too. He's in a new place. He's hungry. His only anchor is his nearby sister and the fact that the adults here smile and treat him kindly.
He'll eat and sleep safe here. He now has a hundred brothers and sisters.
But he was the last one in the door.
We don't want to turn any away.
Please pray and do as God would lead you. Thank you.
In Christ with you,
For the least... Jason & Sharon
