“Jesus said the healthy don’t need medical care, but the ill need medical care,” says Miguel Rubén Guante, Climbing For Christ’s missionary to Haiti. “All of Haiti needs help, but we must choose the emergency to help.”

God sent us to help the people in the mountains in southeastern Haiti, specifically to the village of Gentilhomme and now to some of the neighboring villages in the Chaine de la Selle.

Haiti is said to be a Catholic country. But it is also said that daily life there moves to the rhythm of spirit religion. The beat of the voodoo drum is often synonymous with the heartbeats of those caught in Satan’s wicked lie.

“It is not easy to change the mind of the people,” Miguel says.

Haiti has been a slave to spirit religion since supposedly freeing itself from France through a bloody revolution in 1804. Today, spirit religion still lords over communities with voodoo priests calling on the spirits that will guide their villages.

We call on the Holy Spirit and follow the direction of our Guide, Jesus Christ.

“We can’t see God face to face,” Miguel says, “but if we are doing as Matthew 25:35-45 (tells us), I think we are doing the correct things.”

The passage of Scripture that Miguel is referring to speaks about us serving “the least of these.” Jesus told His followers: “For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me.”

This is what we do.

God has sent us to help the people of Haiti’s mountains with physical needs. From providing food to the hungry to assisting farmers with crops, as we are doing with our Food Bank and Seedling Bank projects. From teaching about sanitation in a place where there are no toilets to developing a water system that will provide easier access to water to drink and for irrigation. From teaching children in a place that never before had a school to teaching pastors and church leaders that there is One True God, and voodoo is the work of Satan.

People carrying charcoal to sell, top, and the remains of the church at Soliette after Tropical Storm Hanna, above. (Photos by Miguel Guante)

Mission: Haiti is ongoing. It is 24/7. The budget for the work He has given us in Haiti will be in excess of $50,000 for 2008 by time this year is done. Climbing For Christ needs prayer and financial support.

In December, another short-term mission team will go to Gentilhomme and Malasi for two weeks to share the love of Christ with the people living there. We are going to take a doctor, but, more importantly, we are going to bring them the Great Physician.

“The glory of God is when we are doing His will,” Miguel says. “Is not that we don’t want to help the people who are living in the cities. No! Only we choose who are the needy” that God has sent us to help in the mountains.

We believe that revival in Haiti will begin in those mountains. The people living there will turn from spirit religion and worship Jesus Christ – and Jesus alone. This is the only way Haiti can be saved from its misery and despair, from its poverty and violence.

In December, Gary Fallesen will be returning to Haiti for the fifth time since God first took Climbing For Christ there in June 2005. This story originally appeared in The Climbing Way (Volume 11, Autumn 2008)

Posted Nov. 22, 2008

The Word

“Healthy people don’t need a doctor – sick people do.”
– Jesus in Matthew 9:12, Mark 2:17, and Luke 5:31

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