Dear Friends.
Thank you, Lord, for your blessings on me is the chorus of a song I like to sing and listen to around Thanksgiving. It goes like this: I’ve a roof up above me, I’ve a good place to sleep. There’s food on my table and shoes on my feet. You gave me your love Lord and a fine family. Thank you, Lord, for your blessings on me! We are truly blessed and have all these things to be thankful for.
But that’s not the case with many of those we serve in Haiti. Many roofs are made of thatch and leak when it rains. That means they don’t have a good, comfortable place to sleep. Often, they don’t have food on their tables and some struggle to afford shoes for their feet. Many have not experienced the love of Jesus and don’t have families who care about them.
Over these past 27 years, Starfish Ministries has had the opportunity to meet many of these needs in the Tricotte area. Through your partnership we have been able to replace over a hundred houses made with mud walls, dirt floors and thatched roofs with block walls, concrete floors and metal roofs. Through your help we have been able to provide literally millions of meals for schoolchildren and poor families. And when we were able to ship containers to Haiti, we had shoe drives and were able to provide hundreds of pairs of shoes for the neediest.
And through these humanitarian outreaches, we have been able to introduce thousands to the love of Jesus and helped them along to experience the loving family of the local church body. Thank you, Lord, for your blessings toward us and toward those we have had the opportunity to minister to.
One of those families is the Josilien Vallin Family. Josilien is 59 years old, has a wife, Rosette, and four children. He was mostly a farmer by trade. About 20 years ago Starfish Ministries helped Josilien learn the trade of jewelry making. When we took teams to Tricotte several times each year, Josilien would sell silver rings, earrings and necklaces to team members. That was his primary means of supporting his family.
Several years ago, Josilien came to Daniel and asked for financial help to pay for his children’s school tuition. Recognizing Josilien’s farming abilities, Daniel offered him a job at the orphanage. Starfish Ministries owns a couple of acres of land behind the orphanage and with a stream running through it. Daniel hired Josilien to work those couple of acres of garden and have the orphanage children work beside him so he could teach them some farming skills and help feed the orphans. Josilien was so happy to have a job and told Daniel that this was the first time he had a paying job. And that meant that he could now walk through the Tricotte village with his head held high since he could now afford to pay his children’s tuition himself.
Daniel had also hired Josilien’s wife, Rosette, to work at the orphanage as a cook. But now with the orphanage temporarily closed, both Josilien and Rosette are out of work. And that is the situation for many of the Tricotte villagers. Many of them worked at the orphanage, the medical clinic and the construction projects. Until the last couple of years, Starfish Ministries was building school classrooms, churches, houses and other structures most of the time. That meant jobs for laborers, masons, concrete finishers, carpenters and many other supporting opportunities. But now, with the drastic conditions in Haiti, that has all come to a standstill. We are not able to get materials due to the gang activity.
When I talked to Daniel recently, he shared that many of the people in our ministry area were becoming in need of support. We have often helped the widows, the elderly and the handicapped with food, now we are having to extend the food relief to more families. And that takes someone to administer the purchasing and the distribution of the food relief. So Daniel decided that Josilien and Rosette are capable of handling this responsibility and they are happily employed again.
Normally we would like to post a list of options for your consideration for your year-end giving. However, due to the current conditions in Haiti it has become very difficult to distribute the gifts to children and their families. So, this year we will simply give you a couple of possibilities for your consideration. This month we are also adding Food Relief to this short list.
- Education Scholarship Fund – As we successfully graduate students from our high schools, we would like to encourage them to go on to higher education. Students like Bendjina. Without support this is not possible.
- Elderly Ministry – this continues to be a vital support for otherwise often forgotten elderly and handicapped Haitians. In many cases this is their only means of receiving their most basic needs.
- The coffee and food ministry in our churches has met a very real need. Many of the church members in our nine churches benefit from this weekly offering.
- Food Relief – since this is becoming an increasing need.
Thank you for your partnership with us as we navigate so many aspects of life as we serve God in Haiti. God has given us the privilege to serve the people of the Tricotte area of Haiti from birth to the very oldest of the population. Babies were born safely in the medical clinic, and healthcare has been provided for people of all ages. Hopefully that will continue soon. 41 children, ages four through 17 now cared for outside the orphanage setting. Many more children from preschool all the way through trade school and university are educated and fed through the school ministry. Children and adults alike are fed through the coffee and food program at the churches each Sunday morning. Many of the poorest families in the region have received help through Food Relief. The elderly and handicapped ministry meets needs for 86 previously-forgotten people. We are able to hold up our Haitian brothers and sisters in prayer as they go through various trials. And through every means possible, we present the gospel of Jesus Christ, trusting in Him to meet their greatest need.
Thank you so much for your prayers and faithful support! We really appreciate your response to the giving list!!
With warmest Christmas greetings!
Serving the Lord together,
Bernie, Sheryl & Philip Bovenkamp
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