ABWE - Association of Baptists for World Evangelism

Haiti —

On February 10, 2010 three ABWE missionaries and a volunteer engineer arrived in Port-au-Prince, Haiti to survey damage and determine how ABWE will be involved in the relief effort and rebuilding process. The following is a report from ABWE missionary Gary Crawford on the progress of the team’s trip.

As we travel, we have been acutely aware and deeply grateful for God's protection and watch over us. Thank you for your prayers.

We are now more than halfway through our Haiti assessment trip. We came to assess immediate needs as well as how ABWE might provide assistance in meeting those needs. After being here for six days and seeing what we have seen, we feel there will be an urgent long-term need for assistance in Haiti. It has been a little over a month since the earthquake and most related injuries have been treated. However, one doctor told me, in the next four to six weeks infections will become more prevalent and the thousands of amputees will need follow-up care.

Our team is staying at Baptist Haiti Mission (BHM) just 12 miles outside of Port-Au-Prince (PAP). BHM is affiliated with an association of 350 churches, located throughout six of ten Haitian provinces.

Our living conditions have been much better than we expected; BHM’s high elevation keeps the temperatures down. It is much hotter in Port-au-Prince or other lower-elevation locations.

The five missionary families at BHM are a precious and humble group of servants. They have been under-staffed and overwhelmed with the magnitude of work since the earthquake on January 12, 2010. Within the first hours after the earthquake more than 400 people were brought to the hospital at the mission. Most of those were not from Port-au-Prince, but from mountain villages surrounding the mission, indicating that the damage was more wide spread than first assumed.

At the time of our arrival no one or agency had been able to get into the rural areas to make an assessment of the damage. On our first full day, BHM personnel and our team piled into a 4-wheel drive vehicle and traveled 25 miles into the mountains. What we found was tragic. Many homes had been completely destroyed. In one community alone more than 400 homes had been damaged or deemed unsafe to live in. Many survivors have salvaged roofing material to build small 10 x 10 shacks where families of six, eight, and sometimes 10 people are living.

On Monday we traveled into the “earthquake zone" in the capitol city. Undoubtedly, many have already seen countless pictures of the destruction and the thousands who are now living in tent cities, which spread across open areas. What the pictures obviously cannot reveal is the stench of garbage and raw sewage collecting on the sidewalks and streets. Or the smell of a mass of humanity living in such close proximity that one could not roll over without bumping the person in the next tent. In reality, most do not even have tents, but rather have created shelter out of sheets, blankets, paper and rags.

We visited two orphanages. One was housing 140 children who are six to 13 years old. The other had 65 toddlers (ages 1 to 5). The pastor and staff, who were doing their best to care for these children, had just received a request to take in 50 more children orphaned by the earthquake. I have been in several orphanages in my life, but never have I seen such desperate living conditions. There were not enough beds for all of the children; most were sleeping outside on a concrete slab, too afraid to go inside since the earthquake. There were only two bathrooms for the older group of children. The bathrooms appeared severely over used and under maintained. This is not meant to be a poor reflection of the staff, who are doing their best just trying to meet basic needs.

Meals were being cooked over an open fire outside while ladies hand-washed what few clothes they had in large plastic tubes. At the other orphanage the 65 toddlers, who were barely walking, had been left to fend mostly for themselves. Living quarters were stark and evidence of these children’s poor living conditions was apparent on their skin and faces.

Still, in the midst of such devastation and suffering there is a ray of hope as reports are coming in of hundreds being saved in churches over the past several days.

Please continue to pray. More than once we have been moved to tears and left speechless over what we have seen. Only God can give us the wisdom to know how we should respond in the months and years to come.

« Back to News Index

Recent Stories