"Now...exactly where is this village"? I guess that is the question I should of asked in the first place. The man I was with had come up to me in the village of Casale and began to tell me that I made a difference to him and his family from 2001 when I was with Pastor Bellande. But to be honest, I still didn't recognize him or remember his family. He said he had a school of 250 in the village called Fontbaptist and he asked me to visit them. So we had a break on Monday afternoon and picked him up in the village of Williamson.
I guess I should of suspected something when he pointed up the mountain and my eyes couldn't see any signs of a road. I figured that I kinda of been many places in Haiti, so I was prepared for about anything...NOT! My big red Ford truck has been in mud, rivers, stuck between trees, wedged between rocks...I thought it would be no problem to visit this guys village. The road I started on disappeared to gravel in about 5 minutes. The gravel turned to mud about 10 minutes later. As I leaned my head out my window I could see my front tire on the edge of the trail that went straight down the mountain if it ran off the side. As we drove straight up this mountain I thought we would never see any people up there. All of a sudden I could hear children's voices. As I looked in my rear view mirror I could see many children running behind the truck. I felt good that we finally made it. When we pulled into the village I asked the man where his school was. He gave me a blank look as he said this wasn't his village. He pointed at the trail and said his village is another 90 minutes farther! So I explained that it was already getting late in the afternoon and because it is rainy season now, the chances of making his village was not possible.
The good news is that we were surrounded by many children smiling and happy because we were there. We unloaded our children's supplies and had a great time with everyone at that village. The good news is we shared...well...the good news. We had fun, we had some games and we gave them Jesus. It was a fulfilling trip even though we never made it back to Fontbaptist.
The funny thing about that whole trip was I later was talking to another missionary who has property at the bottom of that road. He told me that he heard a truck go by his gate but thought that there was nobody that would be crazy enough to go up that mountain. All we could do is laugh as I said "Yep...that was me". But I feel good that as I sit here in Dayton there is a few hundred people up on a mountain that are probably still talking about the day the big red truck came into their village. Thanks to everyone who helps us be light in the nation of Haiti.
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