I don’t get it! Every spring Rena and I dedicate ourselves to decluttering. We claw through our closets and cull what we don’t want anymore. Then we feature all this flotsam in our annual MacGillivray family yard sale or donate it to a local thrift store. So how is that every spring we have more stuff to sell and donate? Can you relate?

This year what if we spring clean FOR OTHERS? Here are three ways you can do that for our friends in Haiti this spring:

1. Part with your prom dresses. Couples in Haiti often wait to get married because they lack nice clothes for the wedding and money to buy food for guests. Haitian pastors have a creative solution to this problem. They organize weddings for several couples at a time and help them with the cost of wedding clothes and food. Brilliant!

We can help couples celebrate their wedding with joy. You may have a little used prom dress (or two) or maybe a wedding dress that you could donate. All sizes needed. Pastor Isaiah and his wife, Celina, have a good plan for coordinating this effort in northeastern Haiti. On our end, either drop off or ship your prom or wedding dress to PPI, and we’ll get it to Haiti in short order. 

2. Donate your drum kick to a Haitian church. This one’s a little more specialized. If you or your church recently upgraded your drum kick, consider donating your good used kick to a Haitian church.

Again, drop it off to us and ship it. Our address is Partnership of Pastors International, 465 Mayflower Drive, Saginaw, MI 48638. Also, we’ll give you a “gift in kind” receipt for all items donated.

3. Turn over your couch cushions for a Bible college roof. Pastor Jasmin, one of our key team members, launched a Bible college in northeast Haiti about five years ago. The Evangelical Theological Institute of Haiti (ITEPHA) is the only college of its kind in northeastern Haiti, and it’s doing well!

Jasmin purchased land three years ago and is building what will serve as a church, elementary school and Bible college. Earlier this year, the Haitian government told Jasmin that he needs to finish the building in 2025 to retain the recognized status of the college. After some negotiation, the government agreed that completing the roof would satisfy their requirements for this year. Take a video tour of the future Bible college building HERE.

Can you help Pastor Jasmin put a roof on the Bible college? Consider contributing the proceeds of your yard sale or Marketplace transactions. Or you could just make a special donation to PPI and note that it’s for the “Bible College roof.” DONATE HERE

Let us know if you have questions HERE.

Giving to our brothers and sisters in Haiti can give us purpose and joy. Happy spring cleaning!

I’d like to introduce you to our new ministry team member. Modie (pronounced “Mo-dee-ay”) embodies what we teach about church leadership in Haiti. I met Modie four years ago in Cap-Haïtien. He participated in PPI Course 1 along with 111 other church leaders, but I noticed him right away. For starters, Modie dresses impeccably in bright colors – yellow, red, blue suits. You can’t miss him. More importantly, he seemed to know everyone there. During our break times and at lunch, he moved among the crowd of pastors, smiling, shaking hands, patting shoulders and speaking to them. Our ministry team met him and liked him immediately.

Modie brought several other church leaders with him to the next PPI course. He began helping our team in any way he could – passing out water on hot afternoons, organizing Thompson Bibles for the day’s training. He has volunteered at nearly every PPI course in northern or northeastern Haiti since then, quietly but energetically, expecting nothing. On top of that, Modie champions our training in northern Haiti. He has invited scores of church leaders to our courses.

I talked with our team last year about asking Modie to join our ministry team “officially” for our training in March. They agreed without hesitation, and Modie helped us lead Course 3 (two times) and Course 1 in Limbé and Cap-Haïtien in early March. His servant’s heart and stellar work ethic have shone through every day – even on a day he (and our entire team) wasn’t feeling well.

One evening in our team meeting, I asked Modie to tell us more about himself and share how he met Christ. He began quietly:

I was born in Ferrier [a village in northeast Haiti]. My father didn’t take care of me so I was given to my uncle, but he treated me badly. I ran away to Cap-Haïtien when I was 12, but I didn’t know anyone there. I just tried to find something better. A pastor took me in and helped me. He sent me to school and had others teach me how to build. I started building when I was 14 years old.

