Alumnus and Kingdom Growth

An EBS alumnus recently visited me (Matt) just to catch up. Excellent Paul was one of my favorite students. 

He was a non-traditional student that went from being homeless, to completing his secondary education at an older age, to then enroll at EBS. His heart looks like Jesus and is a "Flag-Ship" student for EBS. 

"It was amazing, Matt, we saw 176 people come to Jesus!," he reported.

"That's wonderful! How did it all come about?"

"Well, a member of our church said they had a vision to go to Cayes and reach people for Jesus. We decide to pray about it and sensed the Spirit's confirmation to go, so we went and stayed an entire month simply to preach the gospel and disciple believers in partnership with another church in the area."

"I'm so glad, brother. Thank you for your service to Jesus!...what can EBS do to help the cause? Are you facing any obstacles that may cause a decrease in momentum?"

"We desperately need discipleship materials to follow-up with converts. They need to know how to truly follow Jesus and become full-blown, faithful disciples," he replied.

At that point I told him about EBS' Reaching the Heart of Haiti program is designed specifically for making disciples in Haiti and can be used even by those who cannot read or write. He was thrilled. He's having a follow-up meeting at the end of this week with EBS Staff to get training in how to use the materials along with a supply to get things moving among these new converts.

Pray for Excellent and these 176 new believers. Jesus is constant drawing people to himself. It is an honor to be a part of it!

not finished Fev

There are more stories coming out of Fev than I can keep up with.

You might remember Fev from last year.  In an effort to take the Gospel places it has never been in Northern Haiti, Junior and a group of first year students came across Fev following their missiology class.  Full of temples (five, to be exact) dedicated to darkness and completely void of His church, they started to share the Gospel in homes and yards throughout Fev and found that many...most...had never heard the name of Jesus.  NONE knew Him.  Raising funds on their own for transportation, the Missions Class started going 2 and 3 times a week, storytelling the Bible and seeing men, women and children coming to Christ--and HUNGRY for more.

A year later and after much prayer and seeking, Walnique (graduate of 2015) was chosen (and felt called) to lead the discipleship effort, and a regular set of students join him in teaching, Bible study, pastoral care, etc.  New believers and interested community members meet throughout the week with students, and now on Sunday mornings as well they meet in plastic chairs, on tree roots and homemade benches, with students leading worship, taking turns with Walnique preaching, etc.

To stay away from all the negative ideas that terms and buildings and tradition and pastors tend to bring to "church" in Haiti, Fev is just an ever-growing group of new Christ-followers, wanting to know Him more, being discipled and served by a community of EBS Christ-followers.  There's no dress code, there's no money, there's no building, there's no pastor, there are no membership cards.

You can now imagine why there are more stories than I can keep up with.

The hardest part of Fev, for me, is that I have never been there.

And you know me.  I want to BE there.  I want to tell the stories as I see them...want to hear the testimonies from the back row (if there was one) for myself...want to share with you MY experience. Want to pick up on all the little things that no one thinks to tell you.

And I think I'll get my chance.  But for now, even more than I want to be there, I want to not mess anything up.  And when foreigners step in, even quietly, even in the background...things often get weird.  When a person of power (which I can't help but be seen as as a foreigner) appears, priorities have been known to quickly change.

Suddenly, the witch doctor who is miraculously offering to GIVE Junior and the students a small piece of land to meet on would strangely decide he wants a thousand dollars for it.  Suddenly, the people who are asking for more of Jesus start wondering if they need more of something else, too.  No matter what we wear, no matter how we arrive, no matter what I say or don't say, I've seen just the knowledge that there is a foreigner in the background change the foreground.

And the purity with which He is being given, and received, and pursued at Fev continues to make me pause and wait and stay back.  I do not want to mess anything up, as terribly as I want to BE there.

So here is today's story, from one who only hears, with pictures, from one who did not take them...trusting that when the time is right, I'll share for myself!

When June and a group of first year students first started going to Fev, they couldn't help but be heavily aware of how strongly voodoo was practiced in the village.  Five different temples seemed to define Fev, leading people in how to live, what to do with sickness, how to deal with revenge, what to believe about nature, how to appeal to different spirits and demons.  One such witchdoctor has a wife and two daughters, and Junior noted immediately that the daughters seemed soft to what he was sharing.

