Celebrate Church – Sabbath

The Sabbath is a day of rest. It is a time to slow down and assess the important things in life. The mission team from Celebrate Church in Knoxville, Iowa spent the day resting their bodies and renewing their minds with their Haitian brothers and sisters. Keep reading as the group shares of the peace of the Sabbath.  To read yesterday’s blog, click here. Salutations from Haiti, Today our group took full advantage of the sabbath. We started our morning with devotionals and Craig and Christi’s famous Haitian French Toast. We then went to a Haitian church service. This was an interesting experience to say the least. We were able to observe the way the Haitians worship and praise God while giving thanks for what they have. Our group was amazed to see how dressed up the Haitians got for Church, they truly do wear their Sunday best. The service was a lot different than what we were used to back in the states. The language barrier was only the first challenge. The cute kids everywhere offered a distraction for the two hour long outdoor service. 

After church we traveled into Pignon for an authentic meal. After going to the market yesterday some of us were hesitant to try the chicken. However, everything was delicious and we especially enjoyed the fried plantains. We had plenty of left over food and were able to share it with several friends of Many Hands.  We then went back to the campus and spent several hours growing closer to God however we felt fit. This looked different for every person, whether it was prayer, reading the Bible, listening to music, or taking to each other, we all grew from this experience. We finished up this time with our evening devotional.  The rest of our afternoon was spent cleaning the campus and preparing dinner. We were also able to welcome a team from Connecticut as they had several days of difficult travel. This was an answered prayer for many people. Once we cleaned up dinner, the local kids showed up ready to play soccer. We were able to bond with the other groups and spend some time playing games. Overall it was a very relaxing day and helped us reenergize for the rest of the week. Below we have added a short summary of our devotionals from the day and a list of prayer requests for our group.  Our morning devotional was: Psalms 100:1-5 The focus of our conversation was giving thanks. Not only on this trip but even for everything we have back home.  Our evening devotional was: Psalms 67 The focus of this devotional was prayer and knowing that God will and has answered our prayers.  Things to pray for:

• *Than the people in Port-au-Prince would be able to find peace and give thanks.
• *Strength for the rest of the trip
• *To be able to build relationships within the community
• *That our love would be contagious to the Haitian culture and that they would be able to pay it forward.