Modie smiled as he told us how the pastor and his wife included him in their family, introduced him to Christ and discipled him. After finishing high school, he attended a building trades school and two years of Bible college. He is an accomplished designer-builder and has built houses, churches and businesses  across Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

He continued, “I thank God. Street kids in Haiti become criminals and die young. The Lord rescued me. He has a purpose for me and I want to follow it.” Modie’s pastor-mentor died from complications of diabetes in late February. Modie helped the family plan his funeral over the two weeks of our training, paying for much of it himself.

I was moved by Modie’s story. I couldn’t help connecting it with the content of PPI Course 3, which we led two times over the two weeks of training. Course 3 is our first course on church leadership, in which we focus on the mission and strategy of the church. We study and discuss foundational truths about the church in Scriptures such as Matthew 16:13-18 (Jesus’ first teaching on the church), Matthew 28:16-20, Ephesians 4:11-16, etc.

We spend a lot of time in Matthew 28:16-20, where the Lord made clear His mission for the church and His strategy for fulfilling it. “Make disciples of all nations,” He commands us, by going, baptizing and teaching them to obey. We answer from Scripture questions such as:

• What is a “disciple”?
• How does Jesus intend for us to “make” them?
• How can our churches be more effective in fulfilling the Lord’s mission?

We tell pastors that making disciples is Job One for the church and that church leaders must exemplify disciple-making as well as teach it. Modie’s pastor did that. He opened his heart and his home to a boy from the streets. He loved him, won him to Christ and discipled him over many years. That boy was Modie. God changed his life and now he loves Jesus and serves faithfully in His mission – a perfect picture of what we teach church leaders in Course 3. May God use this course to inspire and equip church leaders to devote themselves to making disciples in Haiti!

How uncomfortable am I willing to get to be part of Jesus’ mission? That question swirled in my mind as we flew through high winds and heavy rain last Tuesday morning on our way to Haiti. Our MFI pilots, Rod and Phil, did their best to dodge the lightning, but the DC-3 plunged and rose, tossed and turned like a roller-coaster. Most of the dozen or so passengers were airsick, including me. It’s a terrible feeling –  burning in the stomach, nausea, sweats. I grabbed the gag bag and fluffed it out just in case.

The two hour drive to Limbé from the Cap-Haitien airport felt like the flight. We tossed and turn, rose and fell with the craters in the road. “At least we can’t fall from the sky,” I thought, still fighting back the nausea. We made steady progress until we started up the mountain between us and Limbé. The van stalled and refused to start again. Our driver rolled backward, popped the clutch, and the van reluctantly began to run. But it refused to go into first gear despite the driver’s repeated attempts.

We all got out and stood on the side of the road. What now? Our driver inquired about a local mechanic with two young guys near us. He then set off down the hill. We bought some drinks at a roadside stand near us and moved into the shade. Fifteen minutes later our driver trudged toward us. He tried to start the van again. No luck. Clearly we needed a “B plan,” as Haitians say.

Isaiah and I flagged down a passing SUV, told him our dilemma and asked if he would take us over the mountain to Limbé or knew someone who could. “Pa gen pwoblem,” he replied. “Not a problem.” Thank you, Lord! We off-loaded our Bibles and training supplies from the ailing van and crammed them into the SUV, each holding a box, backpack or bag on our laps. Off we go – until we didn’t. We labored halfway up the steep grade and the SUV quit. Not again!

How uncomfortable am I willing to get to be part of Jesus’ mission? The question returned. I thought of Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 4:17-18: “For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.” What Paul calls light-weight problems would level most of us. A few verses earlier, he says he is “hard-pressed . . . perplexed . . . persecuted and struck down.” Later in this letter, he tells us:

I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. Five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked. I spent a night and a day in the open sea. (2 Corinthians 11:23-25)

Light and momentary troubles? Are you kidding me, Paul?! But he’s not done:

I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger from bandits, in danger from my own countrymen, in danger from the Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea; and in danger from false brothers . . . (2 Corinthians 11:26)

How could Paul call these high pressure even life-threatening situations “light and momentary troubles”? He doesn’t believe for a moment that he’s paying for his sins through hardships, nor is he bragging about his latest episode of suffering for Jesus. He only shares these hardships to combat the super-spirituality of false teachers unwilling to get uncomfortable for the mission of Christ. The Apostle Paul calls these serious troubles “light and momentary” in comparison to the eternal weight of glory achieved by them.

Most Haitians endure more difficulty in one month than we face in 10 years. Why shouldn’t we put up with some discomfort to help them?

