My hope for Haiti, pt. 2.

There are thousands of aid organizations and missions in this city.  And daily, crews of people are showing up wanting to help.  All of that sounds really great, but I'm realizing that perhaps it isn't.  One aid organization outside of the city has acres and acres of free land for people to move to and set up a life, but many won't go.  "We're going to stay here and maybe some white people will come to rebuild our house," they say.  From what I've gathered, there are so many organizations offering aid to the people there that many are content to never do anything...ever.  In their minds, they are entitled to help and will wait, sometimes belligerently, for it.  Some are highly motivated, hard working people, but far more want a handout.  And have lived their entire lives that way.  And since the quake, relief and handouts have come in droves and the people are waiting to be taken care of.  (This is not to say that every need has been met and that the system of getting aid to the people is perfect.  It's not.  But that's a different blog post for a different day.)

I believe in meeting people's physical needs and I believe that God's word tells us to care for orphans and feed the hungry.  I believe Jesus when He said that whatever we do to "the least of these" we will have done unto Him.  And Haiti is full of the least, there's no doubt.  Tent cities are brimming with people; wealthier neighbors now have as many as 50 people camped in their yards.  There is no electricity in most of the city and the water is not safe to drink.  Rivers of feces run next to makeshift beds.  Thousands upon thousands are going hungry every day.  People have lost homes, jobs, livelihoods, family members.  There is no shortage of need and suffering here.  And I want to help - I must.  But what is the best way?

I believe also in the idea that you can give a man a fish and he will eat for a day.  But if you teach the man to fish, he can eat for a lifetime.  And I'm beginning to see how important that kind of thinking is going to be for the Haitian people.  Obviously, there are some very urgent needs right now and hunger is one of them.  And an entire country of starving people can't be taught to fish overnight.  I'm not saying their immediate needs should be ignored.  But I do believe that the Haitian people are resilient and capable and after a time should be able to begin restoring their lives, and for many that means figuring out how to feed their families.  There are many saying that farms should be established outside the city as a means to lure people away from the overpopulated capital.  This would solve several problems - hunger (as they'd be growing their own food), unemployment (as many people would be required to work the farm), and crowding in the city.  However, the land is so depleted from a heritage of terrible farming practices that nothing can be grown.  Crops will fail in this dead soil.  As I talked to a Haitian friend here, I mentioned that perhaps there were farmers from the States that could come and teach the local people good farming practices, thus increasing their crop and their revenue.  She laughed.  "They'll never want to do it your way," she said.  And that seems to be the general consensus.

So how do we help?  If we raise money to build houses or come down to build them, how do we choose who to help first?  Do we require the people to participate in the building of their house?  Do we require that they pay something, eve if it is very little, so that they have ownership of their new homes?  (Habitat for Humanities has been using the concept of "sweat equity" in their organization for years and has found that people take better care of and are actually grateful for a home they participated in building - ownership removes that feeling of entitlement.)  How do we invest in something bigger?  How do we help to restore the lives of people who have never really had anything?  How do we show them that there is something more than their current situation?  These are important questions that I don't have answers to today.  But I guarantee you this - God is big and good and He is already moving.  We don't have to recreate the wheel.  As soon as God shows me where He wants us to participate in the work that He is already doing, I'm going for it.  After all, I can do something.  And I should.

My hope for Haiti, pt. 1.

Flying into Port Au Prince, six weeks after the quake that changed a nation forever, my heart beat out of my chest – not so much for the anticipation of the visual explosion that awaited me, but for the urgency in my spirit, an urgency I wasn’t sure existed.  My seat partner on the plane had already sensed my heaviness – he said, “wow, you just look…burdened” and in truth, I was glad at his observation.  Although I’ve been able, as anyone, to acknowledge the tragedy and it’s implications for Haitian people, I have felt very disconnected and somewhat unfeeling.  I understand the irony there, but at this stage in my “healing and resting” process, I’m still a little unsure of what will come out of my mouth or heart at any point.  It’s bizarre.  So someone else’s observation of what I’m clearly feeling was a comfort and confirmation rather than a frustration or acknowledgment of weakness.

Haiti has been in the news with decreasing frequency over the last few weeks and while World Vision and the Red Cross are still obviously deeply invested in restoration of this island nation, many people have already moved on.  I’ve been deeply convicted for the Body of Christ over how quick we are to move on from devastation and/or our involvement in it.  We are so easily distracted.  It’s not that we’re vindictive or maliciously denying aid to our fellow world inhabitants.  It’s that we are so very easily distracted.  Anything will suffice to steal our attention and shift our focus from the task at hand.  It’s happened with Haiti, it’s happened with taking the Gospel of Jesus to unreached people.  We are just…distracted.  My friend likened it to his 5 year old.  When asked to take her plate to the kitchen, she has every intention of doing so.  But between the living room and the kitchen, the smallest movement or flash of excitement lures her and weeks later, the plate is found in her bedroom closet.  How did she get so far away from the kitchen, where the plate so obviously goes?  Distraction.  We’re not so different.

Part of my desire in coming to Haiti this time is to understand my role in this tragedy and develop ways for us to stay engaged.  It will be terribly easy for us to get distracted by whatever sparkly thing the news shows us or our work or families take us to.  But the reality is that there are Haitian people with no food, no shelter, no water and this situation isn’t going to change overnight.  We are so rich and they are so poor.  We have so much, yet we are so quick to hold onto what is ours that we can’t give what is essentially life to our neighbors in Haiti?  Shame on us.

"I am only one, but I am one. I can't do everything, but I can do something.

What I can do, that I ought to do.

And what I ought to do, by the grace of God, I shall do."

- Edward Everett Hale

I am only one.  But with you, we are two.  We can’t do everything, but we can do something.  We ought to.  And by God’s grace we shall.