Dear Family and Friends,

Please forgive our long delay in updating you. We have been relatively out of internet access since July combined with our computer crashing last month. Recently, we got it up and running again.

We returned to Haiti three weeks ago after being away for eight weeks of steady travel filled with joyful reunions, Cooperative Baptist Fellowship team meetings, Steve’s Family Medicine Board Exams, medical and dental visits, an American Baptist International Ministries World Mission Conference in Suffield, Ct., speaking in churches, and deeply meaningful times with both sets of our parents and our children and two precious granddaughters. It is good to be home here in Haiti to “rest up” from the 5,000 miles we traveled by car and living out of our suitcases!

We found Haiti feeling the effects from the failing U.S. economy and still reeling from the series of hurricanes that left thousands dead and over a million people homeless. As usual, the poor suffer the most. Scarcity of food and energy continues to drive prices to new record highs. At times like these, we must find our trust and hope in the Lord.

We are hearing more and more encouraging stories of people of faith reaching out to their neighbors in need. Thank you for all who have sent donations for relief through American Baptist channels. Despite the recent crises in Haiti, the four Christian community health centers with whom we partner have continued to serve the needy every day without interruption. The local scout troop in our Haut Limbé community, accompanied by the United Nations, has been traveling to one of the hardest hit areas, Gonaives, about 55 miles away, to bring food supplies and clothing for the survivors. The situation in that area is still very bad as mud has buried much of the town of over 300,000 people and flood waters still have not totally receded. We would like to be able to visit the area to assess the situation of the ongoing relief work. Yet, we do not want to go and just be “observers” of the tragedy but really somehow be of help. We hear from those who have visited that, as the need is so great, sometimes mobs of desperate people pillage relief teams bringing in supplies. In some cases, also, it appears there is the diverting and selling of relief goods intended for the poor. We are hearing some very sad stories coming from those areas hardest hit by the storms. This situation reinforces in our minds the importance of channeling disaster relief through Christ-centered, faith-based local communities such as the local churches in Haiti.

As for us personally, we are doing well, better than anticipated. Though we have to search more and be more patient, we have been able to find basic living necessities, such as food and fuel. Micah is enjoying 9th grade at his Junior High teacher’s home in the afternoons (only two other High School students).

This week a sad case was presented to Ebenezer Clinic of a 34-year-old woman, named Cléanthe, with a grapefruit-sized painful tumor obliterating her nose and that is starting to encroach on her ability to see. She came to the clinic wearing a scarf to protect her both from flies and from the shocked stares of all who might see her. She says she has had this growth enlarging for four years without any cure. A visiting medical team discovered her and a missionary asked Steve to do a biopsy to send to a physician at Harvard University to see what possibilities might exist for her in the US. Please pray for Cléanthe. We were able to send the specimen with Kennedy Blough, our young Bruderhof volunteer, who left this week. Kennedy has been a real blessing for us these past nine months.

Knowing that these are financially hard times for everyone, we would still like to encourage those of you to give as generously as you can to the World Mission Offering, which helps so many in need around the world today. Thank you.

In Jesus’ love,

Nancy, Steve & Micah