Bonswa!!! (Good Evening!)

Today we attended our first day of VBS at Eden Church in Limbe. The theme of the VBS is Mark 10:14 "Let the children come to me." This verse is also the title of our journal today. We started our day with a parade of 160 children in matching shirts, singing down the streets of Limbe. The community was very supportive and stood along the street chanting and cheering them on. Each of us had a group of 16 children as well as a partner leader to help us translate. We were all touched by the fact that the children felt so drawn to and attached to us even though we were never really able to talk to them. They were very interested in us; our skin, our hair, watches, sunglasses...etc. The children wanted to know everything about us. Ty was touched by the little boy who always seemed to be trying to watch out for him; the boy would tell him to stay out of the sun and bring him water without him asking, and carrying his backpack around all day. For Sarah, the highlight of her day was teaching the children how to use a yoyo without the use of her words. Nathan was the camera man for the day and although he did not have his own group he was able to make connections with the children because they shared a mutual interest in soccer. Catey enjoyed reading with the kids in Haitian and English as well as singing songs in both languages because it allowed us to share our lives and to teach each other. We spent our day with children hanging off of us, basically human jungle gyms; the connections made through it were spirit-filled and we could tell God wanted us there for a reason bigger than ourselves. The support of the community and the church members for the VBS was humbling because we all feel that support from the community as well as church members in the U.S. has declined since we were attending. It was a long hot day but we cannot wait for tomorrows VBS!

Orevwa!!

Catey, Ty, Sarah, and Nathan

To read all of the postings by the IGNITE team, or to read about the team members, click here.