The apostle doesn’t go looking for trouble, but if troubles comes as he lives every day for the mission of Jesus, so be it. God uses troubles to distinguish real-deal Christ-followers from people who claim to be spiritual but refuse to move from their comfort zones. And I’ve seen again and again in Haiti that God uses troubles to demonstrate to those we’re trying to reach that we really care and are willing to be uncomfortable to encourage them in Christ.

Perhaps we need to restate the question. Instead of “How uncomfortable am I willing to get to be part of Jesus’ mission,” we should ask, Am I willing to put up with temporary problems to take part in the Cause that impacts people’s lives for eternity? By God’s grace, I want to be willing to make that trade every day, don’t you?

Our second driver wouldn’t be denied. He spun the SUV around, started it again, and backed the rest of the way up the mountain!  At first, our team sat stunned then we laughed. Okay, let’s do this! Once we reached the top, our young driver spun the SUV around again to face forward. In another 20 minutes, we rolled into Limbé. We led Course 3 there this week with 82 church leaders – with eternity in view.

I was excited and a little anxious as our plane circled the grass airfield in Pignon, Haiti. Excited that we would offer ministry training to church leaders in central Haiti for the first time, and a little anxious because I wondered how MFI’s twin-engine DC-3 could land on such a short, grass runway. “They do this all the time,” I thought. Sure enough, the plane touched down smoothly, turned toward a waiting crowd of Haitians and rolled to a stop.

We exited the plane, helped unload our 900 lbs of Bibles and training materials, then scanned the crowd. Which one is Pastor François, our host pastor, and where’s the van we reserved? Both Isaiah and Jasmin, key members of our Haitian ministry team, were on their phones. They have it under control. Within minutes, an older, distinguished looking man and two younger men walked toward us smiling. The two younger men looked familiar to me. Where had I seen them before?

The older man introduced himself as François Romelus and welcomed us warmly. We introduced ourselves, thanked Pastor François for helping us introduce PPI training in central Haiti and asked about his family (common courtesy in Haiti). Then we talked logistics. We would leave Bibles and training materials for our Pignon training in locked storage at the airfield and would take the rest with us to Hinche. An 1-1/2 hours drive from Pignon, the city of Hinche is the chief (capital) city of the Centre Department, and we planned to train there first.

The two younger men stood by patiently. We had met but hardly spoken to them. As we organized our materials and luggage, they talked more to me. I was sweating. “It feels hotter than usual for December,” I thought. They told me they were pastors in Hinche. “Do you remember us?” they asked me. I told them I remembered their faces and asked if they had taken a PPI course in the past. They had attended PPI training a few years before in northern Haiti. They had another question for me: “Do you remember that we asked you to come to Hinche to train many pastors in our city?”

A lot of pastors who take part in our training ask us to come to their city or villages to train others. We can’t possibly go everywhere, and the Lord has blessed our strategy of offering training in the chief city of each Department and a strategic city within a two-hour drive of the chief city. When church leaders from a chief city invites us to come, we ask them to pray for us and tell them we intend to come to their city. We then take a picture with them and get their name and phone number. We must have responded that way to these brothers because they said, “We have been praying for you to come to Hinche for three years. Now the Lord has answered our prayers, and we wanted to welcome you!”

I stopped in my tracks and wiped the sweat from my face. I was reminded again that our God works through the faithful, fervent prayers of His children. “Thank you for praying for us so faithfully,” I told them. “The Lord is answering your prayers.” And He certainly did! Course 1 in Hinche overflowed with church leaders, eager to learn and grateful for the training. During our recognition time on the last day, pastors expressed how much they needed and appreciated PPI training and the Thompson Bibles. They gave our team a certificate of appreciation (pictured) and asked when we could return to offer our other courses. We plan to return to Hinche and Pignon in late April. 

Christie Gabhart, a long-time missionary in Pignon, sent me a note in late January. She said:

I have heard feedback from pastors from Many Hands [her mission organization] who attended your December training.  It was a huge blessing. The training, the gift of a beautiful Bible at the end. All are ‘pumped’ to take the level 2 training. And we want to take advantage of the May 1-3 level 1 training . . . . 

The Lord’s work in response to the prayers of two young Haitian pastors – and all of you. Thank you!