Thankful Post Procedure

Greetings from Michigan.  After many diagnoses and treatments, Vivian's pain has lessened, but she continues to have abdominal pain.  Today Vivian successfully completed an operating room procedure.  Above is a picture of her post-procedure.  We need to wait awhile for the results.  We pray that they will further clarify her continuing abdominal pain.   Zachary continues to juggle responsibilities of fathering three of our children, helping with a visiting team, supervising an intern and a new missionary family in addition to his regular responsibilities as a Church and Leadership Developer.  We pray for clarity so that all medical issues will be correctly identified and treated so that Vivian will be pain-free and we can be reunited as a family soon.  Thanks for all your prayers.

Zach Balancing in Haiti While Vivian Seeks Continued Medical Care

This picture is of our intern Cara DeHaan and three of our four kids (picture taken by Zach and re-posted from Cara's Facebook page).

Dear all, Greetings from the USA and Haiti.  Vivian continues to seek medical care in Michigan.  She is now clear of infections, but continues to have abdominal pain and will have a sedated procedure on January 26.  Please keep her in your prayers—prayers of thanks that the infections have cleared but continued concern for the persistent pain she still has and her upcoming procedure. 

Zach continues to balance many roles in Haiti as he supervises seminary intern Cara DeHaan, will receive a new missionary family (the Zuiderveens) next week, receives a team from Goshen beginning on Saturday and fathers three children in addition to doing his regular work.  He is overseeing a lot and prayers would be appreciated for him as well. 

We really need Vivian to get better because she is tired of not feeling well and because Zach needs to defend his PhD thesis in February so I, Sharon, need to be back to manage everything and everyone while he does this.  Blessings to you all!

An Exclamation Point for Jean Rabel

When we arrived in Jean Rabel in January, we were greeted by green since rains had been falling for several weeks.  This is a huge blessing for the Jean Rabel area which has been parched from a multi-year drought.

Zach and Gary Schipper congratulate one of thirteen graduates from the Timothy Leadership Institute training in the Jean Rabel area.

The group of visitors who participated in the graduation ceremony.  From left to right: Dextra Wegens (Director of Ministry for Christian Development, the implementing partner for TLT in Haiti), Cara DeHaan (Calvin Seminary Intern serving in Haiti in January), Zach, Fevrier Cherubin (Program Assistant for CRWM-Haiti), and Gary Schipper (who coordinates much of TLT International's work in Latin America)

It would be a huge understatement to say that people in Haiti enjoy graduations.  Haitians savor dressing up, organizing special music, monologues, and drawn-out thank-you speeches.  In nearly five years of training in Jean-Rabel, our Port-au-Prince-based training team never had the opportunity to organize a graduation.  Gary Schipper, a key player in the coordination of TLT in Latin America, is an expert in putting together inspiring graduation ceremonies.  When Gary and several others decided to organize a graduation in January, 2017, they invited Zach and other members of the Port-au-Prince team to participate.  Despite the punishing drive to Jean-Rabel, Zach, Dextra, and Calvin Seminary Intern Cara DeHaan, arrived fresh and ready to participate in an authentic Haitian graduation ceremony.  It was exciting to see the pride and passion of the graduates during the ceremony which was surprisingly short.  Zach even got the opportunity to wash the feet of the graduates as well as issuing his own inspirational monologue and thank-you speech for the edification of the graduates. Please pray that this experience will motivate the graduates to plant TLT throughout the Northwest Department.  Training like TLT is so effective in an area like Jean-Rabel where so few opportunities exist because of distance and isolation.

Family Divided in Different Countries

Greetings from beautiful snow-covered Michigan at the start of 2017!  Vivian and I, Sharon, flew into Michigan due to persistent abdominal pains that Vivian has been having for many weeks in order to seek medical treatment.  We have left the Caribbean temperatures and are blasted by cold temperatures which are supposed to plummet to 7 degrees Fahrenheit later this week.  Vivian is shown above as she was dressed as Queen Victoria for school a few weeks ago.  Zach remains in balmy Haiti with our other three kids and has just received a Calvin Theological Seminary intern, Cara DeHaan, who will be with us in Haiti for several weeks during the month of January.  Later on this month we are looking forward to receiving a new missionary family who are our coworkers, Cody and Jessica Zuiderveen along with their son Hudson.  Please pray that Vivian’s abdominal pain is resolved and that Zachary can balance the many needs of work with parenting.  God’s blessings on everyone at the start of this New Year!    

Haiti Election Update

We have been so busy the last several weeks that we have forgotten to update our support network on the ever-evolving socio-political crisis in Haiti.  By God's grace, the elections on 20 November were calm and peaceful, though there was a low voter turnout.  The candidate of ex-President Martelly's party, Tet Kale, won over 50% of the vote.  This candidate, named Jovenel Moise, is a plantain farmer from the northwest of the country.  By winning over 50% of the vote, Moise can become President without a second, run-off election.  As you can imagine, several other candidates are rejecting the result and have lodged "contestations" with the election authorities.  The final election results after the "contestation process" are to be publicized 29 December.  Port-au-Prince has seen an increase in demonstrations as political operatives attempt to destabilize the country and invalidate the election.  We are praying that somehow all those involved in politics will give up the violent attempts to pursue their own gain and seek the good of the country through peace.

Christmas Opportunity

The ministry of Christian Reformed World Missions (CRWM) requires “boots on the ground” in the form of missionary families like us.  In addition to training and teaching Haitian leaders which is the core and most exciting part of our ministry, we must do some other necessary jobs.  For example, we supervise the Haitian staff engaged in our ministry, manage projects like church construction, oversee ministry initiatives like IMPACT Clubs (for youth) and Timothy Leadership Training, and we receive volunteers and teams that come to Haiti to serve and grow.  In order to remain in Haiti, we must trust you, our support network, to provide $117,160 USD annually.  Much of these funds come in December.  Please consider giving a financial gift to CRWM in the final weeks of this calendar year.  By doing so, you will make it possible for the work of missions to continue in Haiti.  Thanks!

If you would like to contribute to our ministry in Haiti, please click on the following link:

Support the Segaar-Kings

The Church on the Rock Stood Firm

At the end of his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells a parable about a wise and a foolish man.  The wise man who builds on the rock is like one who hears God’s word and obeys it.  Such a person stands firm in the storms of life. The Vila-de-Wòz church provides a vivid object lesson of Jesus’ parable.  Surrounded by the wreckage of homes and toppled trees, the church stands completely intact, seemingly untouched by the ravages of Hurricane Matthew. In fact, the entire community took shelter in the church building as the full force of Matthew’s winds arrived in the early morning of October 4.  Why did the church building survive?  Obviously, it is a miracle as the building was surrounded by huge breadfruit trees which fell away from the structure instead of on top of it.  In addition to God’s deliverance, the church, which was designed by SON-BEAM International, used a truss system that was much stronger than what is typically used in Haiti.  Large threaded rods securely held the trusses to the bond-beam.  We give thanks to God that this building now provides a space for worship and shelter for its community.