After returning to share the Gospel with Fev dozens of times, first one sister, and then the other came to follow Jesus.  Of course, following Jesus also means NOT following whatever you were following before, which for Dieula (meaning God is Here), was stopping customs that had been a part of her life since always.

One of these customs is called manje naissance, which is the practice of offering to the demons sacrifices in exchange for favor, especially on your birthday or at the start of the new year or before a major event.  Every year as the girls started a new school year, their mother would send them to feed the lwa, the spirits, hoping for a good year.

However, this year at the start of September when mother brought Dieula food and gifts to give over to darkness in hopes of a successful year at school, she refused.  Dieula claimed that Jesus would care for her this year, infuriating her mother.   Her little sister did the same, upsetting both parents.

Finally, her mother gave up trying to force them...and refused to pay for their school this year, noting that they could sit at home and think about this newfound foolishness in their lives.  "Let your God send you to school then."

Two weeks after school started, Junior found Dieula looking glum and home in the middle of the day, and as he pressed, she shared her story with him, noting that even if she never was able to go to school again, she was not going back to the old ways.  She would not be giving one more thing to Satan, no matter what.

Junior prayed with her and encouraged her to continue to trust in the Living God. After Bible study he came home and shared with a bunch of the students her story.

This isn't about our students, but I cannot overemphasize the financial poverty of the large majority of our student body.  It is by the help of many, extremely low tuition, lots of scholarships and a whole lot of His Provision that most of our students are able to be here....95% working in the work study program because the $100/semester room and board is too far out of reach...scraping together what they owe through payment plans and a lot of support from their churches and communities.

And yet these same students (without asking for a penny from EBS or from us) are now sending both Dieula and her sister to school.  Entirely.

"God will provide" Dieula had told her mother confidently of her new God when her parents had withdrawn their support.

And He has, powerfully.

I love dreaming about the the ways Fev is seeing the works of a Hand they never knew before.  I love imagining the confusion and surprise Diuela's parents are currently living in...trying to understand how a Living God through His children is somehow sending her daughters to school.  Without demanding sacrifices.  With nothing in exchange.  I love thinking about the girls loading up their bags each morning, seeing that the God they are learning to trust is worthy.  Is able.  I love seeing our students give, give.  I love His grace to use them to do His work, to be His body.

And I love knowing that He is not finished.

a day in the life

I walked around campus on my way to work today and took a few shots of the day...wish you were here!

Our super-awesome new van has been super-awesome.  Blan and Phil tag-teamed the ladder/front grill/luggage rack/bumper project, and now we feel less nervous about driving it around, and the luggage rack is going to be a huge blessing for those many times we've had 15+passengers, AND luggage!

Somehow, Phil is also working on 25 other things, like the continued transformation of this old tool shed into badly needed office space.  Last week they poured the front steps and walk, this week it's been painted and the roof-thingies are being...finished.  I don't now.  All I know is it's looking GREAT, and everyone is starting to hope that their office will be in here!

I popped in on two classes this morning, and both of them were right in the middle of laughing.  All I can conclude from this that taking classes at EBS must be really fun!  They also must be a lot of work, because everyone's chalkboards and notebooks were busy!

Pastor Lucner Pierre is our academic dean...

...and Prof. Guenson Charlot with third year was having just as much fun studying the person and work of the Holy Spirit!

You can tell from the grass how badly we need rain in those blue skies...hurricane after hurricane seems to amp up in reputation and then miss us all together.  NOT that we want a hurricane, mind you...but a little rain would go a long way!

Phil and the work-study program students still have all the flowers and plants looking lush and green!

If steaming hot corn gruel is your thing, today is your day!  Feeding 100+ people each day is no joke!  I love watching the ladies cook.  It's one thing to cook like I do, with a mixer and an oven and a thermometer and a timer and a spoon.  It's entirely different using a paddle, fanning charcoal, adjusting stones...very impressive.  And incredibly hot.

Inside, MaCodo's working on the beef/veggie sauce and the rice and beans.

Pour it all on top and you have an awesome, 200 degree lunch to cool you down and fill you up!

This is Fanfan, and this weekend, he is heading to Port-au-Prince to GRADUATE with his master's degree from Indiana Wesleyan's distance learning program.  We are all just incredibly proud of him...it's been a lot of work, meant a lot of time away from his wife and precious new baby girl, but he has been dedicated and now he is finished!  So thankful to have him in our community and thankful for the Lord's continued work in Fanfan's life!

(I did not take this picture this morning...but she is just too cute not to share!)

Which brought me back to my office...where piles of grading (though FAR less than there could be due to massive Rosa and Haylie help!) await...

accredidation

It has been a joy to have Dr. Joyce on campus this week, coming alongside Emmaus by helping us through the accreditation process!

 Joyce also proved that working through this long process (after three years of work, we are within a year of finalizing) doesn't have to be painful!

Meanwhile, Phil and his team spent the week working hard on turning the old tool shed into the student life office building!

Despite a continual lack of rain, the campus is beautiful as ever, from the chapel

to the cafeteria

to the Women's Dorm.

So thankful for a beautiful campus as the first week of residential courses get under way!

Living among us...

After two excellent weeks with three excellent men, Charles Lake, David Dick and Leroy Lindsey are off again.  Our entire Emmaus staff put together has an average age of about 30, so to have some godly men living among us with far more life and ministry experience was a gift to all of us.

We are very thankful to have had all four of these men in the classroom and living life alongside of our still-growing student body these past two weeks!

Dr. David's class also spent Friday afternoon at the mosque in Cap-Haitian.  The students were well-prepared and had a great time meeting with leaders there, asking questions and learning more about Islam, especially in Haiti.  What an awesome opportunity! 

together

Emmaus is very thankful for the few days we had with Growth Ministries' discipleship trainers from Port-au-Prince! Lots of time was spent building new relationships in the classroom, in chapel and even at the Citadel, talking about how the Gospel can be given simply and powerfully, forming disciples throughout Haiti, together.

the challenge

On Friday, one visiting professor for our Islam class, who happens to be the vice president at large of OMS, David Dick, spoke in chapel about why we should reach out to Muslims and unreached people.

It was a great message and had everyone truly excited about the job we have as Christ-followers in Haiti to be praying for unreached people and to be REACHING unreached people.

As EBS president Matt Ayars followed with afterwards, Cap-Haitian doesn't NEED another church.  Port-au-Prince doesn't NEED another church.  The cities need utterly transformed Christ-followers living boldly for Jesus.  But we all know there continue to be countless numbers of Haitians living in the mountains throughout Haiti who know NOTHING about our Jesus (Junior was falling out of his pew at this point amen-ing). 

It was exciting, sitting in the last row, to be a part of the equipping of almost 100 men and women who are ready and willing and going OUT...going THERE...doing THAT.  

You may not have been in the last row, dripping in sweat and listening to this powerful challenge, but as you pray, as you support a student or help us or give to the Seminary, you're a part of the equipping, too.  Grateful.

We must keep praying that the Gospel might reach the many around the world who continue to know nothing about our sweet Savior!

Intensives II

Monday kicked of Emmaus Biblical Seminary's second set of intensive courses for the fall semester.  

EBS IT man Junior is teaching Missiology to first year.  We love that he teaches this course and love hearing all the feedback.  His take on God's mission for each of us is just powerful.  

The heat in that packed out room is also powerful.  Two students had to move so that I could get in the door to take this picture...we are busting at the seams!

Dr. Leroy Lindsay is here for the seventh time, teaching the Holiness class to our third year students!

David Dick is here for the second time, teaching our Islam course to fourth year students.  They'll also be visiting the mosque in Cap-Haitian next week with David.

Charles Lake is here to teach Principles of Evangelism to our eager second year students.

So thankful for these fantastic professors and the all of the experience, expertise and Spirit that they bring.  Just eating dinner together in the evenings makes us excited for the opportunity our students have to learn alongside of these men, who are just as excited to be learning alongside of the students.